What constitutes a "high output" moving coil cart?

Dear Rbloom659: As already Nsgarch/Frogman posted the HOMC unfortunatelly IMHO is the " worst " alternative against either LOMC one or the MM/MI alternative.

The Clearaudio Virtuoso Wood is a very good option and seems to me that in your system you will enjoy it a lot over what you have today or what any HOMC could shows you. The Hifiharv advise is a good one too.

Regards and enjoy the music,
R.

It is important to find out where your phone stage starts getting noisy. If the cartridges output is too low, any benefits of the HOMC will just be lost. Everyone will react different. Every person has their own taste also.

In the '70s or '80s, they had a 4 channel LP system called CD4. Those cartridge had a higher limit to their frequency response. They came out with a new stylus shape around that time also. I remember giving it a try, and it was the worst investment for myself. I bought the Audio Technica CD4 compatible, the Empire 4000 series, and possibly another brand, to run this new 4 channel LP. Everything ended up being a waste for me. I even tried these in my other turntables, friends tried them, and they didn't want them either. They may be in the closet yet, as it couldn't be all the different turntable, arm, phono stage combination's mismatch. Others thought these cartridges were great.

So making sure the cartridge gets along with the arm, and preamp is important. The way it sounds is just someone else's opinion. I use all three of these types. They all could sound great, or poor.

I third what Nsgarch wrote regarding HOMCs vs the best of the MM and MI variety.

There are some HOMC cartridges that put out more than I imagined. I guess the are some cartridges that will output around 1mV that I've heard that sound good. Those may not work with a lot of MM phono preamps. Some of those would fit in the med-high output category. If your still using the Goldring 2200, that looks like it puts out 6.5mV. That's 6 times more than what I had in mind.

The biggest compromise of the group would be to use a to low of an output cartridge for your phono amp IMO. The Audible Illusion link is just to see how much they (cartridges) do vary, only. Some links to look at.[http://www.musicdirect.com/p-3733-goldring-2200-mm-cartridge.aspx][http://www.kabusa.com/pregain.htm] [http://www.audibleillusions.com/technical/bulletin2.htm]

The KAB link is what Swampwalker was referring to, I think.