Great cartridges from the past

[Joe Pittman]

Winston Ma was considering reissuing some Direct-To-Disc LP's from the past like M&K's For Duke and others. He called it his "Dream Project". The idea was to create copies of the D2D LP's using some great phono cartridges from the past and recording to tape. Winston had three cartridges in his collection he though would be good candidates for the project, they were Kiseki Lapis Lazuli, Win Labs FET-10 and Audio Note IO LTD. Winston asked me and Gary Koh to check the cartridges out and advise him. The cartridges ultimately were not suitable due to their age and condition, but evaluating them was very interesting. The Dream Project never went forward, but I though member of the forum would be interested in some of my observations. If anyone has interesting experiences with great phono cartridges from the past, please share.

Kiseki Lapis Lazuli was one of the great cartridges from the past utilizing solid gem stone quality Lapis Lazuli and a real diamond cantilever. The suspension was no longer optimal so it's performance had diminished. Still, it had some of it's magic and was the best sounding of the bunch. I fantasize what the sound would be like if the suspension was brand new. It was something special.





Win Labs FET-10 is a "Field Effect Transducer" and is unlike the strain gauge cartridges that Dr. Sau Win is famous for. Unlike the vast majority of cartridges out there that generate electrical power, the FET-10 actually transmits a signal to an external preamplifier for creation of the analog waveform power. The cartridge actually was capable of performance down to 1 Hz! Although it's overall performance was noisy and not competitive with current cartridges, it had the best bass I've ever heard from a cartridge by a big margin. This was really a laboratory quality product. I can only imagine how good this cartridge could be using current technology and a DARPA budget. For detailed information see the following documents: http://www.kosmic.us/WinFET-10Instruction.pdf and http://www.kosmic.us/WinFET-10Technical.pdf






Audio Note IO LTD was given to Winston by Kondo in appreciation for all the business Winston gave him in Hong Kong. This very special cartridge used a field coil for generating the magnetic field for the moving coil rather than a permanent magnet. If you look closely at the picture, you will see that it has 6 pins. Two pins were for the external DC power supply. Two wires were run from the power supply taped to the arm tube. The cartridge had ultra-low output and was played through a Kondo pure silver SUT. Again, the cartridge suspension was too old for optimal performance, but the cartridge definitely had some magic. I fantasized how good the cartridge would be if Kondo was still around to produce a modernized model.

[JCOConnell]

Why couldn't that project be completed using the best cartridges of today? Disc to Disc transfer, that is interesting.

[Joe Pittman]

Why couldn't that project be completed using the best cartridges of today? Disc to Disc transfer, that is interesting.

Winston didn't go forward with his Dream Project because he was not able to get licensing for the D2D titles he wanted to reissue. The project could definitely be completed using the best phono cartridges currently available. This sort of thing has been done before, check out Audiophile Legends Monty Alexander Solo by Jeton which is a remaster of the original D2D.

[Rob]

Winston didn't go forward with his Dream Project because he was not able to get licensing for the D2D titles he wanted to reissue. The project could definitely be completed using the best phono cartridges currently available. This sort of thing has been done before, check out Audiophile Legends Monty Alexander Solo by Jeton which is a remaster of the original D2D.

Joe, those D2D Jeton records and the majority of D2D recording sessions were rolling tape simultaneously. M&K CD's were mastered this way, Sheffields treasury series were the same, I could go on and on.

With all due respect to Winston, I see no point in transferring D2D to tape and back to vinyl or whatever. What the world needs instead is more new music recorded to D2D.

[JCOConnell]

Yeah, I could imagine the licensing would either be too expensive or a legal nightmare or both. Many of those companies went out of business. But that would be really cool to get high quality reissues of classic D2Ds of the past.

[JCOConnell]

Joe, those D2D Jeton records and the majority of D2D recording sessions were rolling tape simultaneously. M&K CD's were mastered this way, Sheffields treasury series were the same, I could go on and on.

With all due respect to Winston, I see no point in transferring D2D to tape and back to vinyl or whatever. What the world needs instead is more new music recorded to D2D.

I missed the part about recording to tape first. That makes no sense. The best way to do it is from disc (turntable) to disc (cutting lathe).

[Joe Pittman]

I missed the part about recording to tape first. That makes no sense. The best way to do it is from disc (turntable) to disc (cutting lathe).

