Why are modern arms so ugly?

Well the Breuer and Brinkmann are not modern arms....but I don't find them particularly elegant.
The Raven pushes no boundaries and is rather pedestrian looking.
I much prefer the looks of the Shroeder arms in terms of their proportions and clarity of purpose.
Of the modern arms, some of the 12" upper Reed models are not so bad.
Happy Nandric? :^)

Speak for yourself.

Dear Halcro, Thuchan is already making my life difficult
with even threefold teasing in a single post. You obviously like to join him. Vidmantas , the designer/owner of the Reed, is a good friend of my but this is not, uh,
a sufficient condition to admire his tonearms in aesthetical sense. To be honest my position is that an tonearm needs to satisfy some other conditions first. As I
stated before I never thought about tonearms in aesthetical
context. But the FR-64S awaked in me this 'wondering' which
I called, by lack of the right vocabulary, 'mechanical beauty'. Now the lack of vocabulary in this whole thread is an obvious indication that the most of us are not 'aestheticaly educated'. No wonder than that we use 'old predicates' or expressions to describe the 'new objects of art'. To me this paradox is obvious. Ie 'old'
and 'new' are (pre) supposed to be different. But you obviously enjoy this 'field' of knowledge because you must feel in this domain like a king. You should however not extend this feeling to the domain of turntables and carts. There are boundaries , you know, even for the architects.

Regards,

I also like the 12" Reed 3Q but I prefer the Centroid's form. Aesthetically it seems more in purpose and less fancy. It can manage to hide some of it's revelations in a seemingly plain design. These days I have the Pluto 9A/Decca REF and SAEC WE-308SX/Condor XCM with the Zonotone Z-SHELL 10 headshell. These two pairs are better integrated in my system than Pluto 9A/Colibri XPP and Reed/Goldfinger in the past. I'm more on the MC side but I can not accept the missing of azimuth adjustability on SAEC. This is a serious issue with vintage arms and one reason that I'm missing the Reed. It's control of azimuth is on a par with Pluto (at the headshell). A really great arm but after living with the Reed I can say it is not my favorite nor in terms of use or at sight, neither on the sound matching with my set-up. I've get over this arm really quick. So far only the Pluto has passed the test of time after 15 years in use. What are you guys doing to overcome the azimuth issue?

Hi Geoch, I thought you decided to grow 'Porporitas' or something and that your new philosophy of life was the modesty of an Greek farmer. But obviously Onasis is still there in your head. Mentioning explict the Pluto 9A, the Goldfinger, the Condor ,the Colibri, etc. Glad to see such consitency qua behaviour as well that at least some Greek are doing well.