What does cartridge 'compliance' really mean in practice?

catman

Addicted Member
G'day all, this is something that I've never really got a 'handle' on, so to speak, but what does cartridge 'compliance' really mean in practice?

Will a 'high compliance' cartridge sound better and more 'accurate', than a 'lower compliance' one?

In general terms when I think of the term 'highly compliant', I get the notion of something that 'follows' something very closely and as a result more 'accurately'.

Does the same sort of thing apply to phono cartridges, in general terms. Some personal record playing observations make me think, 'yes'. Any comments? Regards, Felix aka catman.
 
Hi catman, I'm not 100% what it means but I don't think a different level of compliance is better than another. Compliance has to do with DESIGN of the cartridge and is tied in with the mass range of the mating tone arm and stiffness of the suspension at the cantilever (which are inter-related). I'm confused with the relationship of output of the cart as I read you can get a low compliance cart with a high output which seems a bit weird but hopefully someone can explain better.

High compliance......designed for lower mass arms and has soft suspension at cantilever.
Low compliance.......designed for higher mass arms and has stiffer suspension at cantilever.
 
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G'day all, yes I'm familiar with tonearm/cartridge resonance issues and such, but my question is more to do with the general 'performance' of any given cartridge of differing 'compliance', assuming everything else re. general set up is optimal. Regards, Felix aka catman.
 
I haven't used enough tt's/carts to really comment, but the higher mass/lower compliance combinations I've used seemed the most pleasing sonically.
 
G'day all, yes I'm familiar with tonearm/cartridge resonance issues and such, but my question is more to do with the general 'performance' of any given cartridge of differing 'compliance', assuming everything else re. general set up is optimal. Regards, Felix aka catman.

Its more than a resonance thing. Put a high compliant cart on a too heavy arm (like when I put my AT-150mlx on my VPI's 10.5" arm) and the dynamics can take a hit..the cart just can't respond over the weight of the arm, basically. Everything sounded flat and lifeless, but that cart sounds great on my other turntable with it's much lighter arm. I've not heard any advantage of one over the other over just getting a good arm/cart match. It's like the car/springs-shocks metaphor. You can get a smooth ride in a big or small car, you just need to match it to the right suspension. And with carts and arms, the compliance is the suspension.
 
G'day all, most interesting. I guess what prompted this question was my recent cartridge changes on this system, particularly the differences between the AT95E (a somewhat lower compliance cartridge) and my M97xE (a much higher compliance cartridge).

The Kenwood turntable actually came supplied with the AT95E, presumably a better match with the moderate mass tonearm of the Kenwood, yet the much higher compliance of the M97xE seems to work very well with a tonearm that in theory is not ideal! To me, that doesn't really make much sense.

The AT95E does sound nice on the Kenwood, but so does the M97xE and tracks beautifully at a much lighter tracking weight, which in itself is an indication of higher cartridge compliance. Can you understand why this 'compliance' thing is rather confusing to me? :yes: Regards, Felix aka catman.
 
The compliance is restricted by the VTF, meaning too low VTF causes always tracking and tracing problems. But in principle high compliance is better than low IMO, because created forces will be lower, which is a good thing regarding needed ridgity/damping at cartridge and tonearm.

Unfortunately, comparing with a suspension is difficult, as normally the damping in a good suspension is rather absent in the cartridge/tonearm/plinth interface.

gusten
 
My impression is that compliance of the cartridge does not mean anything about the quality of the sound it may produce unless one considers a specific tonearm+cartridge combination. The combined system must have the property of ideally following all the groove modulation with minimal inertia (to avoid adding mechanical information that would be transformed into electrical parasite signals) and a very dumped harmonic oscillator response (a non-damped oscillation would again distort the original mechanical information by adding additional electric pulses). The model of dumped oscillator makes reference to the cart+tonearm combination and not to any of the two single components, because that, IMHO, would not make much sense leading to undetermined systems.

In practice, I've got both low and high compliance carts, and the quality of the sound does not seem to be affected by that parameter, provided a good matching tonearm is found. For example, most LOMC carts are low compliance, and many people (including myself) would say that most of the very best sounding carts are of this type.
 
