I’ve recently had the misfortune of my Lyra Delos needle being snapped off by the cleaners, crossed with ankle surgery where I’ll have some downtime for a couple months. So down the rabbit hole I went and came around to the Koetsu lineup as a possible replacement. What I liked about the Delos was great imaging and attack and decay, but I couldn’t quite dial in a nice guitar crunch. Michael Jackson’s Thriller and Daft Punk’s Random Access Memories sounded great, classic rock to 90s grunge to Radiohead to Bon Iver sounded good but not great. Anyway, on to a few questions to help me decide whether I should jump up to a Koetsu.
(1) My preamp is a McIntosh C1100 with moving coil sensitivity 0.45mV and 60db gain. The Delos had 0.6mV output. The Keotsu Rosewood signature and Urushi non-Vermilion models have 0.4mV and the RSP has 0.3mV. I do not want to get a standalone phono stage as I have no room. Is the lower 0.3mV on the RSP a non-starter for my 0.45mV sensitivity?
(2) My turntable is an older Pro-ject RPM 9.1 with “ground it” base to reduce vibrations. The tone arm is 9” but a lightweight effective mass 8.5g. Given the forum’s discussion of Koetsu’s loving heavier tone arms is it a non-starter for these Koetsu’s? Are Koetsu’s overkill for this turntable? For reference my digital side is dCS Vivaldi dac and upsampler. I’d still catch my toe tapping a little more to the Delos vinyl, but 95% listen to digital out of convenience (and it’s very good). Also with the digital I didn’t have to choose better bass or better vocals via the MC ohm settings. Anywho, appreciate the forum and any advice here. Thanks in advance.
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