New Schroeder linear tonearm, any thoughts?

+1 to Johnnyb53's post.

@Frank - are you ready to retire on regular monthly royalty payments? I know some good IP attorneys. ;-)

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Mosin, thanks for the props but you mis-spelled "discerning". Having just bought a new house, I'm now among the most "dis-earning" audiophiles.

That's a clever (and funny) one, Doug!! I'm also enjoying my Doshi Alaap.

Leicachamp, Ideally, neither the Schroeder nor the Thales have any tracking error, so the answer is "no". However, life is seldom ideal, so the real answer is "who knows?"

Johnny, It seems that the trick of the Schroeder is to look simple enough so that anyone can build it, but if it works as I think it does, its internal workings are as intricate as a Patek Philipe watch and cannot be cheaply mimicked. (Of course, I chose a bad metaphor, because any $25 Swatch can perform as well as any PP watch, when it comes to keeping time. But the babes will treat you better if you are wearing a Patek Philipe.) Anyway, my real point is that it is likely not possible to make a cheap version of the Schroeder, because of the need for highest quality bearings and metallurgy.

Lewm: I wouldn't expect an automated manufacturing version of this arm to come in at $300, but Panasonic/Technics made *millions* of SL12x0 tonearms while maintaining a mere 7.5mg bearing friction. This was based on a 30+ year-old design and implementation. The Shroeder bearings demand half that level of resistance, and I think it could be as easily accomplished today as 7.5mg was in 1981. Japanese industry has a long track record of high precision mass production. I think it could bring the price from $9K down to $1000-1500.

A $30K automobile, if made individually, would cost at least a million dollars. The quantities for a specialty tonearm wouldn't be nearly as high, but if the pivot were manufactured under tight control and licensed to many tonearm implementers, I think they could reach significant economy of scale, especially if it became the new pivot standard for Pro-Ject, Rega, and VPI. Maybe it would be enticing enough to get Denon or similar back into the quality TT business.

If this works as expected, it should be a game-changer--a tangential tracker that for the most part behaves like a standard pivoting tonearm in all the good ways.

...but is it worth it. Would the less than bat eared audiophile be able to hear the difference between the very slight error of today's arms compared to this arm. Can you reading these posts distinguish between a 9 and 10 inch version of the same arm?