What's the best unipivot to arm ever made?

i like to use the term 'prefer' or favorite as opposed to best.

i have not heard all Unipivots, but i've owned a fair number of tonearms and listened to most arms out there. my favorite is the Durand 12" Telos. which is also my favorite tonearm of any type.

i use 15ips 1/4 inch master tape dubs as my reference and the Telos is as good as those in my system. it's simply more precise and without distortion than other arms i've tried. the whole reproduction chain falls away and you just have music.

it's not cheap and there is a long line to get one but it's my preference.

Dear Mike, Thanks for the URL. It is striking to me the degree to which the Telos is a "throwback" design. I note that it uses a string and weight for anti-skate and that the counter-weight is pretty far back from the pivot point, so it does not minimize effective mass. Further, the center of mass of the counter-wt is not below the pivot point so as to be in the same plane as the LP. I take this as a vindication of the design of certain vintage tonearms (the Grace wood unipivot comes to mind), not as a criticism per se of the Telos, because I am certain that it must sound great, based on what I heard from the Talea.

Have you ever auditioned the Pete Riggle wood tonearm? He is out there in your area is why I asked.

Grace 704/714. While not wildly popular in their day, they perform admirably with modern cartridges, both MM and MC and were well ahead of their time.

hi Lew,

i've not heard Pete Riggle's arm; but it has been recommended to me. i understand Pete lives east of the mountains here in Washington State.

i think that the Telos has something in common with other minimalist-out-of-box thinking tonearm designs. at first glance it does look simple, basic, and even maybe a touch crude. on closer inspection it's crude like a cruise missile is crude. the perfect uncompromised tool for a particular job....and nothing more.

in fact; think of the Telos as like a Manhattan Project of tonearms. what if you were able to rethink everything, and then could apply free thinking and an unlimited materials budget to every bit. and some pretty sophisticated computer modeling was used too.

Please correct me if I'm wrong but when I saw Telos I thought that if pivot shaft was looking downwards it could be more adequate as a vibration coupling device. Of course I'm sure that Mr. Durand has already tried this out...so I'm sceptical about the pertinence of my remark.