Audio-Technica VM540ML/H Turntable Headshell/Cartridge Combo Kit Red

Absolutely love this cartridge. Provides a lot of clarity to your vinyl and minimises most distortion.

This cartridge is very nice. The sound is outstanding. There are a lot of reviews in the internet and they all agreed...one of the best cratridge in that range of price. Very satisfied. Note that youll probably need to fine tune the overhang of the cartridge. I installed it on my technics sl-3300.

Purchased the cartridge mounted on the AT head-shell. The cartridge alignment was perfect on a protractor, out of the box. Other than for adjustment for vertical tracking force (2gm), the headshell clicked into place and was playing records within minutes. The sound is marvelous compared to a Music Hall generic cartridge with an elliptical stylus. No sibilance, no inner track distortion, has a tight bass and full sound. Most satisfying purchase of the year. This cartridge on vinyl could definitely give digitized recordings (maybe not DSD) a run for its money. For those sitting on the fence, this shouldnt be that hard a decision. Definitely audiophile grade and sounds marvelous on a Denon pre/Emotiva power/B&W speaker system.

Not an audiophile by any means but I can hear the significant difference between this 540 and comparative priced cartridges. Very clear highs and clean controlled bass. I have bought two of these for my vintage Pioneer Pl512 TT and up to date AT USB DD TT. I believe for this price range you will not be disappointed at all. Try it out.

ok, Im just saying, this is how music was meant to be played. money well spent. Dear Lord, This is great!

Bought it to upgrade a kit cartridge of Audio-Technica LP120xusb. Since I bought it with a headshell, the installation was less than easy. I only needed to rebalance the tonearm. I immediately got clearly hearable sound improvement.

I have the Audio Technica AT-LP120XUSB. I also have a deer hide mat under my stock AT mat to help absorb vibration and adjust the height of the vinyl slightly. This means my cartridge bottom is parallel to the vinyl since my turntable has a fixed height tone arm base. I use the 1 pound AT disc stabilizer. I used a protractor to slightly adjust the cartridge from its preinstalled setting and used a scale to adjust stylus pressure to 2.0 grams as noted in specs. The weight on this is very important because the VM540ML/H combo weighs 1 gram more than the stock VMN95E and all that weight is right at the stylus. The tone arm counter balance weight had to be dialed back to only 0.5 grams from 2.0 to get the desired stylus pressure. With all that said, this thing sounds phenominal. I give credit to the stock VMN95E for doing a good job out of the box. But the VM540ML has a clarity and a silence that is easy to hear right away. I did not have a volume change when comparing cartridges. Hearing real bongos from the left soundstage when they used to sound like a drum machine from the center was the moment i knew there was a difference. Cymbals are more clear and you can hear the high hats actually touch. Dont forget to use the handy headshell holder at the back of the turntable for the stock set up. Also makes it easy to compare back and forth for the first 3 hours you test out the new set up!

Looking for a stylus to replace the original one on my AT-120LP. After some research decided this was the best option for sound quality, price and easy installation. Got the entire headshell as it was much easier to pop off the old one and put this one on. Noticeable sound improvement right away. Highly recommend.

My turntable a Teac TN-570 came with an installed Audio Technica AT100E worth about $100. I was really surprised how good this turntable/cartridge/stylus combination sounded and should have been satisfied at least until the cartridge was broken in. However, I decided to go for the Gold and invest in a better sounding cartridge. Although the AT100E was very good right out of the box, I could hear some slight distortion towards the end of each of my albums(LP) and I wondered why ? Not wanting to play around with the tracking I figured a better cartridge would do the trick. I had my mind set on the Ortofon Blue which has been receiving rage reviews since I can remember. Thats until I began reading the reviews on the Audio-Technica VM540ML, which stated almost unanimously that the Audio-Technica VM540ML was the better cartridge. Oh well, for an extra $50 I might as well invest in that one, especially since I already own an AT. I purchased the Combo Kit which came with a pre-installed cartridge and head-shell, because I did not want to fiddle around with a $250 cartridge trying to install it. I eagerly waited for the Combo kit to come in the mail. It took about 3 business days. I was really surprised on how cheap looking the head-shell was. I thought it was made out of plastic, until I performed the biting test with my teeth and sure enough it was aluminum, but it sure looked plastic to me ! Also while I was trying to remove the cartridge from the packing, the stylus-guard almost came off and the stylus was actually moved to the left slightly, but I gently moved it back. And this for an extra $40 ?! The cartridge itself did not look any different than my AT100E and it seemed like there were some cut corners when it came to the build of this cartridge. It certainly did not Ooze of quality like my turntable did. In any case, I did not buy this cartridge for looks but for sound, so I placed a copy of a re-mixed Beatles album on the turntable mat and took it for a spin. Like the reviews said, I could not hear a single Snap, Crackle, Pop, but keep in mind this album was purchased recently. The sound was a little better than my AT100E, but not by much. I was not really surprised by the sound for some reason ? Dont get me wrong, the sound was better than anything I have owned so far, its just that I expected this cartridge to blow the AT100E out of the water, which it didnt. Without the noise, I would say that the sound coming out of my turntable probably matches the sound coming out of my expensive Marantz CD player, but there are some minor differences. The sound from my CD player seems to be a little more open and crisp, not as boxy. However, the sound from my TT is not as flat, has more depth and is a little easier to listen to for extended periods. Everything else such as instrument placement, base, mid range, treble is about the same although the cymbals sound a little more natural on my turntable. The reason why I gave this cartridge/stylus a 4-star instead of a 5-star, was the cheap looking head shell that cost me an extra $40 and the slight disappointment in build quality. ** The sound is great so far and I highly recommend this cartridge not only for the quality sound, but for those who want to make high-res copies of their albums on Tape or Digital if your system allows. Maybe after 20 hours of break-in period I will adjust my review. ** After the Break-in period this cartridge/stylus sounds absolutely fantastic, even better than my expensive CD player ! so I upgraded to a 5-star **

My new Audio Technica AT-LP120XUSB turntable came with the stock AT-VMN95E elliptical stylus. Sounded great but I knew there was a better sound if I researched it. So after some research on the AT website, I realized for my listening profile, the micro linear stylus was the way to go versus the elliptical. The micro-linear provides much more surface contact with the record grooves. Once I swapped cartridges (the AT VM540ML cartridge & headshell came perfectly aligned... I checked it with a protractor), I was blown aways with the crystal clarity of the vocals and the separation of the instruments. The bass is pronounced and huge. The cartridge reproduces the sound that the producers wanted you to hear.