Comparing Audio Note UK moving coil and moving magnet cartridges using an all AN system.

Discussion in 'Audio Hardware' started by Steve Hoffman, May 15, 2015.

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  1. Steve Hoffman

    Steve Hoffman Your host Your Host Thread Starter

    So I'm probably the only guy in North America (perhaps anywhere) that has two Audio Note turntables side by side, fed into identical AN M6 preamps, one table with the AN moving magnet cartridge, the other with the moving coil cartridge. I can play two copies of the same vinyl test pressing and simply switch back and forth. How crazy is that? Love it.

    At any rate, a few people had asked me to compare the two Audio Note carts and even though I don't like to do direct comparisons of gear, in this case, since they both come from the same company, I'll say a bit about them, all good fun for me (playing more great vinyl than ever this way).

    First, the Audio Note gear I'm using:

    AN TT-2 Deluxe/Arm 3 v1 (2).
    AN IQ-3 (MM cart). http://www.audionote.co.uk/products/analogue/cart_iq_3_01.shtml
    AN IO-1 (MC cart).

    45 watts a channel Ginrei monoblocks (Elrog ER-211, 1959 RCA 6V6).
    M6 and M6 RIAA phono preamps.
    Step up transformer for the MC cart: AN S9.

    Speaker wire: AN Sogon LX 96 bi-wire.
    Interconnects: Sogon 50 balanced and RCA.

    Speakers: AN-E/SPx HE Alnico hemp on AN stands filled with fine-grain white sand.

    Both carts expertly set up by Warren Jarrett and David Shreve, VTA adjusted, tracking force exactly as recommended by Audio Note, cartridge perfectly positioned per Baerwald alignment, Shreve-world, etc.

    I use the same 4 test records all the time when I explore new turntables and carts, helps keep it simple for me and I've discovered over the years that using records that are NOT sonic wonders in the first place makes it easier to listen to the sound of the cart than using a mind-blowing recording which sounds good on everything. Make sense? So the records I always use:

    "Rosebud: Marches & Rags of SCOTT JOPLIN", Lee Erwin, pipe organ, on Angel. Noisy surface, fun music, DEEP soundstage, a "scratch your head" recording that seems to have the mics placed as close to the noise of the organ as possible and as far away from the actual pipes as possible. This makes for a spooky deep soundstage and a good system can give you front-back chills if you are in to stuff like that. Important for me for judging cart tone (the more "in your face" the cart is, the less realistic the sound is for me). I've had this record since school.

    "The Cotton Club" soundtrack on Geffen. Diana Reid Haig turned me on to this one in 1986. A digital recording, really shockingly good on vinyl with the right cart, totally headache inducing with the wrong cart. A nice, accurate (believe it or not) reproduction of horns and saxes.

    "Presenting THE BACHELORS singing Diane, Whispering, Charmaine" on (British cut and pressed by Decca UK) London/ffrr. This one was given to me by Bill Drake (radio guru). I use this because the stereo version of "Charmaine" impresses the hell out of everyone who hears it. If only Decca had recorded the Stones like this. Produced by Shel Talmy.

    And of course, my trusty test lacquer cut by Kevin Gray of Merle Haggard & The Texas Playboys doing "Cherokee Maiden", from the 1976 30 ips Capitol Records master tape. A perfect example of a "dead" recording from the middle 1970's that I use to judge tracking ability and any kind of front-back that a good system can pull from this dead recording. I have it on a locked groove 33 1/3 RPM lacquer with the "flat" version on the outer grooves and each additional version with more and more EQ (of my choosing) until the last, hard to track, version, with full volume and full EQ, a needle torture track. Very useful for me for many years in testing turntable gear.

    So, All that out of the way, here it is in a nutshell:

    Both carts sound wonderful but in very different ways. Both carts track flawlessly.

    That being said, I'll go in to a little detail about the sonic signature of both and then I'm out of here.

