vdH Colibri Stradivarious Signature .7mv
- Thread starter Mike Lavigne
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hello David and Tang,
I have recently spent time going back and forth between these two fine cartridges on my two identical phono dart phono stages. I cue them both up and switch back and forth every couple of minutes.
it is fun dealing with high output and high resolution carts. they do it all. and their noise floors and dynamic ranges are startling.
it is not a simple question to answer about these 2.....which mostly has to do with the mystique of the vdH. it can be just a slight bit rough.....but then it soars too. no doubt it has more top end air than the GFS. and is a little more spacious, lively, and explosive. slightly bigger bass. and I consider the GFS a champion in all these areas too in my experience.
the GFS is slightly more liquid, refined and never miss steps at all. both have superior.....and mean quite amazing, textural nuance. and are both lightning fast and agile (are there faster, more agile carts out there? maybe....but I've not heard any).
tonally both have that body and fullness in the mid range and beautiful vocals......the GFS with it's liquidity is just that little bit sweeter......at some moments the vdH is not quite as refined.....but only here and there.....but it has more air and top end extension. a trade-off and likely arm and phono stage dependent. and it only has 25 hours or so on it so far. so maybe that will smooth out over time.
as far as the mid to low tonal richness of female vocals, if I had to choose it would be the GFS by a whisker, but both are excellent. neither gives up detail for tone. it's all in balance. they play the middle of the road and you are never lacking information in exchange for anything. lots of weight and authority from both.
another variable is that the vdH is currently on the Telos Sapphire and the GFS on the standard Telos. the Sapphire has the silver phono cable and the Standard the copper. plus the Sapphire is mechanically just that little bit more detailed. which means that the Sapphire is likely pushing the less optimal aspects of the vdH farther into prominence. so in the next few days I will switch them and see how that goes. I expect that switch will play to both of their strengths. interestingly; on Saturday when I moved the Taiko Tana version of the TS-150 active isolation under the dart pre, much of the slight roughness of the vdH vanished. poof! I think it really tells you everything. after that the already slight differences between the two in refinement were reduced considerably. so feed the vdH the best possible groove and isolated phono and be rewarded.
for Ked----i'd call the vdH Colibri Strad Statement .7mv a superior large orchestral cartridge. it can really rock the house. and keep everything organized in the soundstage. it does demand the best arm and phono for sure to pull it off I think. but with .7mv output many phono's can be considered that can't be with some LOMC's. i'm tracking the vdH at 1.47 g. and 57db of gain.
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too early to say how the slight refinement and liquidity nod to the GFS over the vdH Strad Stat will play out, but tonally the two are quite close. i'd say equal in detail, with a bit more top end air, space and slam from the vdH. maybe if they were not in the same system and phono it might be hard to hear the difference in those things. the GFS will be more the universal player and happy in more situations. the vdH will challenge arms and phono stages to be more perfect.
but the upside to both is similar.
After reading your post in this thread i was so excited and went to order VDH strat KOA XGW for myself.
but "mine" will be 0.38mv NOT 0.7...(it is not the signature)
i'm curios what self loading they present... VDH suggest around 600ohm but says you can "play" up to 1000ohm...
now i wonder may be getting the african black wood instead.
i was told it present more "body" and lower bass to the overall sound VS the STRAd... (saddles nuance i believe)
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Today I received the confirmation that the shipment with my Colibri Signature Stradivarius has gone out to me. I am so much looking forward to this new little hummingbird. 
Already so far my "normal" 0.26mV Colibri XGW was an extremely pleasing cartridge, running in an SME 312s. And although I wouldn't want to go so far as to call any of the cartridges of my current lineup "the best" because they all have their specific strenghts and weaknesses the Colibri XGW has definitely been extremely pleasing in what it does. Well, now it makes a friend of mine happy and I cannot wait to get the Signature up and running instead.
