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Something A Bit Different: Optical Cartridge....

Oristo

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what do you make of the idea of an optical cartridge - it's likely advantages or disadvantages?
Obtaining linear response by stylus and cantilever waving shadow plates between LEDs and optical sensors seems problematic;
optics for consistent beam shaping, diffraction, wave plate resonances want considerable sorting.
Optical beams tend to be round, with vignette gradients; passing an opaque straight edge stop across such beams will change photon rates
with a sinusoidal correlation to radial movements, to a first approximation. I suppose that each cartridge can be individually calibrated,
but wonder about stability with e.g. suspension aging and how airborne contamination accumulation in the optical paths is compensated.

The invention of the blue LED changed the entire world.
My understanding is that good blue LEDs are easier than green.
 

Philbo King

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I once considered patenting an optical audio mic using laser interferometry but a prior art search showed they are already widely used in seismic mics...
 

thereimade12

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I had the opportunity to hear the DS003 and was pleasantly surprised. Channel separation in particular exceeded expectations.

What efforts would it take to get a proper data set to put into the phono cartridge measurement library?
Given the matched equalizer required* could one use just a standard line-level ADC?
 

Balle Clorin

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No, it needs powe supplied from the box that follows it.

yes , the channel separation h looks good in the recent HifiNews labreort
 

dlaloum

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Interesting... Well, it would have been a LOT MORE interesting 40 years ago... ;)

The lower moving mass and higher output should be advantages but I wonder if it actually measures/performs better. (I don't give much weight to subjective-anecdotal reviews.)

And of course the 'big problem" and the weak link is the records themselves, not the cartridge or rest of the playback system.

I'm thinking the same thing as when I've r read about laser record players - Now, if they could make the record digital and make it smaller in diameter they'd really have an improvement!
Most of the effective mass of the stylus is in the cantilever, not the magnets or coils, contrary to popular myths.

And today's cantilevers are outright porkers compared to the best of the 1980's.

So mass won't be an advantage.

Really it only leaves the elimination of electro magnetic flaws em noise, eddy currents and such.
Those are a very very small portion of the signal, and the electronics required to convert optical to electrical may well impose their own noise / distortion.

I'm not convinced that this approach is one that focuses on areas where diminishing returns already swamp the benefits.

Real progress in vinyl playback is more likely to happen via a manufacturer starting to make ultra light hollow tube cantilevers of boron or beryllium again. ( back to the future )
 
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