Why Don't All Modern Turntables Have P n P Headshells?

Discussion in 'Audio Hardware' started by Day_Tripper2019, Oct 18, 2019.

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  1. Day_Tripper2019

    Day_Tripper2019 Forum Resident Thread Starter

    Location:
    Sydney
    It seems like those dj decks have the right idea about having a cart already mounted and just changing the head shell.

    Thoughts?
     
  2. vinnn

    vinnn Forum Resident

    Location:
    England
    The headshell introduces an additional connection in the tonearm wire thus introducing additional resistance between the cart and the phono connection.
    Whether this is a major issue with MM carts we could debate but I'd imagine this'd be more of an issue with low output MC carts and with audio purists in general who prefer to tweak with capacitance and achieve exact azimuth adjustment.

    Alternatively, the likes of Rega and Clearaudio eschew detachable phono cables (ensuring their chosen phono cable is soldered directly to the tonearm wire) for that purer cart>phono-amp chain. I'm currently in this camp having a Rega and it sounds pretty great to me.
     
    Last edited: Oct 18, 2019
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  3. Ortofon still make SPU pickups which are incorporated into headshells.
     
  4. Pythonman

    Pythonman Forum Resident

    Location:
    Florida
    Because, Koetsu.
     
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  5. chervokas

    chervokas Senior Member

    Why would you want to have to change the headshell every time you want to change the cartridge? That's paying for extra stuff. Also, why would every cartridge manufacturer have to make all kinds of different headshells with different mounting systems and weights to match all kinds of different arms that are out there in order to sell its cartridges, especially when a vast number of buyers have one-piece tonearms or tonearms with non-user replaceable headshells?
     
  6. SME arms and Technics arms used the same headshell mounting system.
     
  7. Pastafarian

    Pastafarian Forum Resident

    If you're engineering a tone arm the headshell forms part of the resonance characteristics, so a non replaceable headshell makes sense.

    I wouldn't want my choice to be limited to a cartridge who's manufacturer's is making a suitable headshell.
     
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  8. chervokas

    chervokas Senior Member

    OK, But there aren't only SME and Technics arms installed on all the turntables across the world. In 45 years of owning turntables, for one I've never owned and SME or Technics tonearm. In fact, I don't think I've ever owned a tonearm with a replaceable headshell at all. I'm just one consumer of course, but there are millions of other installed tonearms out there that aren't SMEs or Technics or don't have removable headshells at all. If I'm a cart manufacturer, I'm not sure I'd much care to force people to buy headshells they don't need to get them to buy my carts. Or that I'd want to add the step of manufacturing and/or buying headshells and having the carts installed on them in order to sell the carts. It's adding more cost and time to your production, and if it's eliminating a minor barrier for some buyers (having to install the cart in the headshell they already own), it's adding a barrier for many others (having to uninstall a cart from a headshell they're just going to toss).
     
  9. caracallac

    caracallac Forum Resident

    Location:
    Ireland
    The most likely reason is that most of the super arms which became available during the twilight of the vinyl era were designed with low compliance moving coil cartridges in mind so rigidity of the head-shell was a considered a critical factor in performance. In the case of the arm I have, the SME V it's designer Alastair Robertson Aikman pretty much perfected the implementation of the Ortofon mounting system back in the late 1950's but 25 years later when it came to designing his statement piece he chose the fixed head shell route.
     
  10. Subagent

    Subagent down the rabbit hole, they argue over esoterica

    Location:
    Arlington, VA
    Not everyone cares to change cartridges all that often. I realize that some folks get enjoy "rolling" carts, and for them a removable headshell is a big deal. Of course, it's a convenience regardless of how frequently one changes carts. In my case, I don't set up my own cartridges and I change them only after many hours (typically 2 or more years), so I'm satisfied with the integrated headshell and the more direct wiring that goes along with it.
     
  11. allied333

    allied333 Audiophile

    Location:
    nowhere
    My Luxman PD272 has integrated head shell.
     
  12. Rolltide

    Rolltide Forum Resident

    Location:
    Vallejo, CA
    It is possible to special order an EMT 997 tone arm that will use the EMT headshell mounting system.

    ...but if you don’t do that, you’ll find every arm or headshell made in the past 40-50 years uses the SME standard. This idea that there are compatibility issues, proprietary connections, etc is just silly. “Forcing people to buy headshells” :crazy:
     
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  13. Randoms

    Randoms Aerie Faerie Nonsense

    Location:
    UK
    It's a convenient compromise that the majority are more than willing to make.

    Those extra electrical connections can hardly improve the sound and if the arm collar has any (microns) of movement, you are also losing / blurring musical information, which is also why some fixed tonearms also have additional vertical bracing on the headshell.

    I've only had a removable headshell on the first proper turntable I owned, the Rega R200 on a Planar 3 from 1979. Having installed hundreds of cartridges, I've personally had no problems with a fixed headshell, and having always bought a cartridge I knew I liked, simply played records with it until it needed replacing, or upgraded to something substantially better.