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IMO, compliance is a "Goldilocks" situation. Cantilever compliance is all about control in conjunction with the effective mass of the arm/cart combination. Too much (high) compliance with high mass and the stylus will lose control and overshoot in the grooves, to little (low) compliance with low mass and the stylus will steam-roll through. In either worst case scenario the stylus might actually skip out of the groove. The "just right" combination will trace everything with good control regardless whether the combo is low or high compliance.
 
Compliance is a measure of how hard the groove wall has to press on the stylus tip to get it to move.

Since the pressure and movement are changing through time, the usual attributes that come into play with accelerations apply.

In an automobile suspension, all the moving parts are classified as belonging to one of parts of the system - the sprung weight, and the un-sprung weight. In the case of a car, the un-sprung weight is the car itself, the suspension mounting, and the parts of the suspension that "don't move". The sprung weight included the wheel and hub, maybe part of the axle, etc. (the parts that do move).

It get a little tricky when considering the shocks, springs, and sometimes the axle. These things "move", but they are typically held fast at the un-sprung end. What happens is that the wheel itself is considered fully sprung, but the shock or spring is considered partially sprung (math is used to figure the equivalent sprung mass of the partially sprung components).

Anyway, on the turntable, the stylus, cantilever, and a portion of the suspension mounting, (and the coil if MC, or the magnet if MM, or the iron if MI) is the sprung weight; and the tonearm, balance weight, and cartridge mounting is the un-sprung weight.

(And if your turntable uses a suspension subsystem, there is a similar relationship between the tonearm/platter system (sprung) and the chassis (un-sprung).

Because of the geometry of the sprung weight (a tip at the end of a rod with the rod mounted at the other end with something connected to it - a coil, magnet, or iron), the usual way this is all described is effective tip mass. Which is to say, all the linkages and differential momentum and inertia and damping of the cantilever mounting is all rolled into one figure that describes how the groove wall would receive and respond to an equivalent isolated little mass in contact with the walls. The calculation reveals how much the groove wall "thinks" the tip weighs by how hard or easy it is to push and accelerate the tip.

But since the tip in the real world is connected to the rest of the system, the compliance needs to match the physical characteristics of the arm, the mounting, etc. because of the accelerations and inertia.

Sometimes it helps to visualize the extreme cases using a thought experiment.

Case 1 - Low compliance and light arm
Here the tip may be heavy and the cantilever very heavy and the mounting very tight and stiff. Let the arm be very light (like a soda straw). When the groove presses the tip, the tip resists deflecting in relation to the arm strongly and the whole arm moves. Now the whole geometry is wrong because instead of just wiggling the cantilever the whole arm is trying to wiggle and the effects of its geometry and mounting to the table come into effect.

Case 2 - High compliance and heavy arm
Let's say the arm is made of granite and weighs about ten pounds, but it is balanced just right and is floating on air bearings. What happens when the groove wall presses the tip sideways? The tip moves, but the arm does not. What happens when the groove presses the tip up? It moved up, but the arm does not. What happens after a few seconds of tracking? The tip gets bent to the side as the groove moves inward to the center of the record. The arm does not move. The tip finally mistracks and hops over the groove into the next groove and repeats this indefinitely. The compliance is too great for the deflected tip to move the arm. If the tip had a few minutes to apply its deflection continuously to the arm, you might see the arm begin to move, but that's too late, and it would take the same amount of time deflecting the other way just to get it to stop.

Does that make sense?
 
The compliance of a cartridge is an objective of design. When low mass tonearms were all the rage in the late 70's / early '80's, manufacturers cranked out high compliance cartridges to match. Prior to that tonearms had a bit more mass, so cartridge manufacturers produced medium to high compliance carts. EDIT: these days, medium mass tonearms are the norm.

A Koetsu Coralstone cartridge weighs in at nearly 13 grams. In order to support all that weight, the cart will need a beefy suspension and a rigid cantilever: low compliance. It also tracks at 2.0 grams (or above). While I've never had the pleasure of hearing a Coralstone, I have heard another cart in the Koetsu lineup with similar compliance specs: sounds heavenly.

