I don’t know the deck or phonostage but the Moonstone is a very capable MM cartridge. It’s slightly reserved so matches very well with a very forward deck. And the reviews out there are with Naim phonostages so at least thinking it matches with a Stageline isn’t just me.
It is an unusually low output MM though. Getting close to HOMC territory in fact. I use the Moonstone on a SL-1200GR and no thoughts of upgrading. Great imaging and detail for the money.
I’ve had 4 Sumiko carts over the years. One was meh. One was very good but not quite up to the rave reviews. Two were outstanding and the Moonstone is one. The other, which I thought insanely good for half the money, was the Pearl (which has some terrible reviews but go figure).
Dealers love to push the budget like that, tell them £300 and they start from £600 and go up from there. No saying it’s a bad move, hopefully he’s thinking about future custom and is steering you right for your deck so that a satisfied customer comes back but without knowing him It’s hard to be confident. Ask him if the Gold would be better and see if his eyes light up.
And it’s what @Rushboy have done. I would however call another dealer selling Well Tempered. As we say here “ 2 avis valent mieux qu’un “. Better have 2 advices than one.
In Sweden, Well Tempered is always sold together with a pickup from Dynavector. (Although of course the customer can choose someone else if he absolutely wants to)
“I’ve already had the DV 10x5 HO twice.
Once on the Rega Planar 8 and on my current Well Tempered.
And each time I sold it again.
Either it’s MC with high power, or the Shibata cut, which I don’t like.
I like the cheaper gold ring 1042 much better on the Rega and even more on the Well Tempered.”
I have the exact same experience with the TD125 SME3009 combination with the DL103D.
Pretty long time ago, but pretty happy with the sound back in the day.
But when you suggest a DV10x5 for exactly that reason, to a bloke looking for a ‘cheap cartridge’ for his WT, and (unbeknown to you) he’s already rejected it twice, what do you do?!
And I made the mistake of using ‘you’ to talk about what I had suggested, as if to underline my exasperation with the OP for not mentioning those cartridges that he had already rejected, at the very beginning of his thread.
It will fit, but I do not like High Output MCs. They are neither fish nor fowl.
For the higher output voltage, more windings are needed on the coil, which has a “negative” effect on the inductance and the moving mass, but they are less sensitive to the load than MM or MI.
A low output MC always sounds much more spatial and (time) accurate. I´d rather stick to MI/ MM; otherwise you´d should switch to low output, low impedance MC.
How do you feel about some of the LOMM out there? They still work on MM phono stages but their output is close to HOMC which is still much lower than regular MM. I notice a lot of the more expensive MM out there are of the LOMM variety.
To be honest: MM/ MI pickups shift the phase up to 180 degree dependend on their load; with MCs the phase shift is limited to a few degrees or a few millidegrees.
That´s the reason for (real) MCs sounding more spacial and producing a more vivid image. In case you already reached out at Ortofon 2M Bronze level on a SL-1200GAE my next step in order to gain more performance would be a MC pickup rather than a MM/MI.
As said earlier, MM suffer from phase shifts up to 180 degree depending on their load.
I own some MM and MI pickups, including some real ToTLs and lisetend to many of the actual made MM/ MIs, but when it comes to performance, I prefer low impedance and low output MC.
Yes, sometimes it just goes a little wrong.