Best Bang for your buck cartridge? Objective wise.

[steve f]

Any experience with a Nagaoka MP-110? Is it in the VM95ML league? It's been warmly recommended to me.

Anticipating my 2M Red replacement on my SL1210MK2 and I fancy a change

Nagaoka cartridges are top notch. They are of moving iron construction, so there’s less moving mass than both MM or MC cartridges Of course there’s a downside to everything. I use a MP-200 on a Technics SL-1200gr. The phono preamp must have a very good rumble filter as that arm and cartridge combo tried to reproduce the tone arm resonance. The Fosi X5 doesn’t have a filter and I didn’t want to see my woofers do the subsonic dance, It’s a shame because it really otherwise sounds very good.

 

[mike70]

i don't think the mp-110 (bonded 0.4 x 0.7 mil) is close to the vm95ml (nude 2.2 x 0.12 mil) ... the stylus size and properties say it so ... but, anyone have their opinion.
maybe less detail and tracking properties have that "warm sound" like many people says from a conical like the denon 301 ... when technical data isn't enough, happiness is easier

 

[DSJR]

i don't think the mp-110 (bonded 0.4 x 0.7 mil) is close to the vm95ml (nude 2.2 x 0.12 mil) ... the stylus size and properties say it so ... but, anyone have their opinion.
maybe less detail and tracking properties have that "warm sound" like many people says from a conical like the denon 301 ... when technical data isn't enough, happiness is easier

Nagaoka is one of those makes that drastically hiked their prices over the years, the original MP10 being a beer-budget cheapie all those years back and kind-of AT95E level. I believe it's now doublt that or more and I very much doubt adding a '1' to the moniker has improved it any. the MP20 wasn't too highly regarded at the time and I've read reports of the 200 'sounding' a little 'dirty' bearing in mind the price (if the plastic mount VM540 is still around cheaper than the VMx540, I suspect it's far better if loading can be taken into account). Mind you, the 2M Blue is a bit scrappy most of the time, so horses for courses I suspect. It's OM20 forebear never seemed quite that fussy I remember (I have an OM10, OM5e stylus and a Super OM30 here and a similarly scrappy 520mk2).