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Low output MC carts for a SOTA Sapphire

K

k600r

Member
Hello everyone,
I just got.a Sota Star sapphire w/ vacuum hold down up and running. I have a SME 309 arm with a Benz micro glider gold high output on it at the moment.
So the table is awesome, dead quiet, superbly dynamic and my records have never sounded so good, but, I feel the cart is the weak link right now.
Any recommendations for a low output mc cart that pairs well with this table and arm combination?
I’m running it through a Audible Illudions preamp, Quicsilver mid monos and a Fosgate signature tube phono amp to Quad 63 speakers.
I would like to keep the price under 2K. Thanks in advance for your knowledge.
 
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Hana SL on mine right now. Arm is the Eminent Tech II air bearing arm. Great combo... Not sure how that lines up with the 309 though. Off to check...
 
K600r. I do not want to rain on your dreams but, IMHO maybe and I know this will be controversial, start your upgrade of this front end with an outboard hi end phono stage.
 
k600r said:
Hello everyone,
I just got.a Sota Star sapphire w/ vacuum hold down up and running. I have a SME 309 arm with a Benz micro glider gold high output on it at the moment.
So the table is awesome, dead quiet, superbly dynamic and my records have never sounded so good, but, I feel the cart is the weak link right now.
Any recommendations for a low output mc cart that pairs well with this table and arm combination?
I’m running it through a Audible Illudions preamp, Quicsilver mid monos and a Fosgate signature tube phono amp to Quad 63 speakers.
I would like to keep the price under 2K. Thanks in advance for your knowledge.
Click to expand...
Contact Joseph at cartridge_retipping-5 on eBay, he often has cartridges recently retipped for sale and might have just what you're looking for.
 
Yep - the Hana SL and SME 309 are a solid match for each other. Arm effective mass is 9.5. Hana compliance is 17 @ 10 Hz. Mass of 5g. Yielding a nice resonant frequency of 10 Hz.
 
Not exactly at budget, one at 1200 next at 2200, but I'd look into the ZYX cartridges. All three models I have heard are very nice.

Have a friend that had a Benz Ace after trying my Ortofon MC20 as an introduction to moving coil. He liked the MC and bought the Ace. Brought it over for one of our get togethers as he didn't tap his toes for one of his 2 main types of music. We assured him the cartridge was sounding right and that he just might not like the Ace presentation of that type of music. He moved on, MC30Super, Dynavector 17D2MkII and others. Toes were tapping.

Three in our group have gone to ZYX in one form or another. Everyone seems to think they sound excellent. I've had two of them here for extended periods, the Omega and the Yatra. Still remember the sound of the MC30Super in the Fidelity Research FR-64s as being the best but I can't fault the ZYX nails at all. The Ortofon was a one evening visit. Maybe that had something to do with the memory of it.
 
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jn229 said:
K600r. I do not want to rain on your dreams but, IMHO maybe and I know this will be controversial, start your upgrade of this front end with an outboard hi end phono stage.
Click to expand...
Not controversial, but I am honestly interested in why you think the Fosgate is not considered high-end.
 
k600r said:
I just got.a Sota Star sapphire w/ vacuum hold down up and running. I have a SME 309 arm with a Benz micro glider gold high output on it at the moment.
Click to expand...

I've got the same table and arm.and currently have an Audio Technica ART 9xa. The sound is very detailed and dynamic, with an image that extends beyond the left and right speakers (in my room, anyway). By comparison, the Benz Ruby I have is more refined, and seems a bit more relaxed. Both carts
sound very good, just different.

Have heard good things about the ZYX cartridges also, but haven't tried them. Someday, maybe!
 
Hi, As you have 2K I would have said the Hana ML would be a better bet, significantly better that the SL & with it's ML stylus much easier to align. However the new OC9 in it's top XSL spec could be as good & if I am not wrong it is about 1/2 the price of the Hana, also their ML is even cheaper & has had great reviews.

Cheers
 
k600r said:
Hello everyone,
I just got.a Sota Star sapphire w/ vacuum hold down up and running. I have a SME 309 arm with a Benz micro glider gold high output on it at the moment.
So the table is awesome, dead quiet, superbly dynamic and my records have never sounded so good, but, I feel the cart is the weak link right now.
Any recommendations for a low output mc cart that pairs well with this table and arm combination?
I’m running it through a Audible Illudions preamp, Quicsilver mid monos and a Fosgate signature tube phono amp to Quad 63 speakers.
I would like to keep the price under 2K. Thanks in advance for your knowledge.
Click to expand...
With your setup, I'd say you owe it to yourself to consider a London Decca Super Gold. In my very similar setup (Fosgate, separates, Quads) the Super Gold has beaten all my MCs, and is in a class of it's own.

https://audiokarma.org/forums/index...rgy-gm-versus-london-decca-super-gold.777557/
 
Well thank you all for responding to my MC upgrade question. Maybe I’m just not used to hearing so much information through my setup as I am now. It definitely blows the doors off of my digital setup that I have right now and pretty much trumps most of my cd’s also.
Maybe I need to get acclimated more to the Benz cart and as someone suggested run it in MM mode instead of MC. Since the Benz runs at 2.5 milivolts their is plenty of gain, maybe to much for Audible Illusions I’m thinking. All I know is that the Clearaudio MM that I had on my Marantz table, while good sounding, sounds tame and restricted in comparison to the Benz.
Off I go to listen and tweak to see if I’m getting the best from the Benz. Thanks again to all who responded.
 
Hi, Couple of things to check. your cart should go into the MM input, not MC & are you sure you have set the input impedance on your phono amp to 1000 ohms, which is what according to the spec sheet. If you do not have this adjustment on your phono amp, you can do it using RCA loading plugs & RCA Y adapter.

Please discount to recommendation to go to a Decca cart as they have a low compliance & require a heavy, (the heavier the better) weight arm.

Cheers
 
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