Yep, I got that - a foot long run of BJC low capacitance cable. And an iphono2 which has a very satisfying number of switches to play with. I do recall a slightly tippy sound to the MLX... but that's the kind of thing that may mellow with time, either between my ears or something physical. I do have a thing for these awesome trackers, which is why hearing that the ART9 tracks worse than cheaper carts makes me very cautious to pull the trigger on that.
Very good information, thank you. The 33PTG/II still works extremely well on modern medium mass tonearms, I wonder why more MC cartridge makers don't opt for higher compliance? I understand the old days of high mass tonearms and old MC cartridges, but we've come very, very far from those times. My friend has a Japanese cartridge where the first version was $5k (current II is probably far more) that tracks poorly regardless of tonearm (air bearing Kuzma, Tri-Planar 9", older VPI 12" unipivot). Yet I rarely see tracking performance mentioned in hifi press reviews.
Tracking performance is something that is hard to test. It requires work and most writers/reviewers aren't going to put the work in. Instead they use some tame "demo" tracks and review of the "tone" of the cartridge. The best they will do is try some torture bands on the HFN LP or similar but that doesn't tell you how it tracks on actual records, particularly tough inner grooves. Now, when I get a new cart, the first thing I do is grab all my toughest to track records with tight inner grooves and play those. If there is a hint of exaggerated sibilance on those I know the cart isn't up to my standards. And yeah, a high compliance MC will probably track better than a lower compliance one for these purposes. There are some companies that do make them, but you have to search them out. I suppose "mid compliance" MCs are going to be more plentiful.
I was wondering if anyone can help me with finding out the compatibility between ART-9 and the Technics 1200G arm with the stock headshell. The problems that I have with calculating this are: I am not sure what is the effective mass of the Technics arm, I have read reports online that it is 12g or less but I cannot find any official data. Also, same for the stock headshell, I have read that it weights 5.67g or more with the wires. The biggest problem that I have is with ART9's compliance. There are two values there, dynamic 18 × 10-6 cm/dyne (100Hz) and then static, 35 × 10-6 cm/dyne. Why is the compliance quoted in 100hz instead of 10hz? This is so confusing. Thanks in advance to anyone that can shed some light to these questions.
Because Japanese companies do thinks differently than everyone else. There is also a high chance that the dynamic value is wrong anyway. 18 @ 100hz makes no sense - that looks more like a 10hz value given that when AT specs a cart @100hz dynamic the number is usually around 10 when the static is 35, as is here. Given a static value of 35, the dynamic at 10hz is probably half that or a little bit less than half that. In other words, likely medium compliance. Grand Class Direct Drive Turntable System SL-1200G Hi-Fi Audio | Technics US Says the HS is 7.6g, I would assume that is without lead wires or hardware. Unfortunately they don't list effective mass of the tonearm + HS. Maybe email them and ask.
Maybe I missed it, but I don't see any mention to the arm effective mass in the manual. I just see head shell weight = Approx. 7.6 g
I have read test reports saying that the G tonearm effective mass is 8-9g which puts it in the low mass category. I scoured the internet for how to convert compliance of Japanese cartridges like the ART-9 from 100Hz to 10Hz before I purchased it for my old VPI which had a tonearm eff mass of 10.1g. There are a few different ways to do it including conversion factors and static compliance but my personal conclusion was that it gets you in the ball park but is not as accurate as 10Hz dynamic compliance specifications. It is safe to say that the 1200 G has a low mass tonearm and that the ART9 is at least moderate to high compliance which would make it a good match. The ART-9 sounded great on my VPI and even better on my 1200 GR with no ringing or miss-tracking that happens with a bad match. Other ART-9 users have reported great success with similar low mass arms and the new 1200 G/GAE/GR tables. You should be fine.
Just get one of those cheap knock-off Chinese Technics-style headshells. These weight just a bit more than do the stock HS and should make for a nearly perfect match with the Art 9 I would guess.
To know the exact compliance at 10 Hz, you must do a measurement on a test record or use the run-out groove of a normal record where you can hear the "click" every turn and then measure the resonance. Miller Audio measured the ATOC9II and III to 14-17 cu vertical compliance and 28-39 horizontal resonance. Not sure if the difference is in the cartridge or a different effective mass of the tonearm in the different directions that cause a wrong number (quite normal for standard tonearms due to different mass at the rotating pivot). Anyway Moerch recommends the BLUE tonearm tube to the 33PTGII and that arm is 14 g effective mass ("heavy") while RED arm tube is recommended to the OC9 and ART1 which is 7.5 g effective mass ("medium"). Moerch usually base their recommended arm tubes on actual measured response to get safe values around 10 Hz resonance.
And to complicate things, AT gives spec for the OC9/II as 9/35 for dynamic/static compliance and for OC9/III 18/35. To me it is unclear how the dynamic/static values can be translated to the measured response of 14/28 vertical/horisontal compliance at 10 hz for the OC9/II and 17/39 for the OC9/III. The ART 7 gives a specified compliance of 10/35 dynamic/static.
I like AT stuff. I checked audio technica ath m50x frequency response recently and decided to order them for my home studio. I'm new in music production but want to start making my own music in the near future.