Already so far my "normal" 0.26mV Colibri XGW was an extremely pleasing cartridge, running in an SME 312s. And although I wouldn't want to go so far as to call any of the cartridges of my current lineup "the best" because they all have their specific strenghts and weaknesses the Colibri XGW has definitely been extremely pleasing in what it does. Well, now it makes a friend of mine happy and I cannot wait to get the Signature up and running instead.
Today I received the confirmation that the shipment with my Colibri Signature Stradivarius has gone out to me. I am so much looking forward to this new little hummingbird.
Already so far my "normal" 0.26mV Colibri XGW was an extremely pleasing cartridge, running in an SME 312s. And although I wouldn't want to go so far as to call any of the cartridges of my current lineup "the best" because they all have their specific strenghts and weaknesses the Colibri XGW has definitely been extremely pleasing in what it does. Well, now it makes a friend of mine happy and I cannot wait to get the Signature up and running instead.
i received my Colibri strad 0.38 two weeks ago (evan open a thread for myself in the cartridge forum - but with no interest)
it an amazing cart and it doesn't even broke in yet.
i am playing it on a Thales Simplicity II, its sound awesome!
hope you will be glad with yours, congrats!
Cheers, Byrd!
I'm quite sure you are enjoying the XGP Koa Stradivarius now and will enjoy it more and more the further it breaks in. What I heard from someone who had both, the differences between the XGP Koa and the XGP Blackwood are not this significant. And as I wrote above: I really, really liked my Blackwood so I have a fairly good idea what you are enjoying right now.
Hi jeck
Thanks so much for your reply.
I am enjoying my Colibri s lot,
It’s XGW though (w for wood)
I think it’s one of the best I heard.. I have a bunch of great cart including ortofon Anna, Zyx and others.. and soon also the new “Sumile” from Japan, so the Colibri will have a hand full of “fights” in the carts world ring
Will do my friend. when it will arrive. but i guess my zyx will not interest you for the long run as it a "plain" R1000 AIRY3 SB.
i have a good friend who listen to the Omega ultimate silver addition 0.24.
may be if he will indulge our curiosity i can bring my "Sumile" to his place, and get a good comparison to his ZYX.
He run a TechDAS AF3 as i am, with a Thales Simplicity II on the way (as i'm current own).
the only thing will maybe an issue that his Phono stage will not be enough for the Sumile 1.2ohm internal impedance.
It's been a busy week last week so I haven't been able to play around with my new Colibri Signature as much as I wanted to. So far it has seen some 25 hours of use, so it's still pretty far from being properly broken in. My version has an even higher output voltage of 0.9mV so it's really a *lot* louder than my previous 0.26mV Colibri XGW.
I really don't want to comment too much on SQ so far because of the little running time the Signature has seen up until now. What I already can tell though is that it quite significantly betters my old Colibri XGW in detail retrieval. The soundstage is so far a bit further back than with the XGW but also a bit deeper but not by a large margin. Speed and attack seems to be be quite a bit better. And the Signature is a lot hotter in the treble than the XGW so a painstaking adjustment is necessary. But of course all this still needs to be taken with a grain of salt until the Signature has seen at least some 60-80 hours of use. But already now it's clear that the XGW and the Signature are two very different cartridges. Same stable, different horse.
Here is a picture where the different motors of the two Colibris are very obvious.
I really don't want to comment too much on SQ so far because of the little running time the Signature has seen up until now. What I already can tell though is that it quite significantly betters my old Colibri XGW in detail retrieval. The soundstage is so far a bit further back than with the XGW but also a bit deeper but not by a large margin. Speed and attack seems to be be quite a bit better. And the Signature is a lot hotter in the treble than the XGW so a painstaking adjustment is necessary. But of course all this still needs to be taken with a grain of salt until the Signature has seen at least some 60-80 hours of use. But already now it's clear that the XGW and the Signature are two very different cartridges. Same stable, different horse.
Here is a picture where the different motors of the two Colibris are very obvious.
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