Turntables, Arms & Cartridges

Whatever the pros and cons of the arm by incorporating the cartridge leads as flat, flying PCB conductors within the laminate, Vertere has reduced hum pick-up to below –61dB (re. 5cm/sec). The brass/stainless bearing, with tungsten ball, is put under minimal strain by the lightweight cork/alloy/polymer platter and this is reflected in the hearteningly low –73dB rumble, increasing marginally to –72.2dB through the vinyl groove (DIN-B wtd, re. 5cm/sec). These are class-leading results for a sub-£3k deck even if the speed stability is marginally less impressive. Start-up is a swift 3-4secs, absolute speed is almost bang on the money at just –0.03% and peak-wtd wow acceptable at 0.4%, but higher-rate flutter variations appear at ±15Hz, ±19Hz and ±23Hz and amount to 0.6% [see Graph 1, below]. This same cluster of peaks is also visible on the unweighted rumble spectrum [not shown here].

In common with EAT's flat Kevlar tonearm [HFN Jan '12] Vertere's laminated version trades the beam resonances of conventional tubes for its own unique set of bending modes, further complicated here by the three-way 'split' in its construction. The main 'springboard' mode occurs clearly enough at 150Hz with other modes at 280Hz, 375Hz and 420Hz [see Graph 2, below]. Clearly this laminate does exhibit bending (flexing) and higher frequency torsional (twisting) modes from 700Hz-2kHz, but they are evidently high-Q and rapidly damped. Finally, the twisted nylon thread 'bearings' necessarily have a degree of 'play' (movement) but are also free of chatter and have very low levels of stiction/friction (typically <10g in both planes). PM