Concorde VS Head Shell Cartridge WHY I Feel Concord Is the Best for the DJ

0:00 And hopefully show you why it's

Right, so in this video I'm going to explain and hopefully show you why it's very possible, not possibly or maybe, very possible why the likes of Autophon Concord style cartridges will be better for you for use with your vinyl turntable. Now first of all I'd like to say a big thank you very much to GetInTheMix.com from Colchester for sending me these. If you want any information at all about GetInTheMix.com, then check out the link in the description. They are pretty much all singing and dancing DJ store that sells practically everything. If you want some vinyl turntables, some cartridges, some speakers, some decks, give them a bell, give them a call. The information of course will be in the description of this video. Now, so why are concords better for vinyl DJs?

There are quite a few reasons, but I'm going to explain one that should be pure logic for even someone who has no idea even what a turntable is. So take that on board. So imagine you know quite a bit. Imagine there's someone who doesn't know anything. I can even show them why these will be better. Okay, now this is a regular head shell. This is for a Technics turntable and if you buy a Technics SL-1200 Mark II, you would have had a head shell like this, excluding that knobbly bit at the bottom. That's actually the cartridge. We'll talk about that very shortly. But this is the head shell and you will plug that into the vinyl turntable there. Now, if we take out one of the Autofon, these are the Concord Scratch cartridges.

1:45 The back part is very similar

The back part is very similar. You have four pins, you have four pins on the other cartridge and they will both fit into the arm of the turntable exactly the same. You will secure exactly the same. There's no difference there. But that's where the similarity finishes end of and that's it because from that point onwards it's completely different. So in my mind, why the likes of the Concord style cartridges a thousand times better. So let's first of all have a look at a regular cartridge, or sorry, a regular head shell. Now this head shell here... has these two slits where you attach the cartridge, you have to screw it in and one of the I suppose a great feature about a head shell like this is that you can attach whatever cartridge you want based of course on it being compatible with the head shell you're using so you can attach a very expensive cartridge or a pretty cheap one. I mean I'm not going to go into which ones to get because there are quite a few of them

3:51 Autophon cartridge

But the downside to this, this is where you've got a big question mark, is how to set this. Now the trouble is with head shells like this, is if you attach a cartridge and just start playing your record, the needle, the actual styli right at the end, that diamond tip, may be two millimetres too far forward, two millimetres too far back. One of the screws could be like a fraction of a millimetre higher than the other one, which means it's at a slight angle. So the trouble is with a head shell like this, you have to be very, very precise on the position of the cartridge to get the optimum sound from... The cartridge itself. If you don't set that correctly, then you may not get a correct sound, you may wear out your vinyl quicker and so on and so on. Now let's have a look at the Autophon cartridge. Right, so if I take that plastic part off, let me just pull that off very gently and carefully. Alright, so there is the cartridge and the head shell. Now you'll notice that it's all set.

There's no need. You don't have to move anything. You don't have to screw anything on. The cartridge itself is set and positioned in a way so it's completely and utterly user-friendly. I do not have to set anything on that at all. All I've got to do is plug it in. That's it. Now again, I may have to set the weight on the back of the tonearm to make sure that it's compatible. With this, but I would have to do that anyway with the other head shell. The difference between this one and that one is The Concord is pretty much plug and play, whereas the cartridge that you have to attach to a head shell is not plug and play. You've got to set it correctly. Alright, so there you go. There's some very good advice and information on why I truly believe the likes of the Concord style cartridge is far superior than the...

Thank you very much to Jeremy from GetInTheMix.com in Colchester for sending me these. I will be using these very soon in conjunction with a set of ReLoot turntables and a ReLoot mixer as well. Practice and enjoy. Thank you very much.

This transcript was produced automatically from the audio of the video and may contain mistakes.