So I bought me an Audio Technical AT150MLX cartridge (in Tokyo) and installed it on my Systemdek IIX, and for the first time I could hear what everyone was talking about. Even though I kept reading that vinyl can/does sound the same/better then CD play back, I had heard no such thing from my own record player using the Ortofon OM5 cartridge. With the new cartridge, the difference/similarities to my digital front end is very obvious, and in some ways the vinyl wins! So here I am looking to add more upgrade to my Systemdek IIX and the cable was a good place to start.

I could have sourced a new tonearm cable with the proper 5-pin din connector and there where plenty of them available from the price of $100 to up and over $500. I would be more then willing trying out a $100 cable, but I’ve learned that $100 gets you something better then crap, but no more then that. I would love to try more exotic fair, but the wallet seems a little lite. I do have some pretty decent cables laying around, but none of them with a joined 5 pin din, so I got the great idea (saw it online actually) to build me an adapter box that goes from 5-pin din to 2 RCA outputs. What you see above is the culmination of all my hard research and work (one days work!).

I bought me a Cardas 5-pin din and a foot of Cardas 4×22 gauge shielded cable. Locally I picked up a plastic project box and a much to large grounding post. The RCA’s I had in my parts box from a mod I was trying 5 years ago. For the soldering, I had my liquid rosin flux and some 4% silver solder. It melts pretty quickly and makes for a great contact if done right. The organic liquid rosin flux really helps the wetting process, but keep in mind it does leave a somewhat sticky residue. The residue isn’t particularly problematic though. Once I had it all soldered down, I bolted the box to the back of the Systemdek and plugged in the 5-pin din.

I had a few cables for a comparison, a 1m pair of Atlas Questor, 1m pair of Atlas Voyager, 1m pair Atlas Navigator and a 1m pair Prisma cable. Of the four, I settled on the Atlas Questor. Compared to the original Audioquest Tonearm cable, the Atlas Questor was much less bright, more detailed and added quite a lot to the bottom end detail and depth. I did prefer the more expensive Atlas Voyager with it’s more neutral and realistic presentation, but that cable is currently on my digital front end. The Prisma, while being a very inexpensive cable, does sound pretty good, but it omits so much even compared the relatively inexpensive Atlas Questor. The Prisma is a great cable for all around niceness and would be perfect for a tuner or tape deck. The Atlas Navigator does nothing for me, sounding lifeless and in some ways broken. You can’t win em all.

As of this writing, the cost of this project, with box, RCA’s and cabling was around $50CDN. The most expensive parts being the Cardas DIN and cable. I am quite happy with the outcome and will eventually look into swapping out the RCA’s with something a little more upscale, like the copper Vampire RCA’s. I’m not sure if that will improve anything, but till then, I will experiment with cable swapping, which means I have an excuse to hunt down more used Wireworld cables! Yay me!