Moving from MM to MC

I have a Shure M97x cart and it’s been fantastic

If this cartridge is fantastic for you then you will be blown away by a proper MM/MI cartridges you can still try for relatively low price. Few years ago a friend of mine asked for a cartridge, he came to my house with his Shure M97x, his own turntable is Technics SL1210mkII. He wouldn’t pay too much, so the competitive cartridge was Ortofon M20FL Super (under $350 normally). On the same turntable and on the same tonearm the Ortofon M20FL Super (nude FineLine stylus) was much better than Shure. Same Ortofon M20FL Super was praised by many experienced audiogon users in the beggining of Raul’s thread regarding MM vs. MC and that’s why i adviced his to try this first. I believe they can be tracked down for $250-350 (i still have NOS stylus).

Denon DL-103 is a joke, but it’s very popular because it’s very cheap. It’s funny, but people who’s buyin them cheap in stock condition then investing up to $500-700 more to replace a stock aluminum cantilever and conical tip, also to replace the plastic body. They are happy after everything has been replaced and upgraded, but it’s no longer a Denon stock sound, and it’s no longer a cheap affordable cartridge.

So you tell me why do you need a low complianbce DL-103 with conical tip when you can buy Denon DL-S1 or maybe Denon DL-1000 for example? Remember that your tonearm was designed for MM cartridges and definitely not for the low compliance cartridges of any type, the DL-103 designed for super heavy high mass tonearms. 

In my opinion you want to try the LOMC whithout even realised the potential of MM cartridges. But no problem, we’re always looking for something new and different. If your budget is $300 you’d better forget about LOMC (imo), but if you have $1500-2000 you can try to find some nice LOMC.

Point taken. So, in order to realize the true benefit of MC, much more needs to be spent on the cart to ensure adequate quality? And if this is not possible may not be worth the time and money on a lower-end set-up.
My issue is that I do not have a lot of money to play with but I do want to fool around with MC. Tough pill to swallow.

You have to read Raul’s thread , so much information about MM vs. MC. In my opinion it is much more important to have a proper MM/MI on hands, those MM/MI cartridges are always cheaper than LOMC cartridges, but the quality of the selected (very best) MM/MI is outstanding for the money. It is not for those who’s afraid to buy vintage (lightly used or NOS) cartridges from the 70s/80s. They are the best in its class, Moving Magnet peak was at that time, not now. I did everything wrong myself some year ago, so my advice is not to buy cheap MC or even very expensive MC if you don’t have a decent MM cartridge. My curiosity was so high 4-5 years ago than i bought a very expensive new LOMC (i was brainwashed by the common statment that MC are always better than MM), later on i have discovered so many amazing MM cartridges (better than my ex super expensive $3k LOMC). The quest with the right phono stage for the LOMS is also very difficult and expensive. But it’s all a part of the hobby.

Start with the right MM or MI, something that’s have been approved in our community, the Ortofon M20FL Super is one of them and actually still very cheap ($250-350 depends on condition), if you prepared to spend $500-800 there must be a much better MM cartridges, everyone knows that my love is AT-ML170 and Victor X-1II for example. You need a mid compliance cartridges for your Technics tonearm, definitely not low compliance carts.

About the DENON:
There was an MM alternative to the DL-103 - another broadcast cartridge designed for NHK radiostation in the same era! It's Denon DL-107 with conical tip. This is also Denon stock sound, but you don’t have to worry about expensive SUT or MC phono stage with high gain. The DL-107 is Moving Magnet alternative to the DL-103 LOMC. On the DL-107 the replacement stylus is screwed to the cartridge like on Signet or ADC TRX carts - this is great (i have a few NOS styli).

@tooblue Grace are better on light mass tonearms, the compliance of Grace cartridges are extremely high and Technics tonearm is not optimal for them, but i’ve tried my F-9F (Shibata) and F14 LC-OFC on stock technics tonearm, the F14 is much better, but even F9 is much more expensive that the OP budget as i can see.

F9-R normally goes for $600 with original stylus (cartridge body goes alone for $200 without stylus at all) and F14 for $1200 with original stylus. SoundSmith best styli for Grace looks ugly and cost $500 just for the stylus!

While the Ortofon M20FL with nude FineLine stylus cost less than $350 (it’s a bargain) and it’s a better match for Technics stock tonearm. Also original styli are still available NOS from various sources. 