Now, you couldn't easily mate a Koestu with an old Infinity Black Widow tonearm. But a Stanton 881, which I listen to frequently, would mate nicely with it. The Stanton is a relatively light cartridge and is happy with a low tracking force (high compliance). It will track happily in the 1 gram range. I personally LOVE the sound from the 881 and its cousin cartridge the 681. Both of these cartridges had different construction and design goals, and were made for a different era. I wouldn't put the 881 or 681 up against the Koestu, but for its price, its very very good indeed.

Check out this chart:

http://store.acousticsounds.com/pdf/cartridge_comparison.pdf

With some exceptions, you'll generally note that the higher the cartridge weight, the higher the tracking force. As has been noted here before, tracking force is an (inverse) indicator of compliance: the higher the compliance, the lower the tracking force. So, the higher the cartridge weight, the lower the compliance spec, and the higher the tracking force.

Hope this helps.
 
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Theres been a similar thread going on at VE forum and one of the users explained this in a simple way that i could understand and i think makes sense.

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The words low and high are specific mechanical quantities and don't describe the compliance as being low = poor and high = good, that's not the meaning. Low means when you push the needle sideways it doesn't move very much, it moves a low distance. High means when you push the needle sideways it goes easily a long way, the distance moved is high.
 
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. . . my question is more to do with the general 'performance' of any given cartridge of differing 'compliance', assuming everything else re. general set up is optimal.

That's part of what makes it so difficult--if you compare different cartridges on different arms (to optimize compliance match), are you hearing cartridge differences or arm difference? Same with listening to different cartridges on the same arm, are you hearing cartridge performance differences or mass/compliance issues? And if a person chooses a low-mass arm to get better performance from high-compliance cartridges, are they running the risk of getting an arm that simply doesn't perform as well?

SME, in an article I can no longer find on the internet, pointed out that engineering an arm with a little more mass allows the designer to use that additional allowable mass to achieve higher standards of structural integrity/rigidity. This can result in more information being extracted from the groove and turned into an electrical signal that passes to your amplifier rather than being lost due to a less rigid design. Maybe lower compliance cartridges can sound better not simply because of their compliance, but because they're better suited for use in slightly more massive but mechanically superior arm designs.

I don't have compliance specifications, but that may have been part of the issue when I found that an Audio Technica CN5625AL ($39) gave me better performance in terms of dynamics, tracking, and warp-handling ability on my Linn Ittok arm than the more expensive AT 440ML.
 
Compliance is a measure of how hard the groove wall has to press on the stylus tip to get it to move.

Since the pressure and movement are changing through time, the usual attributes that come into play with accelerations apply.

In an automobile suspension, all the moving parts are classified as belonging to one of parts of the system - the sprung weight, and the un-sprung weight. In the case of a car, the un-sprung weight is the car itself, the suspension mounting, and the parts of the suspension that "don't move". The sprung weight included the wheel and hub, maybe part of the axle, etc. (the parts that do move).

It get a little tricky when considering the shocks, springs, and sometimes the axle. These things "move", but they are typically held fast at the un-sprung end. What happens is that the wheel itself is considered fully sprung, but the shock or spring is considered partially sprung (math is used to figure the equivalent sprung mass of the partially sprung components).

Anyway, on the turntable, the stylus, cantilever, and a portion of the suspension mounting, (and the coil if MC, or the magnet if MM, or the iron if MI) is the sprung weight; and the tonearm, balance weight, and cartridge mounting is the un-sprung weight.

(And if your turntable uses a suspension subsystem, there is a similar relationship between the tonearm/platter system (sprung) and the chassis (un-sprung).

Because of the geometry of the sprung weight (a tip at the end of a rod with the rod mounted at the other end with something connected to it - a coil, magnet, or iron), the usual way this is all described is effective tip mass. Which is to say, all the linkages and differential momentum and inertia and damping of the cantilever mounting is all rolled into one figure that describes how the groove wall would receive and respond to an equivalent isolated little mass in contact with the walls. The calculation reveals how much the groove wall "thinks" the tip weighs by how hard or easy it is to push and accelerate the tip.