I agree the best copy of a D2D would be to go direct to a cutting lathe, but we did not go that direction due to cost/logistics. On a positive note, we planned on tape guru Ki Choi to make the tape on one of his ultra great Studer's.

Meanwhile, Gary Koh with Genesis is planning on producing a new D2D with Anne Bisson. That's what we really need are new D2D's...

[Joe Pittman]

Joe, those D2D Jeton records and the majority of D2D recording sessions were rolling tape simultaneously. M&K CD's were mastered this way, Sheffields treasury series were the same, I could go on and on.

With all due respect to Winston, I see no point in transferring D2D to tape and back to vinyl or whatever. What the world needs instead is more new music recorded to D2D.

The only D2D's we were considering were ones which no tape was made at the same time as the original D2D session. Creating a tape copy was more of a financial consideration. The objective of the project was to reissue some rare D2D's which can be hard to find now.

I totally agree that some new D2D's would be cool.

[david k]

Hi Joe,

As a vintage cartridge aficionado with a decent sized collection I've come to realize that so many of the hyped super cartridges from 80's & 90's like Koetsu, Kiseki, AN and some others were/are plain horrible; colored & hifi sounding while many of the so called ordinary ones snubbed but the likes of HP and high-end community have stood the test of time and compare favorably and in some cases better than the best of today. So I'm not sure how Mr. Ma would have felt had he heard his cartridges again with more experienced ears...

david

[Joe Pittman]

Hi Joe,

As a vintage cartridge aficionado with a decent sized collection I've come to realize that so many of the hyped super cartridges from 80's & 90's like Koetsu, Kiseki, AN and some others were/are plain horrible; colored & hifi sounding while many of the so called ordinary ones snubbed but the likes of HP and high-end community have stood the test of time and compare favorably and in some cases better than the best of today. So I'm not sure how Mr. Ma would have felt had he heard his cartridges again with more experienced ears...

david

Had Winston gone forward with the Dream Project, he would used the best cartridge he could find. Looking at the three cartridges in this thread was something he thought of initially and would only have used if they were actually great. Winston was a perfectionist and never produced anything he did not personally endorse.

[MylesBAstor]

Hi Joe,

As a vintage cartridge aficionado with a decent sized collection I've come to realize that so many of the hyped super cartridges from 80's & 90's like Koetsu, Kiseki, AN and some others were/are plain horrible; colored & hifi sounding while many of the so called ordinary ones snubbed but the likes of HP and high-end community have stood the test of time and compare favorably and in some cases better than the best of today. So I'm not sure how Mr. Ma would have felt had he heard his cartridges again with more experienced ears...

david

I don't necessarily disagree with the hyped cartridges but am curious what ordinary cartridges you feel have stood the test of time. I never understood until the newer stone bodies why Koetsu was so highly revered.

[MylesBAstor]

Winston Ma was considering reissuing some Direct-To-Disc LP's from the past like M&K's For Duke and others. He called it his "Dream Project". The idea was to create copies of the D2D LP's using some great phono cartridges from the past and recording to tape. Winston had three cartridges in his collection he though would be good candidates for the project, they were Kiseki Lapis Lazuli, Win Labs FET-10 and Audio Note IO LTD. Winston asked me and Gary Koh to check the cartridges out and advise him. The cartridges ultimately were not suitable due to their age and condition, but evaluating them was very interesting. The Dream Project never went forward, but I though member of the forum would be interested in some of my observations. If anyone has interesting experiences with great phono cartridges from the past, please share.

Kiseki Lapis Lazuli was one of the great cartridges from the past utilizing solid gem stone quality Lapis Lazuli and a real diamond cantilever. The suspension was no longer optimal so it's performance had diminished. Still, it had some of it's magic and was the best sounding of the bunch. I fantasize what the sound would be like if the suspension was brand new. It was something special. [ATTACH=CONFIG]n27177[/ATTACH]





Win Labs FET-10 is a "Field Effect Transducer" and is unlike the strain gauge cartridges that Dr. Sau Win is famous for. Unlike the vast majority of cartridges out there that generate electrical power, the FET-10 actually transmits a signal to an external preamplifier for creation of the analog waveform power. The cartridge actually was capable of performance down to 1 Hz! Although it's overall performance was noisy and not competitive with current cartridges, it had the best bass I've ever heard from a cartridge by a big margin. This was really a laboratory quality product. I can only imagine how good this cartridge could be using current technology and a DARPA budget. For detailed information see the following documents: http://www.kosmic.us/WinFET-10Instruction.pdf and http://www.kosmic.us/WinFET-10Technical.pdf [ATTACH=CONFIG]n27173[/ATTACH]
[ATTACH=CONFIG]n27174[/ATTACH]





