catman Posted August 24, 2014 Share Posted August 24, 2014 (edited) G'day all, playing a record this morning I realised that the well used stylus on my Shure M97xE has seen its best and is due for replacement, and whilst I do have a couple of unused spares, I thought it was a good excuse for a cartridge change and I plugged in my Ortofon Super OM 10. In the past I was a huge fan of that cartridge and listening to it today I remember why. It is a really great sounding cartridge with a somewhat speedy/energetic sound with a beautifully 'airy' treble. It makes one limitation of the OEM stylus Shure M97xE very apparent as it has superb stereo separation, making the Shure M97xE only 'adequate' in this respect. One quirk with the Super OM10 is that it sounds its best with a bit more capacitance loading than average (around 350 to 400 picofarads), and this 'tames' a slightly aggressive treble end which gives the 'impression' of bass lightness. Actually the bass response is excellent, it's just that too much treble puts the bass 'out of balance' overall a little. Interestingly enough I have a standard OM10 as well and whilst the two sound very similar, the Super 0M 10 is definitely the better of the two. I'm not sure if the Ortofon Super OM series is still commercially available but my heartfelt opinion is that the Super OM series was/is better than at least the 'lower' models of the 2M series. Regards, Felix. Edited August 24, 2014 by catman Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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