Soundsmith (eventually gold)

[Corinthian]

Great write up and review Urbinator. Interesting to read from my perspective as we seem to have taken a similar journey with to cartridges, although you're further along than I am and currently have the umami red. Did you listen to any other cartridges alongside the Soundsmith when you were deciding where to go next? Have you heard the Gold alongside the top wing red sparrow? I've not heard either, but based on teh rave reviews it would probably be great to do this.

You're in the UK? Out of interest, which dealer did you buy from? IME it's quite hard to get cartridges to demo at home, particularly high end ones and for an extended period, but this has to be the best way to make up your mind, so impressive support from the supplier!

 

[Urbinator]

Great write up and review Urbinator. Interesting to read from my perspective as we seem to have taken a similar journey with to cartridges, although you're further along than I am and currently have the umami red. Did you listen to any other cartridges alongside the Soundsmith when you were deciding where to go next? Have you heard the Gold alongside the top wing red sparrow? I've not heard either, but based on teh rave reviews it would probably be great to do this.

You're in the UK? Out of interest, which dealer did you buy from? IME it's quite hard to get cartridges to demo at home, particularly high end ones and for an extended period, but this has to be the best way to make up your mind, so impressive support from the supplier!

Thankyou Corinthian,
No, the cartidges I had access to at the time were the Umami Blue and Red, The Soundsmith Paua II, Sussuro Mk II and eventually, the Sussuro Mk II Gold. Carridges I had considered were Top Wing, and Etsuro Urushi Bordeaux, but I had no way to audition these.
What always digs for me is that moving coil cartidges are finite and will need to be replaced, when it is 5k for a new cartidge, the cost can be edging towards £5 per hour of usage. This was a big influence with me as Soundsmith can be rebuilt at around 20 percent of the value. I would still love to hear the Etsuro and Top Wing cartidges, but ownership of such high value disposable instruments makes me nervous.
I got loan of these cartidges from Nintronics having know Adam Taslaq form many years, use of the was as they needed them broken in for demonstrations and was interested in feedback including warts and all.
The purchase of the Sussuro gold was without testing, it was to be sent out for reviews but I begged Adam for it on the basis of me enjoying the standard Sussuro and feedback I had had on this forum. Its now had 120 hours of playback so it very much bedded in. I am tempted to put the Ortofon Jubilee back on just to see how they compare.

 

[Corinthian]

Thankyou Corinthian,
No, the cartidges I had access to at the time were the Umami Blue and Red, The Soundsmith Paua II, Sussuro Mk II and eventually, the Sussuro Mk II Gold. Carridges I had considered were Top Wing, and Etsuro Urushi Bordeaux, but I had no way to audition these.
What always digs for me is that moving coil cartidges are finite and will need to be replaced, when it is 5k for a new cartidge, the cost can be edging towards £5 per hour of usage. This was a big influence with me as Soundsmith can be rebuilt at around 20 percent of the value. I would still love to hear the Etsuro and Top Wing cartidges, but ownership of such high value disposable instruments makes me nervous.
I got loan of these cartidges from Nintronics having know Adam Taslaq form many years, use of the was as they needed them broken in for demonstrations and was interested in feedback including warts and all.
The purchase of the Sussuro gold was without testing, it was to be sent out for reviews but I begged Adam for it on the basis of me enjoying the standard Sussuro and feedback I had had on this forum. Its now had 120 hours of playback so it very much bedded in. I am tempted to put the Ortofon Jubilee back on just to see how they compare.

I completely agree with you that I'd be slightly reluctant about buying such expensive cartridges that are essentially disposable items, so it's interesting to hear about the relatively modest rebuild cost of the Soundsmith cartridges - isn't this a fairly similar idea to the Top Wing Red Sparrow? I'd certainly want to hear one before committing though!

I was wondering whether you might say Nintronics! The reason I say that is that we seem to have some similar bits of kit and there are relatively few distributors in the UK. My experience of Rog and Adam has been very positive too - I've only met Adam once, when he was helping with a home demo of a Galder (which put that very much on the want list, and I now have one). Very nice chaps and very knowledgable too.

My Umami red still has at least a year or so of life left in it so I'm not in a mad rush to replace it, but I'll certainly be asking to try a Soundsmith when it's time - hopefully the gold given your glowing review, and if it can go back to back with a Red Sparrow or Etsuro Bordeaux that would really be something! Thanks for sharing your thoughts and experience, very interesting.

 

[Urbinator]

ypu, guilty as charged I am local to Nintronics, so it is good for my love of HiFi, but bad for my wallet. Adam, I would say is the technical of the two so many of the products they stock are from his research, but Roger is the finance and regularly has to keep Adam under control. They were early adopters of Gryphon, which has been a big boost for them and regularly demo some of their top tier kit. Soundsmith is a recent adoption and they are now the main UK distributors. I know them both well, especially Adam and his love of cars/bikes and he regularly alows me to audition some of their kit.
Congratulations with the Galder, Bergmann do some fantastic kit, which has been pretty much an unkown. Johnnie Im finding all cartidges bring their own style to the table, a bit like different microphone use in a studio and how they all can change the character of the voice. I would love to have a number of cartidges and alternate depending on the recording, but that probably over the top tinkering.