But since the tip in the real world is connected to the rest of the system, the compliance needs to match the physical characteristics of the arm, the mounting, etc. because of the accelerations and inertia.

Sometimes it helps to visualize the extreme cases using a thought experiment.

Case 1 - Low compliance and light arm
Here the tip may be heavy and the cantilever very heavy and the mounting very tight and stiff. Let the arm be very light (like a soda straw). When the groove presses the tip, the tip resists deflecting in relation to the arm strongly and the whole arm moves. Now the whole geometry is wrong because instead of just wiggling the cantilever the whole arm is trying to wiggle and the effects of its geometry and mounting to the table come into effect.

Case 2 - High compliance and heavy arm
Let's say the arm is made of granite and weighs about ten pounds, but it is balanced just right and is floating on air bearings. What happens when the groove wall presses the tip sideways? The tip moves, but the arm does not. What happens when the groove presses the tip up? It moved up, but the arm does not. What happens after a few seconds of tracking? The tip gets bent to the side as the groove moves inward to the center of the record. The arm does not move. The tip finally mistracks and hops over the groove into the next groove and repeats this indefinitely. The compliance is too great for the deflected tip to move the arm. If the tip had a few minutes to apply its deflection continuously to the arm, you might see the arm begin to move, but that's too late, and it would take the same amount of time deflecting the other way just to get it to stop.

Does that make sense?

That sounds damned convincing. You should write a book "Turntables Setup for Dummies" because you explained that in a way that even I can understand.
 
G'day all, yes I'm familiar with tonearm/cartridge resonance issues and such, but my question is more to do with the general 'performance' of any given cartridge of differing 'compliance', assuming everything else re. general set up is optimal. Regards, Felix aka catman.

Please, bear in mind the topic that Felix has brought to discussion. Most of the standard explanations regarding compliance as the inverse "spring constant" parameter do not seem to be the focus here. Performance, sound quality and similar concepts seem to be more relevant to the topic of this thread. As I mentioned before, I cannot match the compliance to good or bad sound based on my experience with several carts. For example, LOMC carts are mostly low compliance carts and some of the top carts belong to this category.
 
... but my question is more to do with the general 'performance' of any given cartridge of differing 'compliance', assuming everything else re. general set up is optimal. Regards, Felix aka catman.

Compliance is not a qualitative measure. Low and high compliance carts can both achieve excellent results. Using my Koetsu example, if you want to design a cartridge that is low output, and uses exotic housing materials that can control micro-vibrations, but are heavy, you've got to account for that weight in the design. Therefore you need to select a suspension/cantilever design that can support all that weight. The sonic result is more than pleasing.

Today, cartridge manufacturers can use low vibration polymers or carbon fiber using manufacturing techniques not available during vinyl's glory years to achieve high performance / low weight design objectives.

All this means that there's lots of ways to design a cartridge based on your design objectives. None of them are "wrong", and many different designs can still sound great.
 
Perhaps an idea? There should be a poll which asks;

"Which do you like best (properly setup ofcourse)

A. A high mass/low compliance combination
B. A low mass/high compliance combination
C. No prefence yet
D. There is no preference possible

Please add your comments."

I'd choose C, have not tried enough setups to really judge this. ;)
 
I choose C, too, from that list, though I've liked both A and B on different setups...one over the other. A: Empire 208 with Denon DL-103. B: Marantz TT-15 with AT-150mlx or Shure V-15vmr.

But in actuality, my favorite route is medium compliance cart with medium weight arm. A Benz Glider on my VPI is the best I've heard a cart sound in my system...BUT, that involves much more than just the compliance of the cart. It's simply a better cart than anything I've tried..too many variables to say whether compliance is what I'm liking.
 
I don't know much about it, but what I've read. All I know is that with my Infinity Black Widow, the list of HiComp carts I can use is very limited.
 
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