Van Den Hul Crimson XGW Stradivarius Moving Coil (MC) Cartridge

Van Den Hul's Crimson Stradivarius is a favourite in the CAV Reference System. It has also become a Superstar with our customers.

The Stradivarius variation of the Crimson cartridge uses a Pau Ferro wooden body but douses that in multiple layers of specialist laquer emulating the laquer used on Stradivarius string instruments. The sound is even more involving, natural and open than the straight Crimson XGW which only difference is the absence of this special laquer.

It is the easiest cartridge to pair with a range of gear. The Colibri range has astounding levels of channel separation but requires more precise matching with the rest of the gear.

Quite forceful on transients but less delicately detailed than its twice-as-expensive Colibri XGW Stradivarius cousin, the Crimson counters by surpassing the Colibri in sheer bottom-octave drive with propulsive music. While not carrying a five-figure price tag, the Crimson isn’t embarrassed in the company of competition at two (or three) times its asking price in soundstaging, energy, dynamic pacing, and drive—making it a relative bargain in the ultra-high-end cartridge sweepstakes, and one of TAS’ most distinguished 2017 Product of the Year Award winners.

Specific characteristics for this great cartridge are a relatively high (0.95mV) output, gold coils, a Samarium-Cobalt magnet, extended channel separation and superb tracking ability.

It is completely hand build by the Master, AJ Van Den Hul and comes with a free 200 hour fine-tune adjustment, which will optimize the suspension after the initial break-in changes.