    The Audio Note MM cart is very balanced sounding with a truly magic midband. Made the pipe organ seem like it was coming from the next room and bouncing off the side walls (a good thing, that's accurate reproduction, an illusion, but nonetheless, correct). This MM cart does furnish more of the groovy colorations I like from a vinyl playback system, the stuff that makes recorded music sound like live music. Probably THE best MM cart I've ever used.

    The Audio Note MC cart has slightly less midrange magic but a truly complex, sweet and lovely top end, probably the most natural treble I've heard in a moving coil cartridge (not a giant fan of many MC carts, as you might remember). The treble is not "out there" with a giant boost like some MC carts I've heard but it's just like the top end became more complex and more exciting without adding needless detail. Very seductive sound, makes some other high quality carts sound grainy in comparison.

    The bass on both was wonderful, the dynamics on both, wonderful. So the bottom line is, on YOUR system, do you want a more magical full-range sound (MC) or a more magical midband (MM)? That essentially is it.

    The MC cart is very neutral but revealing and never analytical or too detailed and I could happily live with it for the long term. The MM cart is very fine to listen to over the long haul (I mean for hours at a time) and isn't really lacking in anything. The MC cart has a truly magnificent top end, controlled but subtle at the same time, very difficult to accomplish, makes you want to listen to more and more records.

    If I had to pick one over the other, I couldn't. Both are great. The way I will do it is Warren will chose which table he wants at his audio salon and that will be it. I can't choose!

    The MC cart costs a lot more than the MM version so take that in to consideration, and you need a step-up. I think that the MM cart is around $1,500.00 and the MC around $4,500.00 but please don't quote me. I could be off.

    Any questions?
     
    Manelus, jukes, Shiver and 6 others like this.
  2. norman_frappe

    norman_frappe Forum Resident

    Nice comparison. I guess the preamp(s) you are using have adjustments for both MM and MC carts? Did you do anything unusual with the gain, or loading for either one? Or is the Audio Note Pre Amp fixed, sorry not familiar with the unit? Do they both share the same stylus? Sorry for all the questions but I actually find this interesting and current because...

    I just recently got a new table and cart and realized the output of the cart combined with all the other stuff (gain, impedance, capacitance, RIAA tone circuit) gives you a maddening array of variables to obsess about or play around with depending on your point of view to try and alter the sound if you so want to.

    From your description I think I would just choose the cheaper one because they both sound very good to me, haha!
     
  3. Steve Hoffman

    Steve Hoffman Your host Your Host Thread Starter

    Audio Note UK preamps are moving magnet only, one size fits all. The moving coil step ups in AudioNoteLand are where the magic happens. The fragile signal comes into its own with the step up, therefore AN has a bunch, for every price point, tailored for the AN MC carts. The one that I am using, the S9, I believe has a list price of twenty thousand dollars but there are many less expensive AN step ups out there, good deals can be had on the used market..
     
  4. jh901

    jh901 Forum Resident

    Location:
    PARRISH FL USA
    Are your AN speakers designed to be placed in the corners?
     
  5. norman_frappe

    norman_frappe Forum Resident

    I think so, from the manual.

    "The ported cabinet has been designed to be placed close to room boundaries,where the bass performance is augmented significantly by the additional reinforcement offered by nearby walls." - Better hope the NFL Commissioner doesn't find out, this could be inflategate! I kid I kid.

    http://www.audionote.co.uk/downloads/manuals/AN-E Manual smaller.pdf

    But see Steve's response below, you don't have to use them that way and may in fact get better results not placing them near walls. But it voids the warranty and may cause damage to surrounding structures. I kid again! I guess you have options which is good.
     