@bstatmeister

This is what I was fearing - That it just might not be possible to get better sound than what I currently have

You will definitely get a better sound with a better MM cartridge. I have the same turntables (they are not my main turntables) and i’ve tried various MM cartridges on that stock Technics tonearm, but my arm has fluid damper and turntable was rewired, also added isonoe footers. Anyway, you don’t have to worry about it, the better cartridge has a better sound - that’s it! Pretty simple, everything starts from the cartridge. The rest you can upgrade later on step by step, but you need a decent cartridge matched to your tonearm. I told you about a guy who just swapped same Shure to a much better Ortofon M20FL Super with Nude Fine Line stylus. It was a very big improvement on the stock Technics with stock wiring etc. The cartridge is the most important thing in the analog chain in my opinion. You can change everything (cables, phono stage, speakers), but if you can’t get the information from the groove walls you will not be able to improve it by anything else. Read about different profiles of the diamond (stylus) and you will find that the best is FineLine (or Line Contact).

Conical profile of DL-103 is a nonsense, that’s the cheapest profile with rolled off bass and treble compared to FineLine or LineContact. That’s why people love to re-tip that stock Denon when they are looking for improvement. It is not the cartridge for your system, especially for your tonearm and phono stage. Forget about it! It’s a waste of money and time. It's oldschool rolled off sound for horn speakers, idler drive turntables and heavy tonearms like Thomas Schick "12.   

@roberjerman 

Arm mass is NOT critical! Excellent results in both cases!

special for you: https://www.ortofon.com/support/support-hifi/resonance-frequency 

If a low compliance cartridge is used with a low mass tonearm, undesirable resonances can occur in the audible range. Mistracking may also be a problem.

When a high compliance cartridge is mated with a moderate mass tonearm, resonances in the infrasonic range may occur in addition to some unwanted high frequency damping.

@lowrider57 

SAEC SS-300 mat is a must have to solve an EMI effect (electromagnetic interference) for both MM or LOMC 

@bstatmeister 

Do you mean the JICO SAS for shure cartidges? The old generation of SAS just replaced with the NEO SAS (Sapphire and Ruby). I remember @halcro post where he explained that he can't detect any difference in sound between an old and new SAS. Both are good. 

Nagaoka MP150 has aluminum cantilever and an elliptical tip. What is special about it ??? It's entry level Nagaoka and the price is not cheap compared to far more superior JVC Victor X-1IIe (beryllium cantilever), Ortofon M20FL Super (FineLine stylus), that you can find for the same price or very close. Much better is Glanz MFG610LX NOS or brand new Garrott p77i in this price range. 

Everyone who's advise is to buy stock DL-103 should learn a bit more about stylus profile, the stock DENON-103 or 103R has a CONICAL TIP

Why the conical/spherical stylus is the worst ever you can read in this thread: 

https://www.vinylengine.com/turntable_forum/viewtopic.php?f=19&t=22894 

What is perfect for my Fidelity-Research FR-7f (0.15mV) on FR-64fx tonearm is WLM Phonatata phono stage. This phono stage is universal for LOMC (see below)

Don’t know what’s happened, but when i changed my tube push-pull integrated amp to First Watt F2J jfet current power amp (and First Watt B1 preamp) the resolution and imaging significantly improved, now the best combination of phono stage+amp for LOMC became my old current phono stage WLM Phonata with automatic load impedance. I tried to discuss it way back on audiogon, but nobody knows this particular phono stage, because the company (WLM was a loudspeaker and amp manufacturer in Vienna) closed the business soon after this phono stage was made.

RIAA equalization is implemented across two amplification stages (within current amplification), providing a frequency expansion from 10Hz to 50kHz (Subsonic cut below 10Hz).

The PHONATA offers automatic adjustment of Load-Impedance:
• You don’t have to adjust the load-Impedance of your cartridge (plus the
interconnect-cable between cartridge and Phono-Preamplifier). It goes
automatically thanks to one ingenious piece of circuitry.
• You don’t have to adjust the source voltage of your cartridge as well.
• There are no micro-switches or any other mechanical contacts in the signal-path.

The PHONATA works with two-stage amplification:
• An inductive voltage amplification stage (for MC cartridges) using high
performance professional audio step-up transformers.
• A solid state current amplification stage, using specific MOS-FET transistors with tube-typical harmonic distortion characteristics.