Choices: Nagaoka MP-50, MP-300, or Garrott P77i?

Dear Vinyladdict: The Empire and the Azden are P-mount type
designs and comes with its dedicated universal adaptor, both
are very good and the P-mount design IMHO is no drawback in
anyway

The Azden YM-P50VL IMHO is superior to any other cartridge (
either LOMC or MM/MI at any price. ) I
own/owned/borrowed/heard in all my audio life. Nothing I
know come close to its high quality performance. In the last
three days I was testing my sample against other top MM/MI's
and against the Dynavector XV-1s and Ortofon A-90 LOMC
cartridges and either can cope with the Azden performance
level.

Btw, don't worry about that high compliance figure on the
Ortofon M20E Super, please read here ( my last post on the
thread ) about:

http://forum.audiogon.com/cgi-bin/fr.pl?eanlg&1265682199

Regards and enjoy the music,
Raul.

Well, after much mental volleying, I placed an order for a P77i from Decibel Hi-Fi in Australia.

Brian at Decible tells me it should be here in about a week! I'll report back as to if it was the right decision or not...

Raul - I'm very very intrigued by the Arzden carts - still doing some research and may end up with one of those yet.

Dear vinyladdict: You don't have to worry anymore, that Azden top of the line samples already sold.

Today the persons that bought it can be proud to own IMHO the best quality performance cartridge ever made!!!!!

Please share with us your near future experiences with the 77i.

Regards and enjoy the music,
Raul.

No offense Raul - but I've been following your thread over many months and your "best quality performance cartridge ever made!!!!!" seems to change every few weeks.

I'll report back on the P77i once I get it.

Dear Vinyladdict: Absolutely, what do you report when you are testing several/many cartridges and find something better than the last one?

Think what will be your opinion if you test these cartridges one next the other for weeks or months? ( and you don't know if exist better cartridges that the one under test ):

103, Celebration, Helikon, Titan, Xv-1s, Colibri,Supreme, Allaerts, Olympos, A-90, Coral, etc, etc

We are in the start/beguin discovery of the MM/MI cartridges where almost no one of us had an in deep knowledge on its quality performance not only that but where we really don't know and have no reference about, no reviews, no cartridge sources, almost no-nothing.

We are building from the beguin and fortunately many of us that are searching and testing on the MM/MI alternative have very good knowledge with the LOMC alternative, with live music and with what means " quality performance " levels.

If you test the AKG P-100LE there is no single doubt that you will think is the better cartridge out there, then after you test the Technics EPC-P100CMK4 you can think the same, after this you test the Audio technica ATML 180-OCC and can think in the same way, after that the Azden YM P50VL and you can say the same and we can go on because the Azden is not the last cartridge we will test in the near future but here and now is the " best ever ".

We already made a preliminar cartridge ranking ( LOMC and MM/MI ) and all the cartridges named here has a very top level over the Garrot that you choose and for a lot less money.

This is not something that I'm the only one that support the great MM/MI alternative, people that I respect like: Halcro, Lewm, Axelwhal, Dgob, Phaser, Downunder, Dougdeacon, Dgarretson, Timeltel, Pryso, Driveman, Lavigne, Porter,Vetterone, Royj, and many other with very good know-how and very good audio systems.

So, today our opinions about are no more a " lightly " one but an " experienced " one.

That you prefer to expense more money for a lesser product only means your preference and nothing more.

I always say that every single day is a learning one that help to improve/grow up on our each one audio learning curve, even our each one mistakes are learning.

No, I'm not offended by your post because ( with all respect ) comes from a person with out the right and precise knowledge on the specific subject: ignorance always is controversial.

Regards and enjoy the music,
Raul.