I have heard and owned multiple Miyajima cartridges. My current reference is the Miyajima Zero Infinity mono cartridge. Here’s the shocker. To my ears, vinyl is best heard in MONO on a MONO cartridge. Stereo is best heard on digital. OK, are you shocked? You shouldn’t be. Stereo was always a hack on vinyl. You need a cartridge to track both the lateral and vertical modulations. That’s really hard. The Zero Infinity cannot track vertical groove modulations. It can only be played on a mono vinyl record. WARNING: you will quickly destroy your stereo vinyl if you play it on the Zero Infinity. It will also complain loudly. But, if you are like me, and enjoy hearing classical jazz, folk, popular music recorded from the 1930s to the 1960s (read: everything from the beginning of recorded time to the
Beatles to Frank Sinatra to Bob Dylan), you must listen to vinyl in mono. Forget stereo. That’s for folks who don’t know what music is supposed to sound like in vinyl. Stick to mono. On the Miyajima Zero Infinite, I guarantee you that you will hear Coltrane’s breathy saxophone like you never hear on stereo. You will hear the true wonderful stunning dynamics of The Beatles like you never hear on stereo vinyl. You will hear Bob Dylan as he wanted you to hear him. In MONO. In short, for the music lover, the Miyajima Zero infinity gets you closer to true master tape sound closer than anything else I have heard, including the fanciest digital Lampizator DACs. Be warned the Miyajima Zero Infinity is a massive blockbuster of a cartridge, hugely heavy and large. It will not fit on all tonearms. Measure and make sure before you plonk down the cash. But if you do, you might very well throw away all your stereo vinyl.