3DSonics
away working hard on "it"
Hi,
The answer is mostly "fashion".
I find often that in audio things are counter intuitive.
The "intuitive" solution seems that if we make the stylus as much as possible like the cutter we should be able to get the best possible result.
In fact, the intuitive solution is actually even true, however it is subject to a significant number of "if" and "but" which mean that the intuitive solution is true only under conditions virtually impossible to achieve in practice.
BTW, when I hear or read somone commenting that adjusting SRA/VTA and/or alignment makes little difference and they are using a line contact stylus then I KNOW their cartridge is substantially misaligned.
Back to why. A long time ago some manufacturers of cartridges started to promote hyperellipical stylus shapes as "the thing". As this particular "the thing" seems intuitively to make sense it was a very easy sell and since it has been practically impossible to sell a cartridge that does not feature a hyperelliptical stylus as "high quality".
Manufacturers will make what sells, if hyperelliptical stylii sell, they will make cartridges using them. For example, my next speaker design for commercial purposes will be a box. Not because I believe it to be the best solution, but because it will sell in ways more adventerous (and arguably better) solutions do not.
And I'm sure the Marketing Department will put enough spin on the "box thing" to make a Labour Spindoctor go green with envy. And maybe we will sell more than enough to fund the development of my pet project, the "variable pattern" loudspeaker codenamed "Saul of Tarsus" (after the later personae's Paul's statement "I am all things to all men").
BTW, I must also note that at least Jonathan Carr of Scan Tech (Lyra) is a real believer in hyper elliptical stylii, so some makers are not just cynical, but some others are definitly cynics of the highest degree.
I know of one who converts cheap Moving magnet Cartidge Motors into "MC" cartridges by winding the coils before and after the pivot onto the MM stylus carrier, thus combining the worst elements of MM and MC construction into one cartridge. And of course they charge huge amounts, have inflationary names for their pickups, use hyper elliptical stylii and even claim their cheapskate manufacturing methode as a major advantage.
So, I'll stick to "what was good enough for the BBC (Ortofon SPU) and NHK (DL-103) cannot be bad for me.". So far, subjectively this has been born out. I also note that Arthur Salvatore ranks the 103 highly (and the LP-12 lowly), to me a reliable indication of one who knows what he is talking about and is equally honest.
His cartridge file is very much worth reading (and it is worth noting that most of his experiences with cartridges are using linear tracker tonearms, where line contact stylii actually work well, if care with setup is taken):
http://www.high-endaudio.com/RC-Cartridges.html
Ciao T
Dynamic Turtle said:
The answer is mostly "fashion".
I find often that in audio things are counter intuitive.
The "intuitive" solution seems that if we make the stylus as much as possible like the cutter we should be able to get the best possible result.
In fact, the intuitive solution is actually even true, however it is subject to a significant number of "if" and "but" which mean that the intuitive solution is true only under conditions virtually impossible to achieve in practice.
BTW, when I hear or read somone commenting that adjusting SRA/VTA and/or alignment makes little difference and they are using a line contact stylus then I KNOW their cartridge is substantially misaligned.
Back to why. A long time ago some manufacturers of cartridges started to promote hyperellipical stylus shapes as "the thing". As this particular "the thing" seems intuitively to make sense it was a very easy sell and since it has been practically impossible to sell a cartridge that does not feature a hyperelliptical stylus as "high quality".
Manufacturers will make what sells, if hyperelliptical stylii sell, they will make cartridges using them. For example, my next speaker design for commercial purposes will be a box. Not because I believe it to be the best solution, but because it will sell in ways more adventerous (and arguably better) solutions do not.
And I'm sure the Marketing Department will put enough spin on the "box thing" to make a Labour Spindoctor go green with envy. And maybe we will sell more than enough to fund the development of my pet project, the "variable pattern" loudspeaker codenamed "Saul of Tarsus" (after the later personae's Paul's statement "I am all things to all men").
BTW, I must also note that at least Jonathan Carr of Scan Tech (Lyra) is a real believer in hyper elliptical stylii, so some makers are not just cynical, but some others are definitly cynics of the highest degree.
I know of one who converts cheap Moving magnet Cartidge Motors into "MC" cartridges by winding the coils before and after the pivot onto the MM stylus carrier, thus combining the worst elements of MM and MC construction into one cartridge. And of course they charge huge amounts, have inflationary names for their pickups, use hyper elliptical stylii and even claim their cheapskate manufacturing methode as a major advantage.
So, I'll stick to "what was good enough for the BBC (Ortofon SPU) and NHK (DL-103) cannot be bad for me.". So far, subjectively this has been born out. I also note that Arthur Salvatore ranks the 103 highly (and the LP-12 lowly), to me a reliable indication of one who knows what he is talking about and is equally honest.
His cartridge file is very much worth reading (and it is worth noting that most of his experiences with cartridges are using linear tracker tonearms, where line contact stylii actually work well, if care with setup is taken):
http://www.high-endaudio.com/RC-Cartridges.html
Ciao T
