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In Reply to: RE: Zu DL 103 MK2, 6 Moons Best under 1K MC, anyone tried ..? posted by Dave Garretson on February 02, 2016 at 05:59:08
I wonder whether the less expensive SS LC stylus affords a warmer sound without sacrificing too much of what is good about the OCL, which would be just about perfecto.
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I ran modified Denon 103R's (rebodied in clavellin, ebony and aluminum-the aluminum and ebony were also potted by Peter at Soundsmith) retipped by Soundsmith with both his standard ($250) LC and the OCL for about 4 years.
I wouldn't say the standard LC is any warmer-it and the OCL are about equal in that regard. The OCL is slightly more detailed (and the standard line contact is much more detailed than the stock Denon conical-it's not even close) and a bit more refined IMO but it is much more demanding of setup. The OCL is worth it IMO but you need an arm with adjustable VTA and azimuth.
I'm now running a totally different cartridge (an Ortofon MC 20 Super) that was totally rebuilt by Andy Kim with a boron cantilever and microridge stylus. It has a slightly different presentation. "Warmer" is probably not the best description for it but I think it is a bit more neutral and less "up front" than the SS retipped Denons I was using. The Ortofon has more of a mid hall presentation while I'd describe the SS retipped Denon as being more "front row".
I'd say that detail retrieval and refinement is every bit as good on Andy's microridge as Peter's OCL. In my system the boron cantilevered Ortofon is quieter in the groove and more natural sounding but that may also be a function of better synergy with my phono stage as the Ortofon has much lower interal impedance and I'm using a current mode phono stage which presents a very low impedance to the cartridge at the input.
Thanks for relating your observations regarding the different styli. I read some scuttlebutt elsewhere to the effect that the less expensive SS LC was in some ways preferred over the OCL, on the Grace F9 body. My perception of my Grace Ruby cum OCL stylus is very much the same as yours of the OCL stylus on a Denon (forward to mid-hall sounding, detailed), which should tell us something about the dominant effect of cantilever/stylus shape on how cartridges sound. However, my Grace may not yet be fully broken in, with only about 20 hours on it so far. In addition to affording "front row" perspective, the Grace does also do a great job with piano and strings, nice rounded tones as in real life. I hear no issues with groove noise, but the perception of this phenomenon has to be somewhat dependent upon the phono stage, the speakers, and other elements in the chain.
I've never quite understood what is meant by "current mode" as applied to a phono stage. If the phono load resistance is high (e.g., 47K), then the stage is responding mostly to signal voltage, as for MM cartridges. If the load resistance is "low" (e.g., 100R), as when the stage is driven by an LOMC with a low internal resistance, then the system becomes more in current mode. LOMCs produce very low signal voltage but are pretty good as current generators. Some manufacturers of phono stages like to talk about "current mode", I guess, but I am not sure how that is applied in circuit design.
If you only have about 20 hours on the Grace OCL I think you'll find it will smooth out some more up to around the 50-60 hour mark.
My gut feeling is that the slightly more forward, tilted toward detail nature of the SS retips is due more to the cantilever material, ruby, than actual stylus shape but I could be wrong. The Boron cantilevered cartridges I've owned have been voiced, as I said, with a slightly more distant perspective-the detail is still there but it doesn't seem to be quite as "highlighted" as it does with Peter's ruby retips.
Personally, I think the criticisms of SS OCL vs. the $250 line contact are due more to its finicky setup. They're both a bit "forward" for lack of a better word, but I think the OCL can be just a bit too aggressive for some people if it's not really dialed in and set up properly. Peter acknowledges on the website that it is difficult to set up. Plus I think they both take a good 50-60 hours to settle in and some people may just lack patience.
I can't really see how anyone would prefer the standard to the OCL but that might just be me. There's no question to me that the OCL retrieves more of what's on the record and is more refined at the same time and that's ultimately what it's all about in my book. Peter's OCL and Andy Kim's microridge on boron are both at the top of the heap for that with slightly different "flavors"-I think I'm just more partial to the sound of boron cantilevers now.
I'm not a real technical guy but some of the aspects of current mode phono preamps (there are very few out there) are covered in the review of the BMC linked to below. I use the Aqvox (it is also a Carlos Candeias design and similar in many ways) and a lot of the reviewers of the Aqvox suggested it really has synergy with lower impedance MC's. The 103R has fairly low impedance of 14 ohms but my present cartridge at 5 ohms is very low and really sounds great with the Aqvox so I'd have to say that is my experience as well.
Please understand that I am not complaining about the OCL re-tip on the Grace; I like it quite a bit. However, I would agree with the characterization that it favors detail over warmth. On the other hand, after the first hour or two, it has not been at all irritating. In fact, it yields such a "big" sound that this compensates a bit for the respect in which it may be said to be lean and detailed. If it were irritating, I wouldn't be listening to it every night for the past week and a half. Your thesis that the sapphire/ruby cantilever may contribute to this quality of its sound does not hold up based on how the re-tip sounds compared to the original Grace Ruby, which of course also has/had a sapphire cantilever. The original Ruby (I still have one other Ruby with its original cantilever/stylus) is anything but lean, but who knows? Over the weekend, I auditioned another system that was decidedly too warm and bass heavy. When I got home, the re-tipped Grace sounded really thin by comparison. After a second night (Tuesday), I heard it as being well balanced by comparison to the other system. The brain conditions itself. (What made the other system so colored in the low midrange and bass frequencies was not its cartridge but probably a combo of speakers and amplification.)
Prior to listening last night, I also discovered that my cartridge was a bit askew in the headshell, which could certainly create problems with the OCL stylus. Re-aligning the cartridge body with the long axis of the headshell seemed to make a noticeable difference for the better, as you might expect.
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