LeSon LS10 MkII cartridge - a musical gem
I’ve been on this HiFi bandwagon for the best part of 50 years. In that time I’ve had 8 turntables, including a Rega and a Linn (for 20 years) not to mention numerous arms and cartridges. Nearly all the cartridges were moving coils ranging from a Supex, Linn, Dynavector, Accuphase, Gold Note, London Decca Super Gold and a few others. To cut to the chase, the LS10 MkII moving coil beats them all, hands down! I asked my lovely wife, who has shared this HiFi experience with me for over 30 years and who always sits and listens to music with me in our afternoons, what she thought of the LS10 MkII. The following are her unbiased descriptions, and I totally agree. She describes it as open, with great clarity, detail, depth and dynamics, and with great bass (she loves the bass, as do I!). She also added that it simply “draws you into the music” like no other cartridge we’ve listened to. I would add that it also has great inner detail; there is better separation between instruments and quite often I could hear instrument and bass details that I had not heard before. A real joy! It’s also quiet in the groove. I have many records in my “out box” which I previously considered unplayable due to surface noise and some of these have now been resurrected and put back on the shelf! The LS10 MkII is like no other cartridge I’ve ever owned or heard before, although I have to say that I have not heard any of those high 4 and 5 figure cartridges to do a comparison, such as the Ortofon MC Anna. However, what I can say is that the LS10 MkII is a highly engaging listen. Some cartridges engage the mind with their high degree of detail and technical excellence and whilst the LS10 MkII does that very well, while doing so it also engages the heart and soul of the music and to me that is what I’ve been missing for a very, very long time. Undoubtedly there are better cartridges out there, but at what price? For me, at this moment, I don’t feel the need to look any further! A word on phono stages. I tried the LS10 with three phono stages, two tube and one Gold Note solid state. I initially tried it with the solid state and it sounded great, I was in heaven. But that was until about 20 hours in when I switched it to my tube preamp which has a built in Oxford Step Up Transformer (SUT). After a few hours of finding the right transformer gain settings, this combination blew me away. It smoked the solid state, which was no slouch. So, there’s a caveat here, no doubt the LS10 MkII will sound good through many phono stages; but, you may never know what all the fuss is about unless you give it the very best phono stage that you can; and if you can use an input SUT into a tube phono preamp, then even better. My only criticism, not related to sound quality of the cartridge, is that the stylus guard is somewhat loose and falls off fairly easily. For me that’s not a really big deal as I’m used to naked cartridges, but it can become a big deal when changing cartridges or arms. In such cases I put a small elastic band around the stylus guard and headshell assembly to hold the stylus guard in place. Hopefully this is something LeSon can fix, or may have already fixed. I can’t leave this review without also mentioning that dealing with Gregory from LeSon has been a real pleasure. He is a true professional and answered every question I could throw at him. He is not your typical HiFi salesman, he will also ask you, the potential purchaser, questions to make sure you have the right equipment to make the LS10 sound its best. These are people who really care about music! I really love what the LS10 MkII does with vinyl grooves such that I’ve told Gregory I will be buying another, or possibly the next incarnation, the LS10 MKIII! Call this is a rave review! Thank you LeSon.