A recording engineer pal of mine (in the AV industry) liked his stock V15 III and found the Jico SAS stylus changed things too much for him, hence my comments regarding the 97 series with SAS styli, which will change the performance away from that intended, maybe for the better? The best V15 III I heard was with an HE stylus. Much sweeter and 'friendlier' in musical communication to me. There was also a MR version of the VN35 stylus but I never saw it listed over here in the UK.

I loved my V15VMR but the cantilever was fractured by accident. I still have it and hope it may one day be possible to patch the cantilever somehow. The sound-field is smaller than a really good MC type and the dynamic range is also small scale in comparison with a really good Decca, but I found everything is in correct proportion. The later V15XMR, VST-V and 97XE are related I think in the body (the styli are different fitting size to the 'original' V15V I think).

Two ways to load a 97Xe. Low capacitance causes a gentle but continuous treble droop which will either give a beefy or dull balance depending on system and personal 'feel' of this balance. High capacitance will keep everything 'flat' for 90% of the range, but over 10k, the response will fall quite markedly.

As for rising treble in modern cartridges, I've been told it's something to do with Japanese vinyl, which has a different composition to other pressings worldwide. The peaky balance favours this *apparently.*