[Patrick Turner]

William Sommerwerck wrote:

I still have all my CBS test records, plus the HFN&RR quad disks.

I'm going to tell a story that will get Arny very, very angry...

Around 30 years ago, Murray Zeligman, a well-known Baltimore audiophile and
amp/speaker designer, handed me a Japanese MC pickup -- I forget who the
importer was -- Monster? -- and asked me to listen to it (at home).

"What do you expect me to hear?"

He shook his head. "Just listen."

I listened. The sound was extremely dull and lacking in life/detail. So I
pulled out a CBS test disk and measured the response.

It was up something like 14dB at 20kHz. (No, there was no significant
suckout in the "presence" region.)

Obviously, there has to be /some/ measurement that correlate's with the
pickup's sound. I still sometimes wonder what it might be.

So you measured and found a rising treble response of +14dB at 20kHz
above the reference 1kHz?

And yet music sounded like there was a big treble cut.

Apart from the possibility your hearing is very poor, what you heard
with music and what you measure doesn't corelate at all.

But you have to be aware of how they may have equalised the test record.

Some do not simply have anounced test frequencies that have been
recorded using the standard the RIAA recording eq.

I searched for and could NOT find a test record with its announced
frequencies properly eq'd for RIAA and not one of the 3 test records I
have have such a simple set of test tones so that you don't have to make
calculations from the weird response you may initially measure.

I don't bother testing carts anymore because of the problem of not being
able to get a decent test record. They have everything you don't need
and nothing that you really want.

Last time I tested 2 MCs and two MMs, the responses were weird with
rising HF response, but all much the same, and there was serious
distortion above 5kHz, like a wriggle in the sine at each zero crossing
of about 20% of the main wave amplitude.

Judging by the sound of my Denon 103R there isn't much wrong with the
response. When I changed to the Denon from a Shure V15, the sound was
cleaner, and just better, but the response was about the same.

Patrick Turner.