ortofon om 30 or at-vm95ml

Here what i have.
pioneer pl 41
little bear t11
yamaha a-s501
klipsch rp-260f
My question that i have is should i upgrade my at-vm95e to a at-vm95ml or upgrade my om 10 to a om 30.
I have hear a om 30 on my setup and really liked the sound,but and i dont know how i did this i lose the
om 30 stylus.I was wondering if the at-vm95ml would be close to the sound of the om 30 if i upgrade my
stylus to a vm95ml. Thanks.

 

What is the effective mass of the arm?

The OM30 and the VM95ML are very different cartridges, meant for different types of arms.

If a lightweight arm, the OM30 is better suited.

If a medium mass, or medium-heavy effective mass arm, then the 95ML is better suited.

If you already know you like the OM30 on your turntable, then that is probably a better bet for you.

 

The OM30 is a lovely stylus using one on a Concorde-R and if you like the sound of the cartridge is an excellent upgrade.

 

They are similar in performance. The OM has a little more mid-bass punch, but the old Pioneer deck has that as well, so the AT was actually a more commonly installed cartridge by owners of the Pioneer decks and other Japanese units of that era. The ML stylus is even nicer than what most used back in the day, so it'll track great.
-Bill

 

I belive the pl 41 has a medium-heavy arm.I am just curious about the at-vm95ml.

 

ok thanks bill

 

The VM95ML is a great cartridge, possibly better suited to your arm. To know for sure you'd need to analyze the resonance of your current OM10 + arm. If you can make a WAV digital recording of 1 minute of music from your REC OUT or phono preamp out into a computer I can help you with this.

Note that whatever cartridge you use it is going to be affected by your preamp and other gear. Note that AT recommends between 100-200pf total capacitance for the 95ML, while Ortofon recommends 200-500 for the OM30. I can't find a capacitance spec for the Little Bear. Also note the distortion figures are fairly high on the LB but that may not be out of the ordinary for a tube phono pre. I prefer to stick with solid state for my own use.

 

Ok I will see what I can come up with.I have a Schiit mani too.I just go the t11 so far I like the sound from it wide sound stage.

 

Thanks patient_ot for your help.

 

1200 MK2 -- lightweight or medium mass arm?

 

i would say light side of medium haha

 

Concorde-R won't work on his Pioneer. Wrong geometry. His Pioneer is 49 mm overhang, and the Ortofon is 52 mm overhang to get Stevenson alignment. Concorde works great on a Technics, but not a Pioneer, and I own both of these makes. I have both a SL-1500 and a PL-518.

 

With that specific TT you've got a 12g effective mass arm with the stock headshell.

Either cart would work but the OM30 is higher compliance and you'll get a lower resonance number. In all likelihood it would be fine, but I would probably want a KAB damper on the arm for a cart like that.

With the 95ML, you'll probably get better performance if you use a headshell that is just slightly heavier than the stock one. I use a 10g headshell with mine.

 

They have pretty substantially different sounds.

I prefer the sound of the OM30, but the Audio Technica substantially out-tracks it at low frequencies (although the OM30 may have a very slight advantage at middle and high frequencies).

But the Ortofon is no good if you have records with significant warps, just not enough clearance, IMHO.

If everything is just right, that Ortofon can sound superb. But the vinyl has gotta be fairly flat.