ORTOFON MC DIAMOND

what they say ...

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Reviewary

 In cooperation with HiFi Choice  |  2019

 

 

Ortofon MC Anna Diamond

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"While I can’t profess to be any kind of expert when it comes to operatic divas and their output, if the operatic diva Ms Netrebko (aka "Anna Netrebko") is anywhere near as good at warbling as the MC Anna Diamond is, she must have one hell of a set of lungs. Sure, the diva-esque price tag is not to be sniffed at, but this is one of the very best moving-coil cartridges to pass through HFC in quite some time. In short, it excels at pretty much everything it turns its hand to.

 

If forced to be super pedantic, we might suggest vinylistas that maintain that analogue sound should be sweet, warm and romantic might want to look elsewhere as the MC Anna Diamond does not attempt to add or subtract when it comes to what’s imprinted in the groove. Instead it simply communicates what’s there with mesmerising imaging capability,

sublime clarity and insight and a supreme sense of the recording’s dynamics. Add to the mix fine detail retrieval the likes of which we’ve never experienced anywhere else, and you’ve got a pick-up that can squeeze out vast amounts of information from even the dullest of recordings.

 

A criticism that’s frequently levelled at vinyl is that it can sometimes sound rather vague and diffuse in the way that it goes about reproducing the recorded acoustic. The Ortofon shatters this idea, showing just how precisely things can snap into focus when a serious cartridge is employed.

 

Summary

As Ortofon’s flagship moving-coil offering, the MC Anna Diamond has plenty to live up to and it’s far from inexpensive. However, it effortlessly shatters all expectations with a performance that is among the very best that we’ve heard. From its stunning design and impeccable engineering to the way that it drags even the dullest recordings into sharp relief, this is a very special pick-up indeed. Proof if ever it were required that when done properly, vinyl can sound simply heavenly"

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Absolute Sound

Jonathan Valin  |  June 26  2013

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Ortofon MC Anna

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The System

"The Anna’s chassis is, indeed, much larger, heavier, and more bulbous than that of the A90, but it has been built in precisely the same way that the A90’s was, using the selective laser melting (SLM) process in which micro-particles of titanium are welded together by lasers working like computer-controlled knitting needles to construct—bit-by-bit, layer by layer—a single-piece enclosure. This technique, says Ortofon, “allows for precise control of the density of the body material [and] extremely high internal damping.” As was the case with the A90, the end result is lower susceptibility to resonances.

 

Ortofon claims that this entirely new system, which “greatly optimizes geometry” and also increases the “active material” (a combination of neodymium and iron-cobalt) of the magnetic engine, “allows each coil to sense identical flux density regardless of position,” thereby optimizing dynamic linearity. Since the Anna’s magnetic field is much stronger and more evenly distributed, the coils can be constructed with far fewer windings and zero overlap among those windings. The cumulative results of these improvements,” says Ortofon, “[are] more lifelike reproduction, with nearly boundless imaging, dimensionality, and dynamics.”

 

The Sound

Ortofon describes Anna as having “boundless imaging” which is borne out in the listening. What I find odd is that the company hasn’t also touted the most obvious and dramatic departure from the classic Ortofon sound: the Anna’s richer and more beautiful reproduction of timbre. The Anna is also unprecedentedly more beautiful-sounding than past Ortofons, with a considerably fuller, more extended, and more dynamic bass range and a richer, lovelier, more fully fleshed-out lower midrange than the A90, as well as a smoother, more natural upper midrange and more extended treble.

 

Not for nothing was this cartridge named after Ms. Netrebko, whose fleet, powerful, gorgeously full-bodied voice it aptly calls to mind.

While the Ortofon MC Anna has undoubtedly gained lifelike density of tone color, it has not done so at the expense of any of Ortofon’s traditional virtues. Which is to say that this is still an extraordinarily fast, clear, ultra- high-resolution transducer with superb imaging and excellent soundstage width, depth, and height. And in spite of its newfound warmth and color, it is still a fundamentally neutral and transparent cartridge. Which is to say that what has been added to the sonic mix fills an absence rather than exaggerates something that was already present.

 

The Anna sounds more lifelike with lifelike sources because it is, in fact, sonically more complete. While the Anna is probably more forgiving of mediocre-to- poor sources than the A90 was, it is not so rich and warm that it makes sow’s ears into silk purses; it simply makes lesser LPs more listenable and livable. When you combine lifelike tone color with outstanding transient speed, exceptional resolution, and rock ’em/sock ’em dynamics, good things happen sonically.

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Like the best speakers and electronics, the Anna is also exceptionally good at preserving the lifelike timing of notes. While considerably warmer and more inherently beautiful- sounding than the A90, the Anna doesn’t overemphasize the harmonic series, as more romantic cartridges (such as Koetsus) do. Nor, for all its incredible speed and newfound power does it scant tone and decay. Everything unfolds at a natural pace— which along with the cartridge’s pinpoint imaging, sensational resolution of low-level detail, and excellent reproduction of soundstage ambience and dimensionality—makes for more of those moments when recorded things sounds so much like the real ones that your heart skips a beat.

 

This doesn’t just go for thrilling staccato or fortissimo passages, BTW; it is also there in lilting legato or pianissimo ones. Massed strings, for example, on well-recorded LPs like the Shostakovich I mentioned or the Poulenc Concerto for Two Pianos [Decca] have a silken sweetness that I don’t associate with previous Ortofons. The A90 would’ve deracinated those strings just a bit, making them a little “whiter” in timbre, a little less fully like themselves. Same for high-pitched instruments such as flutes, bells, and cymbals. Like bass and power-range instruments, they have more energy, but they also have considerably more color, which is mixed with that energy in proportions that make these instruments sound just that much more “there.”

 

All in All

What we have in the MC Anna is a cartridge that is far more likely to please far more listeners. It still has the kind of neutrality and resolution that transparency-first listeners crave.

On first-rate sources it sounds as fool-ya realistic as any absolute sound listener could possibly hope for; and with its newfound density of color and dynamic clout, it is beautiful and exciting enough to delight the “as you like it” crowd.

Naturally, the Ortofon MC Anna receives my highest and most enthusiastic recommendation. It is a reference-grade cartridge that significantly improves upon the reference-grade cartridge (the A90) that preceded it. In fact, I think the Anna is the most natural-sounding cartridge the venerable Danish company has made in a century of doing business!"

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