Harry Lavo wrote:
Recently there has been some discussion on usenet of the relative
sensitivity to loading of MM and MC cartridges. I learned this from early
issues of the IAR published back in the late '70's early '80s and have used
the knowledge ever since.
The following is a link to audioasylum, to a post that shows the effects of
loading and phase on a late model Shure V15 and an Audio Technica OC-9. It
is very illustrative of the advantages of a properly loaded MC, and why it
is possible to get them to sound (and be) perfectly flat. Since 1990 my
test has been...can I get the cartridge to sound as flat as a CD of the same
material. Once this is achieved, then some other benefits of cartridges can
come to the fore.
Thought many would find this interesting who don't vist Audio Asylum very
much.
http://www.audioasylum.com/audio/vin...es/597184.html
Very interesting, and thanks for the post. However, if I have understood
the graphs correctly, the MC graph shows no effect on frequency response
until well into rf. At af, it would seem that the response is identical
whatever the load.
As it happens, I have now changed my two MM cartridges for low output
MCs, but run them both into 47k inputs perfectly happily. As there is
low coupling between the mechanical and electrical parts of the
cartridge, it seems to me that running into a low impedance, (say 100
ohms or less) won't make any significant difference to damping the
tip/vinyl resonance. That being so, what other benefit is there from a
low impedance? I would expect the distortion to be lower if the
cartridge isn't being asked to drive any current, although even here I
would not expect a noticeable improvement.
S.