Koetsu sound

i have owned the koetsu rosewood signature platinum II for 2 years. i use a graham 2.0 delux arm on a basis 2500 tt. i agree with the comments above and would add that in my setup speed and resolution are excellent.

about the time i purchased it myles astor in "ultimate audio" reviewed this cartridge and reported that he enjoyed the traditional strengths of the koetsu but felt that it was too slow for his tastes. my take on his comments was that his vpi tnt, jmw memorial arm, and cj 15 phono stage were not a proper balance for the koetsu.

so mate the koetsu with fast and neutral gear and the balance should be good.

mike lavigne

Excellent posts above, most of which I totally agree. To my ear the Rosewood Signature Platinum captures the quintessential Koetsu sound, something that will never disappoint when used in a neutral arm like the Graham. The Onyx sounds to me like Koetsu's tribute to the inevitable, all its considerable glory notwithstanding. Personally, my ear is leaning toward a more agile and neutral cartridge, say the Lyra Helikon, paired with a more romantic arm like the Wheaton Triplanar. But I think the Koetsu/Graham would be an equally appealing antithesis.

Thanks for your responses. I own a Graham 2.0, Oracle Delphi V Turntable with the Lyra Helicon. I listened to the Urushi on a Graham 2.0 Lynn turntable. Maybe I should try to convince this person to come home with his Urushi and put it in my system.

IMO the Koetsu RSP and Onyx are not slow or musically colored-just sweet, fast, and open like the real thing.
Albert's right, the Onyx is cleaner and clearer but less rich than the RSP. Both the best I've ever heard. Buy one and forget about upgrading for a long time.

This Koetsu and Jan Alberts threads are very interesting. I was able to home audition a store's demos of the Koestu U, RSP and OP in my system and in a friend's before deciding to buy the OP. We both have Graham 2.0 deluxe's so we had the cartridges on separate ceramic wands. He has a level 5 Audio Note/Avante Garde Trio system and I have the Aesthetix, Audio Note and Wislon W/P system. They are both fully tweaked reference systems in excellent listening environments. Each system does have different qualities. We each preferred (and purchased) OP because it demonstrated a faster, more delicate, less noise, and a greater sense of space around the instruments while still having all the musical qualities we were expecting in each of our systems. I was surprised that the OP's sound qualities would be so apparent in two radically different speaker systems, but it was for us. He loads it at 3 ohms by his AN M& Silver Transfer and I have it set up at 10 Ohms in the Aesthetix. Some times I go to 100 ohms, but I seem to prefer the 10 Ohms load. BTW: so now I have four arm wands and have sunk a lot of money in cartridges over twenty years. It one of the easily addictive aspects of audiophilia obsessiveness. I should have two-thirds of that money into real estate.