Cartridge help

VTA is the first thing I would check. Raise the tonearm by several millimeters and see if that improves things. 

Ortofon recommends an input load impedance greater than 20 Ohms. 100 Ohms should be fine. But if you want to try 20, you can make RCA cheater plugs with either a 27 or a 33 Ohm resistor wired in parallel. 

johnto

everything appears to be set properly but my high end is missing ...

What procedure did you follow to set this up? Did you use a gauge with a mirrored surface that actually aligns the cantilever, such as the Mint or WallyTractor gauges? Did you use a VTA gauge?

I'm using an Ortofon Winfield.  When loaded as directed I too felt that the highs (openness) was not quite there.   I experimented and found 1000 ohms more to my liking....of coarse, its just a matter of taste.

Thanks for all the suggestion so far. I used the VPI alignment jig for set up.

You have switched to MC at the back of the amp? Try the 47k MC mode.