Anyone tried Soundsmith VPI Zephyr MI Cartridge

The one other major plus is that you can actually call and talk to Peter at Soundsmith about set up. He is super informative and nice. Try that with most any other mfg.

My eyes are burning today from staying up way too late listening to the newly installed Zephyr.

Macdadtexas,
Did you speak with Peter regarding the sonic differences between the Aida and the Zephyr?

Both are the same price but utilise very different cantilever/stylus arrangements. Aida has the SS's topline Ruby cantilever/optimised line contact while the Zephyr uses and Aluminium/Elliptical setup. Zephyr has much lower compliance at 10µm/mN vs 22 µm/mN for the Aida (or 28 µm/mN with the high compliance option).

I'm thinking the low compliance Zephyr would be more appropriate for my Phantom arm, but I really like how the ruby cantilever/optimised line contact sounds on my SS retipped 103R.

Any thoughts?

System Details

I did not speak about the differences. I just assumed since he worked with VPI on it, it would sound great with the Classic. It does.

Thanks for the reply Macdadtexas.

After reading the blurb on both products it seems the Zephyr's elliptical stylus was used to alleviate the tracing problems with azimuth roll in unipivot arms.
Since the Phantom has the 'magnaglide' stabilisation to prevent azimuth changes, maybe the line contact equipped Aida would provide higher performance for my situation(?).

Perhaps I'll enquire with SoundSmith.

Everything sounds good with the Phantom, great arm.