Головки звукоснимателя — Clearaudio Maestro V2

The Maestro V2 Ebony is a moving magnet cartridge from Clearaudio of Erlangen. It grew out of the earlier Aurum series and borrows two parts usually reserved for costly moving coil pickups, a line contact diamond and a solid boron cantilever. The US price is USD 1,500.

Key specs that matter

Clearaudio's figures give an output of about 3.6 mV at 1 kHz and 5 cm/s and cover 20 Hz to 20 kHz. Channel separation is 25 dB, channel balance 0.3 dB and tracking ability 80 µm. Recommended downforce is 2.2 g, with an allowed window of 1.8 to 2.6 g. The coils measure 0.66 kOhm at 1 kHz with an inductance of about 400 mH, and the intended load is 47 kOhm in parallel with 100 pF. Compliance is 16 µ/mN, and the cartridge weighs 8.4 g with a tolerance of 0.4 g. Warranty runs for two years.

Engineering and use context

The stylus is listed as Shibata or Micro HD, a line contact profile, and the diamond receives an optimised polishing process. The diamond sits at the tip of a solid boron rod rather than a hollow alloy tube, the same cantilever material Clearaudio uses in its gold-coil MC range. Clearaudio's stated priorities for this generation were a lower moving mass, a better stylus polish and effective internal damping of the whole cartridge. The body is carved from ebony, picked for its resistance to resonance, and it follows the V2 layout used across the wooden MM models of the brand, with only the entry Concept V2 housed in aluminium. For the MM V2 series, Clearaudio measures, analyses and hand-selects its moving magnet cartridges in four planes, aiming for left and right outputs that behave alike.

Pairing

Any standard MM phono input will accept the Maestro V2 directly, and the low recommended capacitance means that long, high-capacitance tonearm leads should be avoided or the input capacitance reduced. With its moderate mass and medium compliance, the cartridge works best in arms of medium effective mass. The line contact tip also calls for accurate alignment of overhang and azimuth to trace the groove as intended.

Alternatives

The Clearaudio MM Jubilee is a moving magnet model of similar weight and output, housed in a Panzerholz body.