Your review doesn’t mention that Audio Technica rate the Shibata SH stylus at 800 hours, the elliptical EN at 300 hours. Non Mainland locations - Isle of Man, Isle of Wight, the Scilly Isles, the Scottish highlands and Islands, the Channel Islands and Northern Ireland may take a day or so longer and are not Free of Charge. The VM95ML really started to reveal its full abilities when mounted into a Connoisseur BD2a turntable w/ Connoisseur SAU 2 tonearm, a forgotten classic whose uncanny music-making prowess is still unassailable, even 40 years after the firm’s demise. I can think of several of his French contemporaries that would have made for better listening and sonic comparison, e. From this comparison, it should be apparent that a budget minded listener needs to carefully balance each component to achieve the best possible sound.

The sound is very balanced and a little quieter versus the less expensive styli, though it's not lacking in punch where needed. AT-VM95ML with line contact MicroLinear stylus - The AT-VM95ML features a MicroLinear diamond stylus and aluminium cantilever for even greater fidelity and musical accuracy. The VM95 Series suspension design and compliances of VM95 Series have been designed for optimum audiophile reproduction. The results are impressive, there's very little surface noise compared to the Goldring and the microlinear stylus picks up a lot of detail from the grooves.

the nude elliptical is rated at 300 hours of play time, while the microline is rated at 1000 hours and the conical at 500 hours. The ML stylus is also noted for its exceptionally long playing-life, which can be further lengthened using LAST Stylus Preservative or Lyra SPT. I used a wide variety of turntables, arms, and phono stages in reviewing the VM95ML in an attempt to understand its inherent sonic signature. Played in an uncompromised front-end will reveal its ultimate limitations and thus place it into an unfortunate Limbo. The VM95ML’s line-contact stylus was not exceptionally neurotic about set-up: the standard rules of thumb regarding finding the Goldilockian Ideal of ‘just right’ applied.

It tracks very well - even on more worn records, and the surface noise is far lower than a stylus with a less fine profile.As measurement shows, all VM95s are forward in the midrange, fairly cool in their sound as a result – not dull – and quite revealing. The budget VM95C conical stylus (blue) measured -2dB down at 10kHz, the VM95E (green) -1dB giving a slightly brighter sound balance. Viewed from an ultimate performance perspective, the VM95ML’s only real limitation is its aluminum cantilever, which lacks the ultimate speed, rigidity, and detail/snap of cantilevers made of more exotic and more expensive materials. The Facebook tracking pixel allows us to share anonymous tracking data with Facebook for the purpose of statistics and targeted marketing. File one was louder as has been mentioned and I didn’t try to match them but file 2 sounded the more natural, 1 was a bit too etched.