Raul, your point is well taken. That is what makes vinyl playback so interesting. Perfection gets boring after a while. Something so special or romantic about the glow of the preamp tubes, the spinning platter and those golden tones- with a little background crackle :)
Zero Antiskate vs Stylus Wear
This article, based on a long term study, was “plagiarised” from another Forum. It’s quite an old article so apologies to “older heads” for whom this may be old news.
It comes from an era when light VTF = good, but was not necessarily true, however the basic principle of long term wear looks sound.
Styli were tested to destruction over their full lifecycle.
http://www.audiomods.co.uk/papers/kogen_skatingforce.PDF
Viewers may have to cut & paste but in the event of difficulty with the link I will give a brief summary :
Of 14 cartridge samples tested without bias, 9 of them suffered excessive wear on the inner groove. One was neutral and the remaining 4 were “outer wall”.
When bias compensation was applied to a group of 6 samples, the wear pattern that resulted was symmetrical.
Given the strong and logical argument that skating damages styli asymmetrically – and gives a skewed reading of the LP over time, the “deviations” are a concern i.e. why 4 of them behaved oppositely.
Poor bearings? Arm cable too stiff? Wrong geometry?
IMO most turntable enthusiasts considered it self evident that unilateral force would cause this type of wear pattern so we didn’t need to be told but documented study, even one as old as this, is always interesting.
The photograph of the spherical stylus is poorly resolved on this copy but it makes the point quite graphically.
Based on long term experience that the simplest things can affect the sound of a turntable, I cannot deny that the idea of “de-stressing” the cantilever by removing a poorly directed/located AS force IS attractive and may produce a degree of audible benefit…at first...(?!?!?!!!)
The doubter in me always asks the question : can a mechanical assembly successfully zero out all mechanical influence and give a pure result? (If true zero AS is the goal even arm damping might be prohibited?)
The principle of using excessive VTF (up to 50% more) to achieve the same “trackability”, without bias, it was suggested, merely accelerates the unilateral wear & tear with (presumably) commensurate damage to the LP(?)
The proposed compensation of up to ”50% extra VTF” sounded a bit excessive to me.
(I’d balk at applying more than 0.1g over maximum.)
Old as it is, I found this study mildly unsettling.
Comments and opinions are invited from both Zero-antiskate adherents and those who always use AS.
It comes from an era when light VTF = good, but was not necessarily true, however the basic principle of long term wear looks sound.
Styli were tested to destruction over their full lifecycle.
http://www.audiomods.co.uk/papers/kogen_skatingforce.PDF
Viewers may have to cut & paste but in the event of difficulty with the link I will give a brief summary :
Of 14 cartridge samples tested without bias, 9 of them suffered excessive wear on the inner groove. One was neutral and the remaining 4 were “outer wall”.
When bias compensation was applied to a group of 6 samples, the wear pattern that resulted was symmetrical.
Given the strong and logical argument that skating damages styli asymmetrically – and gives a skewed reading of the LP over time, the “deviations” are a concern i.e. why 4 of them behaved oppositely.
Poor bearings? Arm cable too stiff? Wrong geometry?
IMO most turntable enthusiasts considered it self evident that unilateral force would cause this type of wear pattern so we didn’t need to be told but documented study, even one as old as this, is always interesting.
The photograph of the spherical stylus is poorly resolved on this copy but it makes the point quite graphically.
Based on long term experience that the simplest things can affect the sound of a turntable, I cannot deny that the idea of “de-stressing” the cantilever by removing a poorly directed/located AS force IS attractive and may produce a degree of audible benefit…at first...(?!?!?!!!)
The doubter in me always asks the question : can a mechanical assembly successfully zero out all mechanical influence and give a pure result? (If true zero AS is the goal even arm damping might be prohibited?)
The principle of using excessive VTF (up to 50% more) to achieve the same “trackability”, without bias, it was suggested, merely accelerates the unilateral wear & tear with (presumably) commensurate damage to the LP(?)
The proposed compensation of up to ”50% extra VTF” sounded a bit excessive to me.
(I’d balk at applying more than 0.1g over maximum.)
Old as it is, I found this study mildly unsettling.
Comments and opinions are invited from both Zero-antiskate adherents and those who always use AS.