    I've never had a specialist mono, or 78 cartridge, so I had no need for the convenience of being able to swap cartridge just by swapping headshells. To my mind, a good £600 cartridge (mounted in a good arm, on an excellent turntable) outperforms 2 £300 cartridges, or 3 £200 cartridges, so again no benefit of multiple jalternative pre-mounted cartridges.
     
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  14. Rolltide

    Rolltide Forum Resident

    Location:
    Vallejo, CA
    It would be interesting to compare two arms that were otherwise identical except for a removable headshell. SME comes close to this with the M2 line, but not quite (the detachable headshell version is also J vs. straight). I just don't think there's really much to the idea there's a tangible loss in sound quality. I suspect this became an audio fact around the same time manufacturers realized people don't use pickup heads anymore and its cheaper to manufacture an arm with a fixed headshell.

    I do agree that people who find themselves constantly swapping cartridges under the auspices of "different flavors" tend to stop doing this when they find one that is definitely better then the others.
     
  15. patient_ot

    patient_ot Senior Member

    Location:
    USA
    If anyone is interested in how this stuff shakes out in actual measurements and objective tests, check out the Korf Audio blog. They did a number of vibration tests on different headshells and tested a few different tonearms as well as tonearm materials for their own tonearm prototype. The results would probably surprise a number of people.

    The Rega RB300 did not measure all that well w/r/t "headshell" vibrations via the integrated headshell.
     
  16. Big Blue

    Big Blue Forum Resident

    Location:
    Wisconsin
    I am confused. Why would the cartridge manufacturers need to have anything to do with the headshells? Are we all talking about the same thing here? The bayonet-mount headshell employed by SME and Technics is a pretty standardized system, is it not?

    I am reading OP’s question as asking why aren’t more tonearms bayonet-mount like Technics/SME/all the DJ turntable tonearms? I don’t see what that has to do with cartridge manufacturers, whose 1/2-inch mount cartridges go on any of the various headshells on the market. :confused:
     
  17. patient_ot

    patient_ot Senior Member

    Location:
    USA
    Bingo, if a cart manufacturer is doing their job, they will need to make the cartridge body such that it can be mounted on either a one piece tonearm or a headshell with SME-style connector. Not to mention, a number of manufacturers had proprietary headshells back in the 70s and 80s. Cart companies had to account for those and they usually did.

    The other thing is not all cart manufacturers make their own headshells, nor do they need to. Even if they sell a branded headshell, odds are it was made by a third party OEM for them.
     
  18. harby

    harby Forum Resident

    Location:
    Portland, OR, USA
    [​IMG]
     
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  19. McLover

    McLover Senior Member

    Big problem, different SME style tonearms have different overhang. The Ortofon mentioned here is 52 mm, Pioneer in their classic era was 49 mm and several other makes had different overhang. Most of the early such integrated headshell/cartridge combinations (plug and play) had adjustable overhang. This concept is a nice idea to revive with adjustable overhang for S and J shaped SME style tonearm users.
     
  20. snorker

    snorker Big Daddy

    Right, but isn’t Ortofon the only/last manufacturer to do this? Even the P-mounts could use an adapter to fit on a regular headshell, right?

    Generally though, I think @Big Blue is right. It really doesn’t matter to the cartridge manufacturers (other than Ortofon) because the 1/2” mounts fit both a removable headshell and a fixed headshell.

    I personally prefer the detachable headshell because it makes it a lot easier to install and align, as well as make the occasional swap.
     
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  21. snorker

    snorker Big Daddy

    Exactly. The Concorde and SPU only fit certain tonearms. Because arms aren’t universal, there really can’t be a universal plug and play that wouldn’t require any adjustment to get proper alignment and overhang.
     
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  22. Bob_in_OKC

    Bob_in_OKC Forum Resident

    Location:
    Dallas, Texas
    I don't understand whether OP is asking about removable headshells or truly the PnP mentioned in the subject line. When it comes to removable headshells, that's probably one of those two-side debates that can never be settled. If it's truly about the PnP cartridges, it's simple. They require exactly one length. Coordinating the whole industry into a geometry that requires the Ortofon length isn't feasible.
     
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  23. Rolltide

    Rolltide Forum Resident

    Location:
    Vallejo, CA
    Yes and no. While it's true that not every tonearm w/detachable shell ever made will work with a Concorde/SPU, the world has generally fallen into line with the 52mm spec. Which is why Ortofon confidently sells Concordes and SPUs. If you take into account you have to ignore what the manual says for a couple older Jelco-OEM'd Ortofon arms, I don't think it's possible to buy a tonearm w/ the SME mount that isn't 52mm.
     
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  24. Big Blue

    Big Blue Forum Resident

    Location:
    Wisconsin
    I didn’t take that to be specifically what he meant, though, because he mentions headshell. I thought he was talking about just having headshells set up ready to change.
     
  25. snorker

    snorker Big Daddy

    Very true. Can’t think of too many (any?) on the market now that don’t use 52mm. Certainly any designed to work with a SPU are set up for 52mm.
     
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