Cartridge Choice for Thorens TP16

[TellMeWhy]

Hi folks, Having recently bought a Nagaoka MP110 for my Thorens TD160 Mk1 (TP16 arm) I am enjoying the sound, but through a Marantz 2230 and Kef 103.2 speakers I find it (compared to an old and now worn out Ortofon OM10) overly warm, super rich is bass but crucially muted / suffocated in the treble. I realise that might be due to having a warm system, but still was wondering if a more forward / detailed cartridge (eg Denon DL110 / AT 440MTB / Shure M97 w. Jico SAS / Nagaoka JNP 200 stylus in the MP110 cartridge ) might make a worthy difference.

What are your opinions?

The turntable is set up properly although with the exception of a heavy baseboard and cork mat is unmodified. The Marantz and Kefs are recapped and generally sound great with digital sources. The phono transistors on the Marantz have also been renewed.

Cheers, Jon

 

[Dennis Gardner]

Try lowering the tracking force. It may give a more balanced top to bottom response.

 

[tnsilver]

I loved the DL-110 / TP-16 combination. I used it a lot back when the DL-110 was about $87 at Comet Supply. I also loved the Stanton 681eee with this tonearm. I've used a Shure M95ED with great success and even a Stanton 881S with a Pfantstiehl 4822DEE after market stylus. I tried a Shure M97xe (not to my liking at all) and an M75ED (great if you're into vintage warm sound!) after the doubling of the DL-110 price, which kept going up, I've swapped to a Denon DL-301 Mk-II (LOMC) that I could then get for just a tad more. Then I tried a vintage Ortofon FF15E and then a VMS20E which in my opinion beat the crap out of the Ortofon 2M blue (again, not my cup of tea). In retrospective - I think the DL-110 was the sweetest of them all with the TP-16.

 

[malden]

Hi folks, Having recently bought a Nagaoka MP110 for my Thorens TD160 Mk1 (TP16 arm) I am enjoying the sound, but through a Marantz 2230 and Kef 103.2 speakers I find it (compared to an old and now worn out Ortofon OM10) overly warm, super rich is bass but crucially muted / suffocated in the treble. I realise that might be due to having a warm system, but still was wondering if a more forward / detailed cartridge (eg Denon DL110 / AT 440MTB / Shure M97 w. Jico SAS / Nagaoka JNP 200 stylus in the MP110 cartridge ) might make a worthy difference.

What are your opinions?

The turntable is set up properly although with the exception of a heavy baseboard and cork mat is unmodified. The Marantz and Kefs are recapped and generally sound great with digital sources. The phono transistors on the Marantz have also been renewed.

Cheers, Jon

I suspect the Marantz 2230 could be the bottle-neck. I have a Marantz 1060, same era and similar amp as the 2230 and compared to some of my other gear it sounds kind of dull. Mine has not been recapped, but the other vintage amps I've compared it to have not been recapped either.

The 2230 should have "pre-out" jacks that would allow you to connect to a dedicated power amp. This may help to close- in on the problem.