Yamaha MC-1X and MC-1S phono cartridge

I’ve used several Yamaha moving coils, including the MC1s. My first mc was the MC 7, which was a not quite entry level mc, and was clean, precise and well balanced, but didn’t have the warmth/oomph/frequency extension that the MC 1s did. It was one of the best cartridges I’ve encountered, even though I got it used. I plan to have it retipped, but right now I’m working through a stock of cartridges and stylii that I already have, so the cost benefit ration doesn’t work.
Yamaha’s cartridges have a good reputation. If you want wackiness in a Yamaha, you should look at their ‘ear’ speakers, which had a flat styrofoam driver that was sort of shaped like an ear, as the ill conceived advertisements put it. In fact it was more like a rounded off rectangle with one corner cut off, which both broke up resonant modes (which can be severe in styrofoam) and allowed a place to put a tweeter. The drivers were typically in a very shallow box with no real back, so they were functionally dipoles, with all the complexities of placement that implies. They tanked on the market, but I suspect that properly set up (which they probably rarely were) they might have some real appeal. That’s just a guess based on my other experience with open baffle drivers — I’ve never heard them.

I have a Yamaha MC-1S on a FR-64S tonearm on a Luxman PD-441, serving backup vinyl playing on a multi-hundred K $ system. It sounds amazingly close to a 30K modern vinyl rig through the same system. The Yamaha MC cartridges of the 70’s were all good, and the MC-1S is the best of the bunch. It competes with almost anything, past or present.