Ortofon MC A90 Cartridge VTF

Sure, I have been a bit busy and meant to post a little sooner.

The thought by the Chief Engineer at Ortofon was that it could probably be explained by stylus rake angle.

He did note that the VTF will vary slightly between arms, even when it’s the same cartridge, but he also remarked that the difference should not be one of extreme magnitude.

He agreed with the notion that SRA has a profound effect on the performance of the cartridge, as the Replicant diamond’s size and shape requires careful stylus rake adjustment to get the sharp edges perfectly within the groove. If the VTA is only set approximately (say within 5mm), then the VTF is going to seriously change the stylus rake angle.

He also said that you should shoot for 2.0g as a minimum, as anything less could compromise the tracking ability.

Ultimately Louis of Ortofon USA agreed “follow your ears”.

Personally I followed my ears and found the settings we used to be the best. Of course we took into account VTA and Steve Dobbins worked very diligently setting up each source.

Even at the 1.56 setting on the Garrard, the cartridge tracked great!

Dear Jtinn: Certainly the Ortofon people at Ortofon ( Denmark. ) has the same advise and they does not talk about " follow your ears ". Next is the answer direct from other Ortofon Chief:

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Hi Raul

There are some things that might go wrong when you are using such a low VTF.
I certainly won’t recommend that!

Most critical is that you will probably damage your records do to mistracking.
Remember that the Replicant 100 has a very narrow (“sharp”) edge!

Secondly (and third) you might have wrong VTA and SRA.
So the coils will be in non-ideal position and misaligned rake angle will cause distortion and record wear.

Ortofon cartridge are designed to have correct VTA and SRA when used with correct (i.e. recommended) VTF in a tonearm parallel to the record surface.
The range of VTF that is indicated in the data-sheet gives you the limits for adjustment.

Hope these comments helps you

Best regards

Leif Johannsen
Chief of acoustics and technology
Ortofon A/S

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I posted about " minute/tiny " mistracking even if we can't detect and about coild position, both subjects IMHO are critical for the cartridge performance.

Of course that we audiophiles normaly follows our ears and like Mike each one of us made/make what give us better musical pleasure.

Thank you Mike to share your A-90 experiences.

Regards and enjoy the music,
Raul.

after reading the responses to jtinn and Raul from Ortofon, and then listening over many hours to my A90 tracking very happily at 1.56 grams, one is tempted to conclude that maybe the Reed 2P arm has advantages over the Ortofon arms used to form the factory perspectives.

please note that i am only 'tempted' to conclude and have not actually concluded that.

i do not presume to understand cartridge construction to the degree to question the manufacturer's perspective, i'm only listening and observing. i can say there is no audible evidence that any miss-tracking is occuring. another way to put it would be that any cartridge would be 'proud' to sound like this while miss-tracking.

Dear Mike: As you know several times in audio is really difficult to meet/match exactly the " technical " factors with what we heard/hear.

Obviously that your cartridge/tonearm combination function in that precise way and to function/perform in that way it needs that lower VTF.
I want to think ( by my experiences. ) that other cartridge/tonearm combination can perform in a similar way but with different VTF.

The behavior in a tonearm/cartridge and its performance is something that we know works and have to works in matced couple but we really don't know yet all the why's and how's on that critical relationship.

Regards and enjoy the music,
Raul.

Dear Mike: +++++ " one is tempted to conclude that
maybe the Reed 2P arm has advantages over the Ortofon arms
used to form the factory perspectives ... " +++++

yes, you/we can speculate about. Seems to me that Ortofon
like any other cartridge designers/builders have to make the
cartridge voicing using different tonearms because that
cartridge will work out there with different tonearms and
has to perform in good " shape " with almost all.
Well this is what I assume about but I can say it for sure.

Now, I have a little different perspective than you in that
subject:

if I assume that either the cartridge and the tonearm are
right on manufacturer specs, that is that there is no single
build/operation quality problem then that tonearm does not
match the cartridge needs.
Why is that?, IMHO if for an audio item perform at its
" best " I need to make an out of manufacturer
specs set up then something is happen that could not be
good.

In this specific case at least, according with the
manufacturer, the cartridge coils are not " centered
" ( non-ideal position. ) at that lower than specs VTF
and this is critical ( it generate different kind of
distortions. ) and one of the main targets of the designers
when they give/made its set up specs.

Mike, that you like/enjoy the better in that set up is not
the subject and I'm not questioning that in anyway, I'm
refering what IMHO is the non-ideal tonearm for that A-90 in
that TT in that audio system.

It is not easy to find out what is happening and where is
happening but something is happening in favor of your ears,
why?????

Regards and enjoy the music,
raul.