the perfect tonearm

Dear Atmasphere, very interesting. Would you please enlighten us all why the Graham is "incompatible with the Grado cartridge line" ?
I very much look forward to learn the technical background for this incompatibility.......
BTW - you should clarify that you - according to your own statements - have never actually listened to the Phantom and that you have friendship relationship with the distributor of Triplanar.
Cheers,
D.

To Mikeyc8, you may have problems finding what you are looking for such a price in a new arm.

I concur with Dertonarm's recommendation for the Graham 2.2, which is easy to setup and sounds decent. The Triplanars also sound decent, and if you can find either one second-hand and in good condition, I'd go for it.

In a somewhat different direction, you could consider vintage heavyweight arms like the FR-64fx or an IT-245, both of which can sound quite good and don't need to cost a lot of money. Like this:

http://page18.auctions.yahoo.co.jp/jp/auction/w37585355

FWIW, the Triplanar and other tonearms that have drop-down headshell sides may have problems with wide-bodied cartridges like the Allearts Formula One. When I was using this particular pair, I had to machine a thick spacer to get the cartridge body to clear the headshell sides. hth

FYI - the Ikeda IT-245 was sold (in limited quantities however...) in the USA in the late 1980ies and very early 1990ies as the Rowland Research Complement tonearm (together with the Ikeda EMPL named as "Rowland Research Complement" too). As it is sometimes very difficult for most audiophiles outside Nippon to get any component from a seller listing on Japanese Yahoo it might be a suitable alternative to have a look on the home 2nd hand market for the OEM -Rowland version.
The effective moving mass of the IT-245 is however considerable higher than the Graham 2.2 or Phantom.

Again - I won't stress this point too far, but it is a VERY important aspect worth mentioning again - keep in mind the very easy alignment of the Graham which allows even the inexperienced user to obtain very precise adjustment in a minute and thus excellent results much harder to achieve with other designs.

Cheers,
D.

JCarr, You wrote, "the Triplanar and other tonearms that have drop-down headshell sides may have problems with wide-bodied cartridges like the Allearts Formula One." What model of Triplanar have you used that has such a headshell? I have owned mine for more than 15 years, and, altho it is not sitting in front of me at the moment, I could swear that the under-surface of the headshell is a flat plane with no "sides" to it. Moreover, to my knowledge there has been no change to the headshell design in the entire long history of the product. Your warning would still apply to tonearms that DO sport such headshells, to be sure. Anyway, the Allaerts cartridges are unusually wide-bodied.

Jcarr, yes the FR 64fx does sound and look interesting. I haven't decided on a cart yet, but I'm interested in the Soundsmith Aida which is low compliance. Would it work well with low compliance carts? Is the IT245 comparable to the 64fx in terms of quality and price?

The Micro 505 is also interesting, as it has VTA on the fly I believe.

To clarify, I would buy it used, I realize that $2K for a new tonearm offers very limited choices.