Koetsu cartridges - myth or reality?

I recently purchased a Koetsu Black. It is Very nice, a bargain imo. A good place to start if you are curious. It replaced a denon 103R with ease.

I own the Koetsu Coral for two years. Noted its high frequencies extension compared to Urushi, another cartridge from Koetsu which I like and have been using it with Graham 2.2 tonearm. For my case, I found it to be critical for tonearm's effective mass matching with Coral and the fine tuning and adjustment of the settings prove extremely important to derive the best performance out of Coral, espeically to capture its high frequency intensity right. I use it with Triplanar and the ASR basis phonostage setting at 65ohms. It is definitely a fine cartridge with all the fine attributes that Urushi has, and maybe due to its stone body, the micro details is more focus at the upper frequency region as compared to Urushi. As for a wood body, Urushi when paired with 47lab Phonocube gives a very realistic and fine presentation in my system. Overall, lesser micro details as compared to Coral, but prove itself to be organic in the midrange with just sufficient frequency extension in both ends when heard in my system. Really a different taste with these two cartridges though they are from the same company. Top perfomers.

All Koetsus I ever listened to are great when the owner has a super analytical reproduction system and he looks for additional warmth. Here they are great with their dominant, blown midrange and their non existant high frequency area, linked with a weak bass. I like their design and the good pricing, when available 2. hand. They work well in heavy Arms.

Fernando - all the Koetsu's are great. I really love mine and recommend them unreservedly. However Raul brings up a very good point.

Your RB300 cannot, and will not, bring the best out of a Koetsu, not even the Black. If you go for a Koetsu you'll need to upgrade to a much much better arm.

Perhaps your first step should be to keep your current cart and upgrade your arm.

Regards
Paul

Thanks all for your feedback - I forgot mentioning that I already bought an SME IV tonearm - (currently on its way thru FedEX - and that is the reason of looking for a change of cartridge.

I agree with the description of the Dynavector sound - nothing to complain at except of a not so envolving presentation - tonality is great. speed and decay are fine as well, but a little lightweight presentation overall (could be my modified RB300?).

There is a Coral Blue (?) listed here at a reasonable price - but I just can't find any feedback on that particular Koetsu model. Hunting season started!

Fernando
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