IGD seem to be common on recent purchases

Absolutely. Where the conical mistracks, like inner grooves or high frequencies, it will wear on them fast.
The table or arm matters little, the stylus is whats contacting the groove, if it cant follow the groove properly it will wear a lot on it.

I can show you proof if you wish.

 

Any mistracking stylus will produce wear, I think we're talking different things. Is like say cars didn't work because inevitably the fuel will be empty.

Improper use of stuff isn't an argument.

 

The analogy would be like having a freight truck drive through a windy bike road. It wont fit no matter how good the driver is and thus run over signs and railings. Thats a conical trying to follow high frequency inner grooves.
Im not talking worn styli.

 

Well, I understand better your post now, I couldn't see that your position was ... something more basic about conical stylus.

we can agree to disagree ...

Conical only fits different in the groove and cannot track as well as other profiles, but ... it doesn't mean groove wear. Also, conical in mc cartridges have better tracking than in mm, due to less moving mass.

But, it's ok, as I said, free will.

 

But worse tracking = more wear, its by definition and conicals cant track certain grooves, its geometrically impossible. See below:



Also MC is typically more mass than fixed coil designs, see below one of the smaller MC designs:


Where do you get this information from?

 

Poor conical styli and elliptical styli do. Not all conical and elliptical styli are poor quality. The conical you denigrate, at least one of those was used to calibrate lacquer mastering systems by, that being the Stanton 681 A of yore. Food for thought.

The Stereohedron on the same platform was also a recording industry reference standard for A&R audition in record companies, quality control in pressing plants, and by quality minded broadcast stations. Places where mistracking and sibilance are not tolerated.

For me, the best Ortofon MM far and away was the earliest series, the VMS 20 my favorite.

 

Theres no difference in quality of conical styli, its a rounded diamond, if its something else its not a conical. Elipticals can vary.

Just because they are used as testing standards in the past doesnt mean they are optimal, no correlation there. It could just as well be the other way around, since most everyone used conicals back in the day and they had to consider limiting the signal more for that.

 

Both gross overgeneralizations.
HOMC cartridges tend to have a greater moving mass than a LOMC and it can exceed that of MM cartridges that use modern neodymium magnets.
However, a LOMC has much less windings (hence the lower output voltage), and is likely to provide less moving mass than traditional MM cartridges that use Alnico magnets.
And even when making these more specific distinctions, there are many variations and exceptions to these of course.

 

Back in the day, records with few exceptions had to be playable on a much wider range of playback equipment. You know that. You also know, bass had to be sharply filtered, and high frequency content had to be dealt with in terms of keeping it within what tonearms and cartridges could handle. Basic audio engineering. But you also know records then and now have compromises sometimes in how they're mastered and pressed. Perfect is not reality. Excellence can be done.

Like I have said time and time again, the stylus you can afford to replace when it wears out gets replaced. The one most can't afford gets used until it's used up way beyond when it should have been replaced ages ago. There is no one size fits all in cartridges and in styli. No one type which plays every record optimally either.

 

Im pretty sure the one pictured is a LOMC.

 

Thats why I never use old records for benchmarking. Who knows how worn those grooves are and with the cutbacks on the signal it doesnt match up against modern audiophile reissues.

Its true that no one stylus is optimal for every record. But in general the finer shapes are much superior. No matter what shape it is it should be replaced after 500 - 1000 hours though.

 

Then do you play nothing but new records? Old and new records often have different playback needs. Especially to get the best out of them. Fine Line for everything is not an answer. What I play my audiophile super discs with, and what I play my older discs with is different. I use the best tool (stylus profile) for the job, which isn't always the FineLine.

I play everything from 78 RPM shellac and broadcast transcriptions, to the modern audiophile LP, and all points in between. I want the music in the case of vintage discs, I want no out of band surface noise or other artifacts, I want the music in the best light possible with records which will never have more than a certain frequency range on them.

 

Well, usually when we talk about mc cartridges (without other specification) we're referring to LOMC ...