I believe that you are overthinking this. All of these calculations are really just approximations at best anyways based upon spec sheets which, at best, represent average samples. And I'd be willing to bet that even if one did the math perfectly to 10 decimal point of precision that you are still going to have enough cartridge-to-cartridge variation to cause the actual resonance to differ slightly from one's calculations. If your resonant frequency is off slightly from the ideal 10Hz, its not going to kill you. The experience of those who have already tried nearly this exact combination and who have reported that it works great and sound fantastic is worth the weight of 10,000 spec sheets IMO. And all that one needs to do to improve the theoretical match between the arm and cartridge is to use a heavier headshell. Yes, you might have some real problems if you ever needed to reduce the effective mass of your arm to achieve a resonance frequency which is within the zone. But this is not the case here. And adding a few grams of mass to the arm of a G or a GR is as simple as ordering a ~$15 knock-off replacement headshell from KAB.
Pretty sure the 18/35 value for the OC9/III is wrong like I said above. The differences in the actual measurements must be down to sample variation or some kind of error. 14 and 17 are reasonably close but 28 and 39 seem too far apart there. I agree that measuring resonance is always the best course of action. On the 1200 and other tables like it, lots of headshell options, so if the stock one doesn't produce the desired resonance numbers @5-String can just swap out the headshell for a heavier or lighter one to get the desired resonance number.
True, I have a few head shells that I can try to experiment with, but I am waiting for the cartridge to beak a little more before going to that direction. Also, let me just say that I am getting impressed every time I play something with the ART-9, it is a very good sounding cart.
I am using an Audio Technica MG-11 headshell with my ART9 on a 1200G. Works a treat. It's nice having tapped holes in the headshell since AT didn't provide threaded holes on the cartridge itself. It is perfectly aligned using the second set of tapped holes from the front and the arm elevation set at "0". I did have to play with the azimuth ever so slightly.
I agree on most things with respect to problems playing like skipping or heavy visible wobbling, you seldom see that with arm/cartridges. In those cases you have resonances that create severe problems. It is just that moving up a few Hz, e.g. from 8 to 11 Hz lowers the warp-induced noise. Since you are dealing with several distortion components already, it is IMO a good idea to keep the stylus working at the optimal conditions. Being off does not kill you, agreed, but playing while knowing that there may be improvements to be made can be quite frustrating.
Could be a misprint, but it would also be great to get measured compliance values of these AT cartridges both lateral/vertical from another source. I am sure that there are some forum members that using these AT cartridges that also have a copy of the Hifi News test LP. It has been done for the Nagaokas that show quite different values than you would expect from their stated static/dynamic values.
Highly unlikely it is 18@100hz. Maybe 18@10hz. Measurements are the only way to know for sure. Even then not perfect.
I'm new to this the SUT issue and would sure appreciate some help. I just received my new ART9 cartridge and had a chance to get a like new Signet XK50 / AT-1100 tonearm. This is pretty nice arm by any standards and according to a couple of inside people at AT should be a perfect match for the cartridge. They said that they still use the 1100 and the 1010 as reference when they design their carts - who knows. I also got an extra arm tube that I may try to move the fittings to a carbon fiber tube. Anyway, I have a SUT made by Reisong. It is 1:20 step up which it puts its output at 10mv for the Art9. Running sweeps through it on a scope show its channel tracing to be dead on. My PAS4 preamp phono section has: min input of 1mv / a gain of 40db / Input impedence of 47K shunted by 10pf / phono overload of 500mv at 1kv. Would this SUT be suitable or would it need some modification? If so, what and how to do it. I'm good at assembly and kits, etc but not at solving this mystery. Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks in advance.
I'm not sure what mystery you are trying to solve. You've got a very nice sounding preamp, and you've been using the cartridge and SUT together for a few months and like the sound, and you've made measurements showing the frequency response is good, and the loading is right where the manufacturer and many others suggest is best at around 120 ohms, so personally I'd just sit back and enjoy the music. Normally a 10mV input level could lead to overload on some of the modern breed of wall wart-powered opamp-based phono preamps with their 40mV overload margins, but obviously not on a well-designed tube unit like yours. The only mystery in my mind is can you really get a good SUT for under $200, but you seem to have answered that too. I posted about the Reisong awhile back in another thread just as an example of what was becoming available from China, but didn't realize anyone around here was using one yet. Keep us posted on your feelings about it, that could be a great alternative for those not averse to using Chinese audio gear... Why are SUT's so expensive?
Hi guys, I bought my ART9 in Jan. 2017 and have been very happy with it. I have however become convinced that it is time for a new stylus.. Just sounds off the last few months. I am retired so I play a lot of records. I haven't tracked the hours but my best guess is that it has appox. 1500-2000 hours on it. I checked with Audio Technica and as stated in the manual they will replace it for appox half the price of a new cartridge ($535). Has anyone replaced theirs yet? Does AT replace the whole cart or do they just retip it? I clean the stylus regularly and check it via a jewelers eye magnifier. Any thoughts appreciated.
I haven't dug through all of the posts, but I am curious how this cartridge would fair with a moderate mass (13.4g) tonearm with a knife edge bearing. My understanding is that with knife edge bearings, perfect compliance matching isn't too much of an issue. FWIW, my 2m Bronze (22 µm/mN) runs fine without issue. I tried to reach out to Jelco with this specific question and got the following canned response: "This tonearm is employed very sensitive mechanism. So, any cartridge can be used and get best its performance ability."