    Last edited: May 15, 2015
  6. Steve Hoffman

    Steve Hoffman Your host Your Host Thread Starter

    Not in my big room, reprinted from another thread:

    Steve sez: "Regarding AN-E placement, I've found (much to my surprise) that listening in the midfield works amazingly well. I have two rooms, both with AN-E speakers and the first room has them correctly placed in the corners (but not towed in as much as AN recommends) and my second pair is in a big room where it is not possible to be against a back wall. By accident last week I found the sweet spot. I had another set of speakers in place (client request) and I had to move the AN-E's out of the way so I removed the spikes and pushed them to the side. When the client left for the day I wanted to hear the music with the AN speakers so I just pushed them IN FRONT of the other speakers and fired them up. Well, the bass response improved so I figured that the big speakers behind them were acting like a back wall and helping the bass. After thinking about it for a little while I realized that, no, this wasn't the case. They were just in a better position. To prove this, I moved the big speakers out of the way and behold! Same bass response from the AN-E's. They were so much closer to my listening chair it was a bit disconcerting but they work this way so I'm not going to complain. Sorry for the long-winded paragraph but I just wanted to state that AN-E's work well in midfield, a silly 15 inches closer to my listening chair did the trick. The soundstaging is awesome this way as well. Nobody I've told this to believes me... Carry on".
     
    norman_frappe likes this.
  7. jh901

    jh901 Forum Resident

    Location:
    PARRISH FL USA
    Cool, thanks. I'm pretty close to near field with my speakers, which have nothing in common with AN, but my room is small and I pretty much stick to "rule of thirds". I like front to back depth and little or no room boom reinforcement. I've got 16" cylinder bass traps too.

    I did wonder about AN design and if the designer simply prefers the sound of reinforced bass at the expense of soundstage, etc.

    In any event, back to MM v. entry level step-up MC!
     
  8. OcdMan

    OcdMan Senior Member

    Location:
    Maryland
    Thanks for the review. I think it's great that you have the setup to be able to compare both cartridges, pretty much in real-time, without any other equipment differences except for the step-up transformer. So often you see comparisons of cartridges that are made from memory, on different turntables, through different preamps, and so on. Totally understandable but nowhere near ideal. So how much does the Audio Note IQ3 MM cart typically cost in the US?
     
  9. blakep

    blakep Senior Member

    I'd be curious about the prices. It seems to be pretty difficult to find out what these cartridges actually sell for. In searching online all I could really come up with is guesses that the MM retails for around $1300-$1500 U.S. and the MC around $4500.

    If that's the case and the MC requires a $20K stepup it would not seem to me to be a high value proposition when the MM will get you what seems to be described as quite a bit of what the MC offers and a pretty satisfying experience.

    I certainly wouldn't have any difficulty choosing in that situation if I had difficulty making up my mind on which cartridge I preferred on the basis of sonics!
     
  10. Steve Hoffman

    Steve Hoffman Your host Your Host Thread Starter

    That's silly, Audio Note UK offers many different MC step ups in all price ranges, some quite affordable. I just got lucky and was sent the top of the line.
     
  11. blakep

    blakep Senior Member

    With all due respect, I guess we just look at things differently, which is perfectly ok. My point was that I personally would not spend $24,000 to get performance that was similar to or, in most ways made me as happy (even almost as happy) as that which I'd get if I spent $1500. The ratio is still likely to be out of wack (again, for me personally) with a more "affordable" AN transformer, especially factoring in that the more affordable transformer is less likely to offer the performance of the top of the line, probably making it even more difficult to choose between them.

    Which may just mean that the MM is a bargain.

    Many of us have different approaches to the hobby but I think that is a valid point and not one that many people who were putting out the money to make the purchase would find silly.

    What are the retail prices on the cartridges?
     
    SetANE likes this.
  12. alfajim

    alfajim Forum Resident

    Location:
    san rafael ca
    What in the hell makes a step up worth $20k? I can't imagine the frame or windings worth that much money same with the enclosure and any other components? that's like three time what a mil spec thing would cost.
     