Audio Note IO LTD was given to Winston by Kondo in appreciation for all the business Winston gave him in Hong Kong. This very special cartridge used a field coil for generating the magnetic field for the moving coil rather than a permanent magnet. If you look closely at the picture, you will see that it has 6 pins. Two pins were for the external DC power supply. Two wires were run from the power supply taped to the arm tube. The cartridge had ultra-low output and was played through a Kondo pure silver SUT. Again, the cartridge suspension was too old for optimal performance, but the cartridge definitely had some magic. I fantasized how good the cartridge would be if Kondo was still around to produce a modernized model. [ATTACH=CONFIG]n27175[/ATTACH]
[ATTACH=CONFIG]n27176[/ATTACH]

Very cool Joe! I've never seen the Win close up like that. The other strain gauge that I know Harry Weisfeld always revered was John Iverson's Electron Kinetics.

I never paid any attention to Audio Note because their outputs were just out of the realm of possibility.

[david k]

I don't necessarily disagree with the hyped cartridges but am curious what ordinary cartridges you feel have stood the test of time. I never understood until the newer stone bodies why Koetsu was so highly revered.

These are just some, starting with moving magnets

Shure V series including various v15 types starting from the 60's to limited edition V's of the 80's & 90's, also Technics, AT, Grado, Stanton, Pickering, Garrett all had some excellent models back in the day. What distinguishes these mm cartridges starting with their tracking prowess is their accurate tone, timbre and scale, zero hype here and very balanced.





MC cartridges, we have to start with the Denon 103 standard bearer for decades, current production ones aren't quite the same!

Early mono EMT OFS/OFD and the later TSD/TMD/TND models are all extremely musical, apparently all still produced today and supposedly also sound very similar to the originals.




Ortofon SPU, the Porsche 911 of the audiophile world! So many, many varieties and generations of this cartridge is cherished by music lovers worldwide yet they never got the same traction with American high enders who looked down on it because of price… Here are few, got many more.




and their higher end and lesser known offshoot S15/SL15 series;




The lovely sounding 3 dimensional early Decca cartridges still set the standard for spaciousness,



Followed by more modern MC 10/20/30 Super and standard versions along with early Fidelity Research cartridges starting with FR-1. Of course the KING of them all and IMO still untouched even by the best from today, the Neuman DST cartridges.




I'm sure there are others that I missed. The Neumanns aside the rest really aren't that rare nor do they cost much, I sincerely think that any vinylphile would benefit from giving these gems a spin.

david

[Rob]

David, that's out-and-out cartridge porn thanks for the post.

[Beaur]

David,

Have you heard the Tsar cartridge that is a copy of the Neumann yet? I have heard it on a couple of occasions and it'd pretty good. Never heard the Neumann properly set up so I can't compare the sound.

[david k]

No Beau, haven't heard the Tzar yet but a friend heard it and said it's nice but it's nothing like the Neumann. I guess it's like the Lumiere, great sounding cartridge on it's own but not a Neumann. There's also the one from Audio Technica which should be interesting to hear.

david

[Joe Pittman]

OK David, awesome collection. I am very impressed. Thanks for the great pictures!

[david k]

Thank you Joe.
david

[Metamatic]

Technics EPC-P100C MK4 cartridge from 1982.

The best cartridge Technics could make. MM with very low 1.2mv voltage. Awesome cartridge with sonics to compete with anything. Ruler flat frequency response has to be seen to believe - see below








Frequency response: 5 Hz- 120,000 Hz
20 Hz- 20,000 Hz +,- 0.3 db ( **** )
15 Hz- 80,000 Hz +,- 3 db

Output voltage: 1.2 mV ( * )
Channel separation: more than 25 db.
Channel balance: within 0.5 db
Compliance: 12cu ( 100 Hz, dynamic. )
DC resistance: 30 Ohms ( ** )
Inductance: 33 mH
Recommended load
Resistance: 10 kohms to 1 Mohms!
Recommended load
Capacitance: less than 500 pf. ( *** )
VTF: 1.25 +,-0.25 g.

[JCOConnell]

what did this cart cost at the time?