EMT 927 vs. Micro Seiki 5000 or 8000 - different?

Excellent ! Great news.
Thank you very much for sharing your thoughts about this.
My 308SX comes with the ceramic 18gr ULS-3X headshell & I can't figure the possible cart compatibilities.
Can you help please ?
Are there any known things that you suggest to avoid ?
Have you noticed any particular preferences ?

At 1990 for a brief period of 4 months, I use to listen via the EMT 950 that comes to me as a trade for my Piere Lurnee J4/SL5. To my personal taste, this TT failed to please me with it's perspective performance. But then, the same failure at these present days exposed by the Shindo 301 also! It seems to me that these 2 TT plays the music without the usual hi-fi trends, but mostly in a plain & unpretentious manner that shamelessly trascends the flamboyant & glitzy reproduction by refusing to analyse the signal into myriad pieces of innermost details, in favor for a more humble, naturalistic & coherent performance.
There are not any similarities to their way they play music, other than the above mentioned AND ...
... their dull, dark, clumsy, cloudy & veiled character.
IMHO there are quality layers of this holistic view & uncontrived perspective, depended by the offered clarity, transparency, speed & dynamic impact. An analogy between a 92db paper cone full-range driver & a 106db compression driver. Or between the Grado wood body cartridges & the London Decca Reference.
I agree that the EMT 950 was designed for practical studio priorities & not for top performance. I remember clearly my preferance for my Denon DP 80 / SME V / Grasshopper III M those days, that it was better overall, being more genuinly honest & balanced in it's own monitor way.
I can't say a thing about the 927 or 930 as I've never seen them in person, but I like the Idler drive sound even more than the finest Direct drives, for the emotional involvement that can engage when critically executed avoiding overdamping that can mask & veil their clarity.
Today I've found peace of mind with a Thorens TD124mkII and I'm almost done with my Lenco GL75 project and what I've found so far to be the most important thing in our hobby, is the learned & practiced skill that comes after many wrong decisions & disappointing results :
There are many paths to find pleasure in building a successful system. ... And the certain way to discarce this hobby is by having high expectations for ANY project in order to justify your expense. So, the rest of us with modest length of pockets, lets get over this giant iconoclastic EMT 927 & put some love & devotion into our formal way to fight our demons. Me too I've had the Studer C37 and I was staying ecstatic upon it's innards, but I felt OK when I substitute it for the Teac Z 7000 tape deck and even better the day that I got rid of this also, in order to dismantle my worries about their repairing needs.
You see the peace of mind only comes when you can listen to your fav music without such worries
.... unless of course your budjet is unlimited.
My point is that :
There are conponents that in pursuit of the art of music reproduction, are designed without compromise. But the cost & the difficulty of purchase, of maintenance service, of repairing service & even handling them without problems could be a serious insulting factor to our state of calm.
And there are some humble but inventive & sophisticated (ie: Lenco L75/Technics EPA100, Denon DP80/SME 312S ) that could bring a careless enjoyment without breaking our nerves & our bank account.
Are we having fun by collecting these mythical titans or we just care for a more faithful & puristic perpoduction ?
Can you answer honestly ?

I'm so grateful that you did'nt get me wrong.
Thank you for your kindness & intellectual plurality.

You bring me memories from the :

Shindo "Latour" 38000euro (EMT 927)
-Vs-
Shindo "604" 18000euro (EMT 930)

Unfortunatelly I choose the Carfrae LBH instead, in favor of the higher level of permitted experimentation.
By this same logic I went to the side of Lenco L75 to explore the possibilities, and my latest purchase was the SAEC WE-308SX to satisfy my secret project (changing the armtube!).