  13. David Cope

    David Cope Forum Resident

    Location:
    Gales Ferry, CT
    To clear up a few details:

    - Yes, the IQ3 and IOI share the same stylus tip and square cross-section titanium cantilever. The bodies, magnets and coils are, of course, completely different.
    - Except for the entry level AN transformer, each model is available in your choice of one of six individual impedances. The multiple windings and switches are considered to inhibit the quality of reproduction as compared to the unswitchable, single impedance versions. The IO cartridges require a 1 ohm transformer.
    - The IOI doesn't require, and is most often NOT paired with the S9, which is more likely to be partnered with the IO Gold and something like the M9 Phono pre-amp, which are approx $8k and $136k, respectively. Mario Binner, who does the European shows, and I use the IOI and S4 combination on the TT Two Dlx/Arm Three combo. The S4 is about $6k.

    At a completely different price point, Don Thorne of Sound Hounds in Victoria, BC, mounted a Denon 103 ($300) on an Arm Three, loaded with an S1 step-up (approx $1k) for an entry level application of the AN step-ups.
     
    Manelus likes this.
  14. I've read several nice comments about the AN IQ-3 MM on some British forums and have always been curious about it. Usually it is paired up with either an AN or a "boutique" arm in the reviews. How do they match up in more pedestrian setups? I have a Project with the 10CC Evo arm and wonder if that would be a good match. Any experience or commentary on that as a pairing?
     
  15. Mulroydave

    Mulroydave Forum Resident

    I recently bought the IQ3 for my Rega P24 with Groovetracer mods (sub platter , delrin platter, counterweight) going into a Puresound P10 and it works really well in this more modest system

    It's certainly a lovely sounding cartridge, very natural and dynamic and involving. I agree with Steve , the midband is quite superb.
     
  16. Ryan Rocks

    Ryan Rocks Member

    Last fall the fine folks at Soundhounds convinced me to buy the Audio Note UK IQ3 for my Rega RP6. It sounds wonderful. It is a great tracker. I am still rediscovering my record collection.
     
    raferx likes this.
  17. Good to hear about the Rega's, hopefully a Project owner will chime in too. I'm currently using an AT-150MLX and looking for a change. I play a lot of jazz or acoustic singer/songwriter music.
     
  18. jimbutsu

    jimbutsu WATCH YÖUR STEPPE

    Ooh - I have a Pro-Ject table and am strongly considering a 150MLX... what don't you like about it?
    (Apologies if I'm steering the thread off course with this)
     
  19. I like it a lot! I'm just thinking about trying something else for fun. I preferred mine to a friends 2m Black but also liked another's Dynavector 20xl. I won't get rid of the AT, I'm just looking to play with a different sound and am thinking of something that may be a little fuller in the midrange to see if I like it better. It's hard to learn about cartridges without ponying up for one unfortunately.
     
  20. Steve Hoffman

    Steve Hoffman Your host Your Host Thread Starter

    I have some information on these two AN carts. As you know, getting any kind of feedback on Audio Note off of the Internet is very difficult but I found some stuff from BD Audio in the UK: http://www.bd-audio.co.uk/product-category/audionote-uk/. Here are some specs and a review..

    Product Description Io-I moving coil cart from Audio Note:

    The range of Io cartridges from Audio Note UK are renowned throughout the world for their incredible quality and their effortless ability to reproduce music to the highest possible standards. The unique nature of the Io design runs contrary to most accepted criteria, but the end result is a relatively small selection of hand-built moving coil cartridges, which are second to none with regard to dynamic range, tonal balance, channel separation, timbral reproduction, and a lack of colouration and surface noise. The cartridges are not able to be mass produced due to their design, and as a result are extremely time-consuming to produce. In use, they require a tone arm of very substantial rigidity, and must be combined with a properly matched, high-ratio step-up transformer in order to achieve the best possible linearity and dynamic signal transfer.

    All Io cartridges are hand-built in the UK to exacting standards and the Io 1 features ALNICO magnets, silver-wound generator coils and a titanium cantilever with an Audio Note AN Type-2 profile, diamond stylus. The Io-I, has generator coils wound on a Swedish-made former and is available with either red or blue aluminium sides.

