Головки звукоснимателя — Vertere Acoustics Ruby One

The Ruby One is the top moving-coil cartridge of Vertere Acoustics, the result of more than five years of development, and the brand's US arm sells it under the reference moving-coil label. It went on sale in Japan on 20 May 2026 at JPY 2,420,000 including tax, and the US price is USD 12,995, which puts it at the top of a Vertere cartridge list that also includes the XtraX, Mystic II, Mystic and Solo Mono MC models and the Sabre family of moving-magnet designs, a range that starts at USD 699 for the Sabre Lite MM.

Key specs that matter

The coils have a resistance of 40 ohm and deliver 0.45 mV at 5 cm/sec, working in the field of a samarium-cobalt magnet. Vertere quotes a frequency response of 10 Hz to 50 kHz and channel separation of at least 30 dB. A nude diamond with a Micro Ridge profile of 2.4 x 73 µm does the tracking, mounted on a telescopic ruby and aluminium cantilever with a diameter of 0.3 mm. The distance from the mounting holes to the stylus tip is about 7.8 mm, and from the headshell face to the tip about 18.5 mm.

Engineering and use context

A single piece of solid aluminium alloy is machined to form the body, a choice the company makes to suppress unwanted resonance around the generator. Inside, a custom low-mass moving coil works with a Cross Coil assembly. The generator is held by the brand's four-point floating support, in which four stainless steel spike screws provide the contact points. The two-material telescopic construction of the cantilever is meant to pass groove vibration to the coils while keeping its own resonance under control, and a dual-layer suspension of specially selected materials sets the compliance and damping. For fixing to the headshell Vertere uses its Tri-Point pattern with M2.5 threaded holes, combined with a three-point contact design for precise alignment on the arm.

Pairing

The recommended tracking force is 2.05 g within a window of 1.90 g to 2.10 g, the dynamic compliance is 12 x 10-6 cm/dyne at 100 Hz, and the body weighs 11.8 g. Published load recommendations range from 850 ohm to 1.5 kohm, with capacitance kept to 0.022 µF or below. In Vertere's own electronics the Phono-1 LX accepts MC cartridges with resistive loading from 78 ohm to 47 kohm and gain from 40 dB to 63 dB.

Alternatives

The Vertere XtraX MC is the next moving-coil model down, with the same 0.45 mV output, a nude Micro Elliptical 7.5 x 15.5 µm stylus on a telescopic cantilever and a USD 7,995 price.