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Stylus or cartridge

Darby Crash

Darby Crash

Well-Known Member
Hi, Im finally gonna change the stylus on my sansui 2050 and its the kind with the mounted cartridge and removable stylus. Was there a reason on some you can just replace the stylus? Cost? Id like to get the most bang for my limited budget. Should i replace full cartridge or just change stylus. Looks like stylus is $10-20. Id be willing to pay more for whole cartridge if it will help sound wise.

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Is that a Numark Groove Tool? If that's the case and you want to spend as little as possible, just replace the stylus.
 
I would replace the whole cartridge with something better. Those Sanyo MG09/Numark Groove Tool cartridges are pretty much scraping the bottom of the barrel. I got one with a used headshell, and it sits in my junk box unused, even though I bought a new stylus for it.

An Ortofon Omega, or Audio Technica AT95E would be much better and aren't expensive at all. Even the $20 Audio Technica CN5625AL is a substantial improvement as far as I am concerned. Or, if you want to go really cheap and can wait a while for delivery, read this.:) http://audiokarma.org/forums/index.php?threads/chinese-at3600-11-wow.790786/
 
Well it would help if we knew what cartridge, but it looks to me not to be a really top flight one. You look to have a SME 3009 arm so I would say the bigest bang for buck sound wise would be to look for a better cartridge. Band for buck to save money would be to just but a stylus.
 
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Only marks are “made in japan”.
Arm is a TA2050.

Im gonna go ahead and change to a new Cart. I have all the specs, cart weight range, overhang measurment etc. From the manual and maitanance papers I have, it looks original. (?).
 
Yeah, that's the MG 09, aka Numark Groove Tool, made by the same people who made the Red Ed, and also of similar quality.

The CN5625 may be an upgrade. Don't know about the Chinese one linked to above.
 
FWIW, I am using the same tt and I use a shure m91 cartridge. I bought the turntable and it came with the shure cartridge. I replaced the stylus with a EVG replacement stylus and I am very happy with the sound.
 
4-2-7 said:
Well it would help if we knew what cartridge, but it looks to me not to be a really top flight one. You look to have a SME 3009 arm so I would say the bigest bang for buck sound wise would be to look for a better cartridge. Band for buck to save money would be to just but a stylus.
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I think you are way off on the arm. A heavy looking SME-like headshell, thicker metal, rounded edges just doesn't say SME arm to me but rather a regular arm, needing a better cartridge. But we know the table now and off to the interweb to find a new cartridge.

I would get something much better, depending on how you want it to sound. The Audio Technicas have a bit of a high frequency bump the Ortofons maybe not. The OM being better than the newer 2M according to some, even though the styli will fit both, just look weird.

How much you decide to spend will help narrow down the choices. Check needledoctor for a picture of cartridges in all price categories to get an idea. They do get better as you go up in price.
 
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