    Please note that due to the construction process, Io cartridges may not always be available from stock.

    SPECIFICATIONS:
    Output voltage: 0.05mV
    Coil impedance: 1 ohm
    Matching impedance: 3-4 ohms
    Frequency range: 10Hz-50kHz ± 3dB (dynamic test)
    Channel separation: greater than 25dB at 1kHz
    Compliance: vertical 15, horizontal 10
    Stylus tracking weight: 1.5-3.5 gm
    Weight: 11-12 gm
    Review:
    http://www.hifiwigwam.com/audio-note-io/
    ----------------------------------------------------------------------------
    Product Description IQ-3 MM cart from Audio Note:

    The Audio Note IQ cartridges are the finest Moving Magnet designs currently available. A refinement of the established Moving Magnet principle, they offer an excellent combination of exceptional tracking ability, dynamic range and longevity, thanks to the extremely high quality components used for their construction. Each model employs a highly rigid PocanT body shell, equipped with integral threaded inserts for easy installation in the tone arm head-shell. This mounting system greatly improves mechanical coupling between the cartridge body and head-shell in comparison to the traditional nut & bolt fixing. A detachable stylus assembly was chosen to facilitate easy replacement or upgrade. In fact, All three models in the IQ range use the same body shell, so it is a very simple and cost effective procedure to upgrade merely by changing the stylus assembly.

    The coils in all of the IQ cartridges are made from high purity, ‘four nines’ copper wire that is of an incredibly small diameter. The IQ 3 is similar to the IQ-2. However, its performance is the ultimate in moving magnet designs, as it uses an AN Type 2 diamond and a titanium cantilever which are identical to those in the legendary Io-I cartridge
    . an I0 1.jpg an iq-3.jpg
     
  21. norman_frappe

    norman_frappe Forum Resident

    Thanks for the info Steve. They don't generally seem to have any technical specs listed on the Audio Note web site at first glance, but I think going straight to the manuals for each product line gives you more info on technical specs that a consumer might want to know. In some cases it's still lacking, but here is a good link.

    http://www.audionote.co.uk/downloads/index.shtml
     
    Last edited: May 21, 2015
  22. shutdown66

    shutdown66 Forum Resident

    Location:
    Athens, Greece
    Very nice review!!!
    Thanks.
    Any photos of AN gear???
     
  23. Manelus

    Manelus Forum Resident

    Location:
    Barcelona, Spain
    I am considering to "upgrade" my analogue rig with AN IoI + AN S4 Step up Transformer, and searching the web I found this thread.

    I'm happy to see our host has Audio Note.

    I began with Digital frontend AN CDT4 + DAC 4 (great sound) and now I point to analogue AN.

    I wonder if Steve has also AN Digital.

    I will have a IoI + S4 SUP at home (demo) in a few days.

    I will post back my opinion. Now I have a Benz Micro LPs + Lukascheck pre.
     
  24. Raylinds

    Raylinds Resident Lake Surfer

    Yes, Steve reviewed some AN digital gear here: http://forums.stevehoffman.tv/threa...port-tube-rolling-m6-riaa-phono-stage.380521/

    If you do a search for "Audio Note" in thread titles, you will fins he posts several reviews of various AN gear.
     
  25. Manelus

    Manelus Forum Resident

    Location:
    Barcelona, Spain
    Well I ended up ordering a Io1 cartridge + S4 SUT + M5 RIAA Phono stage.

    A killer combo, it sounds waaaayyyy better than my previous rig (at a price of course).

    Sure a M6 would have done better, but I can’t afford it.

    Looking forward to get the new M5 with the new Keisei capacitors that I hope will outperform the current one.

    I will have it in a few weeks, and be able to compare current M5 and the new “Keisei inside” one.

    I will post my results.

    I do like this Io1+S4+M5 RIAA combo :agree:
     
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