I'm a DIY junkie. I'm addicted to the flexibility of personalize my demands upon everything.
I don't care to build it by myself. That is not the point.
I have this obsession with the custom & unique crafts to the point that it scares me when I realize the short time that left to enjoy the music (after all these projects).
I can't escape of myself, but at least I do try not to keep very high expectations, by compromising my demands to the most feasible & unsentimental down to Earth humble plans.
But the most necessary & important thing that I have to do, is always -always- advise money wise. 'Cause it really matters what remains in our soul, not right after a new purchase, but when we can relax and live with it in the long run without regrets & conflicts about it's value in our life.
By this point of view, the fully loaded EMT 930 and (I insist to add) the Shindo 604, may are the safest way to carelessly enjoy the music without taking the endless & tiresome path of exploring the possibilities.
But then, how many of us can manage to escape and make the shortcut ?

T_bone,
I think he ment the WE-8000ST.
Thuchan,
I'm waiting for the courier to deliver it within the week.
This model WE-308SX has about half of the required offset angle in the armtube and so, I have to twist the cartridge on the headshell.
But I was advised by Dertonarm that :
"If the line of your aligned cantilever is off-line compared to the offset angle of your tonearm (or a fixed offset angle in a fixed headshell ( SME V for instance )) then you have another - an additional - breakdown torque moment in the static force model of your tonearm.
In most cases it will result in an increased skating force - resulting in higher unlinear distortion figures".
I'm sure the 407/23 & the 8000ST are having the right angle.
In my case of 308SX I really don't know how to proceed differently & I have some thoughts of changing the armtube.
After Derto's advice, I'm reluctant to twist the cartridge on the headshell & I'm thinking about this drastic modification. A interesting & highly experimental project, that requires some skill & knowlege & I'm not qualified for.
If I had a chance I would trade the WE-308SX arm with the WE-8000ST but unfortunately all this info comes to me after my purchase. Anyway maybe something good & inspired arise from this uncomfortable situation.
Do you mind to comment about the SAEC in general? The 308SX have the ruby bearings as the higher numbered models, but I don't know anything about the level of performance in the models that the cart twisting is a must : (308, 317, 506)
Do you have any idea about the matching with Decca Ref or the EMT JSD5 ?
Thank you in advance.

The 407/23 is manufactured especialy to hit the market outside the Japan, after Allen Wright's recommendation when he was the SAEC's importer for Australia. The 23 is refered to the offset angle that indeed is the right equivalent of the arm's eff. length by the Baerwald alignment.
But what about the other models of the SAEC's geometry ?
How one can align the cartridge & what cartridges are accepted in general ? Have you ever notice any problems with resonances or whatever the Dertonearm has refered ?

My God!
T_bone are you OK?
Earthquake & TSUNAMI the freakiest nightmare

No one claims that Syntax,
but I feel it is not fair to delude our self that a scarce, expensive to buy, expensive to maintain, expensive to repair & so much restricted to arm/cart choises gigantic TT,
is the end and all of our troubles in choosing our source.
It can solve most of them concerning the sound, but may create some serious others, in the shadow of them, we can not enjoy the music any more.

I hope to get you right meaning the Lenco that equals the VW.
The EMT 927 is definitely the Bugatti or Hispano Suiza of the most marvelous & monumental TT of all times.

Dear friends, To my 15 years involving experience with my (24kgr platter) Symphonic Line RG6, I can add that never I've had to re-align the speed also, but what happens to the MOMENT CHANGES in speed due to stylus friction, is another thing of a great concern. This Shutherland laser equiped clamp can not evaluate this, but you can hear it happens during playing, as like the LP is warped or the spindle hole is off centered. Auditioning the same LP with my DP80 then, and TD124 II now, I can not detect this momentary speed instability. I've lost my faith & I'm trying to get rid this TT as I could'nt find a solution for 15 years of changing strings, bearing oils, PSU inner parts, platter mats, bases e.t.c
Now, please don't get me wrong. I don't want to provoke against the BD approach, but it seems that the point of real concern is not the speed change over a period of a year.
Thank you.

Dear Raul,
My mistake to expose such a dangerous post here.
I think Dover explains this precisely at his 05-04-11 reply.
Please lets pretend that the case has closed by that post, as there is not much to be said further about and we should stop walking in this mine field. Too many of us have invested great deal of money having great expectations and no more than perhaps a handfull of us can realise and accept the fact.
I apologise and I wish to stop this discussion here.
I'm sorry.