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Absolute Analog
The best moving coil yet?
Air Tight PC-1 Cartridge
Jonathan Valin
Like most vinylphiles, I’ve listened to
a lot of fine moving-coil cartridges
over the years. The Air Tight PC-
1, TAS’ 2006 Phono Cartridge of the
Year award-winner, is, IMO, the best yet
in nearly every aspect of phonographic
reproduction—the most complete.
I am scarcely alone in my admiration
for the PC-1, which has been a big
success critically and commercially. This
is not one of those products that hides
its light under a bushel. All you have to
do is listen to a violin recording, like,
say, Joseph Silverstein playing Bartók’s
great (and greatly difficult) Sonata for
Solo Violin [Columbia], and it quickly
becomes obvious that you are getting
40 August 2007 The Absolute Sound
more information with less distortion and
greater speed than you’re used to hearing
from an mc.
In the third movement “Melodia,” for
instance, when Silverstein plays those
tricky high harmonics, you not only hear
how these wispy little curlicue-notes
sound; you hear how they are sounded. You
hear, beneath the harmonics, the faint
silken rush of the bow and the shift of
fingertips lightly touching strings. This is
extraordinary low-level detail, bespeaking
a very low noise floor and very high
resolution.
But the PC-1 isn’t just very quiet
and highly detailed; it’s unusually fast. I
thought the London Reference was a
world-beater when it came to transient
response; but the PC-1 audibly bested it.
Just listen to any of the pizzicatos in this
same movement of the Bartók Sonata
to hear a new benchmark in the lifelike
reproduction of plucked strings.
In addition to its world-class distortion,
resolution, and speed, the PC-1 is also
extremely natural in timbre for a moving
coil. Once again, listen to Silverstein’s
violin on the double- and triple-stopped
chords and trills of the “Melodia.” With
their rising treble response, moving coils
tend to brighten up or thin out timbres in
the upper mids and highs. Not here. (At
least, not when the cartridge is properly
loaded to 100–500 ohms.)

Absolute Analog
The PC-1 isn’t just a wonderment in
the treble. Its bass is just as remarkable—
and in the same ways. On something
like Robert Helps’ Steinway on Arthur
Berger’s Two Episodes (from New Music
for the Piano [CRI), you not only get the
fullness of timbre of the big pedaled
chords; you get the full energy with which
Helps sounds them, the power with
which they are projected and sustained.
Many moving-coil cartridges (many
stereo systems, for that matter) make big
instruments like concert grands sound
as if they’re getting smaller in volume,
power, and projection as they descend
in frequency, as if their sound is being
funneled to a point, like a “V.” The PC-1
reproduces deep sustained notes as they
sound in life—expansive, bottomless, and
open, like an upside-down “V.”
Happily, the PC-1 is also exceptional
in the midband, reproducing voices from
John Shirley-Quirk’s resonant baritone
on Lutoslawski’s haunting Les Espaces
du sommeil [Columbia] to Joan Baez’s
gorgeous soprano on “Gospel Ship”
(from Live in Concert [Cisco]) with in-theroom-with-you
presence, while, at the
same time, fully reproducing the acoustic
of the hall each singer is singing in.
The PC-1’s truly extraordinary
resolution of timbre, dynamics, and
detail is no accident. As I noted in my
Kuzma vs. Walker review in Issue 171,
the cartridge is the end product of many
years of research. Designed by the late Y.
Matsudaira, who was largely responsible
for some of the legendary coils from
Koetsu and Miyabi, the PC-1 uses a
new high-µ core and winding material
(designated SH-µX) that is said to have
three times the saturation flux-density
Truly
extraordinary
resolution
and initial permeability of conventional
core materials. In plain English, the PC-
1’s magnets produce a much stronger
magnetic field, greatly lowering noise
and coloration and greatly increasing
resolution in every regard. Details are
clearer, timbres are truer, air is more
plentiful, dynamics are more lifelike,
and stage width, depth, and height are
expanded.
As I said in Issue 170, the PC-1 isn’t
simply a slight improvement over what came
before it; it is a leap forward in moving-coil
design. And well worth its $5500 asking
price. (A superb tracker, the PC-1 fares best
between 2.03 to 2.11 grams.) TAS
Specs &
Pricing
Output: 0.6 mV at 1kHz 5cm/sec
Stylus: 3µm x 30µm semi-line contact
Tracking force: 2.0 to 2.2 grams
Weight: 11 grams
Price: $5495
Axiss Audio
17800 South Main Street, Suite 109
Gardena, CA 90248
(310) 329-0187
axissaudio.com
42 August 2007 The Absolute Sound