As Nandric notes, “price is of ’some’ consideration.” As he also says, Koetsu doesn’t “retip” — they gut the cartridge, leaving only the body. Maybe, if it’s a current model, they replace it with the innards of that model. But a long-discontinued model like mine...? How do they fill my empty little Rosewood box? I don’t know, maybe with the innards of their cheapest, a Black, and charge me more than I would pay for a brand new Black... if I wanted a Black.
I want a Rosewood Longbody — and I have one, except for its smallest, and most important part, the stylus.
This leads back to my question — Is it worth fixing?
I only know its reputation: glorious midrange, weak in bass and treble — much like the Quad 57 electrostatic speakers, which I know well, I had many.
Three all-Quad systems — 2 pairs of Stacked Quads (8 panels), and a single pair for the bedroom. Each panel was driven by its own Quad II valve amp. I even had spare Q-II amps as dedicated power supplies for the three Quad 22 preamps which controlled each system. It was heavenly.
Sounds expensive, certainly at today’s prices. But at the time and place, nobody wanted those obsolete old-fogey speakers. And valve amps? Why, when you could have 20-times the power with a Krell? People accepted any offer for their “old crap”— they even threw in all their unused new spare valves for free, eg real Gold Lion KT66s — just be rid of it all.
I know the Rosewood isn’t an “all-rounder”, and of course I won’t use it to play Heavy Metal. No loss, I don’t play Heavy Metal. But it might be ideal (even unsurpassable, like the Quad 57) for the right, midrange-dominant music — solo acoustic instruments, intimate vocals, small chamber groups both classical and jazz — and that is my main musical diet.
Or do I have ridiculous, over-romanticized notions of the old Rosewood? Am I choosing an old shriveled senile woman to be my lover because she was so beautiful in those tattered old photographs?
If this new info triggers any new thinking, please share.