Tonearms: Ripoff?

Finally, the two 'rip off' threads have joined forces. Now the ugly truth can be revealed. Huh? Well, it seems that judgement calls about the 'value' of tonearms and MC cartridges as isolated items are not very useful. The synergy between tonearm and cartridge (or lack thereof) can be 'make or break', so perhaps we should view them as 'one component' within the system.

For all sorts of reasons I don't like 'ranking order lists', but might make an exception for a list of the best 'tonearm / cartridge combinations'. I don't think this has ever been tried, but with all the experience on this forum it could actually be pulled off. It would provide useful information for anyone starting out on this journey and prevent the sort of mistakes that fuel those useless 'rip off' debates.

We should probably start the easy way by listing combinations from one brand or designer, which would suggest that the synergy has been conciously built into them. There were 'made for each other'. Some obvious examples are:
Ortofon RM-309 + Ortofon SPU series
EMT 997 + EMT TSD-15
Fidelity Research FR-64S + Fidelity Research FR-7 series

I only have personal experience with the FR synergy, which is most certainly there. But I assume the other combinations have something similar going for them. I'm only a beginner at this 'cart rolling', but I can already mention three example that I've stumbled on by chance. Of course these are the most exciting discoveries:
Audiocraft AC-4400 + Ortofon MC-5000
Pioneer PL-70L II tonearm + Sony XL-44
Fidelity Research FR-64fx + Phasemation P-3G

Most of these combinations are considered 'vintage' and none of them are anywhere near the 'trophy' (or 'rip off') price category. But in my system on the same turntable they can easily compete with the one combination I use as 'reference' and which does sort of belong to that category: Reed 3P tonearm + vdHul Colibri XPW Blackwood (combined retail price around 10k).

It seems that the 'trophies' are in truth hidden in the search to find the right combinations. From a hobbyist perspective this is a great deal more fun that dropping 10 big ones in the blind and hoping to find audiophile redemption. But of course no individual can try out every possible combination. This is what crowd based platforms are made for, so let's put those 'big data' to some good use.

@daveyf 
Would such a list of tonearm / cartridge combinations put an end to your nightmare?

I found that tonearms make a difference. however, if you're not going to sit in the sweet spot, with the right room and speakers placed where they should be placed, you might be wasting your money. I can hear an improvement with a better arm but you have to be listening fot it. Also, paying attention to 'synergy' between arm and cartridge is a factor, I don't think it makes that big of difference if you stay in the middle of the road with each

When it comes to economics, audiophiles are the dumbest of people, they don't have a clue as to what the price of corn and gasoline have to do with cartridges and everything else; It's called INFLATION.

@edgewear   What you propose makes some sense. It would be an interesting data point for the cartridge and/or arm buyer to relate to. However, it is not solving the issue, and may in fact contribute to more problems...why...because you are assuming that the synergy that you are reporting on, is what the prospective arm and/or cartridge buyer is listening for. That is a matter of taste, and how do we determine if something meets our taste test; if we don't have an opportunity to hear it for ourselves. As was posted on my cartridge nightmare thread, in the old days, we had HP who generally called it as he heard it, and IF you agreed with his thinking on SQ ( which BTW, I did), you had a pretty good idea as to what you were getting. Not ideal by any means, but at least a fairly decent reference point, IMO. Today, unfortunately, we do NOT have such a reviewer of analog...and I do happen to think that MF's reporting is questionable at best....remember he has NEVER heard a piece of gear that he didn't like, so long as the price was high and ever spiraling! 

@orpheus10 Uhmmm...Last time I looked inflation wasn’t on the order of tens of percentage points in a period of just a very few years ( i don't know what country you live in, but certainly not here in the US)...as some of the cartridges in question have risen to.
As an example, the Lyra Etna was priced at $6K when newly released, now it is $8.9K...is that just due to inflation...please do tell!