Are linear tracking arms better than pivoted arms?

Yes, Darkmoebius, Scheu with Conductor and Acoustic Solid with Ortofon but not vice versa. That was not supposed to be an official comparison for both arm designs(not solely for that purpose). However, that's the closest comparison we could have at that time. We also had time and other limitations, too. Fortunately, both turntables are high mass, rigid designs(Note: Acoustic Solid's 35kg platter had been covered with a 5-mm acrylic layer and a thin leather) with separate motors, string-driven, on identical Solid Steel racks, and all other rigs were basically the same, except the phono cable.

I have to stress that both TT setups were performing so well that no one of them could capture all our hearts at the same time. That is to say, when we play solo violin, Scheu combo prevails. When we played piano or vocals, both perform very well but in a rather different way. When we play pipe organ in the church, AA combo outperforms Scheu. But no one could predominantly outperform the other with all types of music we had thrown in.

Unfortunately, Scheu were only with 2 arm plates one mounted with Conductor and the other with Scheu's own unipivot. Both plates weren't made for an Ortofon. (Off the topis, we sometimes found a two-armed TT sonically less ideal...maybe due to the resonance of the idle one feedback on the TT.) At that time, we had removed Scheu's arm(for unipivot it was very easy) when playing with the Conductor II.

We had a Conductor mounted on Transrotor ZET 3 with Dyna Te Kaitora II later...the results were not as satisfactory as(thin sounding, no bass authority, etc) on Scheu with PC-1. Maybe it was due to wrong matching of arm/cart/other rigs' synergy. I wish I could have made more arms switching if I know you may ask me this question, Darkmoebius;)

Best regards
Dan

I see alot of discussion here about the theoretical downside of linear arms relative to forces on the stylus/cantilever, but not much real-world testing.

OTOH I have an article from High Performance Review circa 1986, where they used a special test device, the Orsonic Side Force Checker SG-1, to measure stylus deflection of the device mounted to an ET-2 arm compared to the device mounted to a pivoted arm (can't remember which arm right now, I'll have to go check). The pivoted arm showed much greater side-to-side deflection of the stylus during play as compared to the ET-2, the conclusion being that the pivoted arm was causing greater wear of the stylus and cartridge suspension. Unfortunately they haven't made the Orsonic for a while, as it would be interesting to make the same test with more modern pivoted tonearms.

I would agree (and the second link below seems to come to the same conclusion) that mechanical linear trackers (whether passive or active) do put excessive side force on the stylus, in a way that would lead to poor performance and quicker wear of the cartridge.

http://db.audioasylum.com/cgi/m.mpl?forum=vinyl&n=155855

http://www.diyaudio.com/forums/analogue-source/34126-opus-3-cantus-parallel-tracking-arm.html#post395258

The idea that a pivoted arm of correct effective mass is going to induce greater side-to-side excursion than an air-bearing straight-tracking arm strains credulity.

Re:Thegage
"I would agree (and the second link below seems to come to the same conclusion) that mechanical linear trackers (whether passive or active) do put excessive side force on the stylus, in a way that would lead to poor performance and quicker wear of the cartridge."

I have read every post so far, and I appreciate (accept) the theory that state of the art pivoted arms are currently better, but where is the evidence that this "poor performance and quicker wear of the cartridge" actually happens. I am beginning to suspect that the argument concerning the "best", is beginning to become the argument that the "other" in any form is unacceptably flawed. I protest.

This has been a most interesting thread. I started this thread off by saying that I thought linear tracking arms sounded better than pivoted arms that I had been used to. I still think my humble ET-2 sounds outstanding. However, in the interest of further education, I am going to switch back to a pivoted arm and see how it fares. I am conviced after reading all the posts that it is worth another try. The only dog I have in this fight is that I want the best sounding arm that I can afford. If the Fidelity Research FR64s sounds better than my ET-2, I will be one happy camper. I hope it does and from everything I have read, it should.

For the here and now, I have torn my table down (VPI TNT) in anticipation of the FR64s arriving. I have removed my Benz Glider and have it safely installed back in its box. The ET-2 arm and mounting board have been removed. I took my TNT bearing to my local machinist for a check up. He didn't like the fact that the tolerance between the platter shaft and the bearing bushing was .004". He pressed out the original bushing and machined a new bushing and line bored it so it now has a tolerance of .001". My bearing should now be better than new. I am waiting for the new blank armboard to arrive from VPI as well as the FR64s arm and Orsonics headshell. This should be interesting.

FWIW, I have referred to my TNT as a MKIII but I know now that is not true after studying some pictures of the TNT evolution. I believe it is an original TNT that had new corner feet installed like the TNT III. I had previously removed the two extra pulleys from the T-bar and snapped in covers from VPI to cover the two holes that were drilled in the plinth. I have replaced the motor with the 300 RPM version and I have a new SDS that I bought to replace the PLC.