VERTERE SABRE MOVING MAGNET CARTRIDGE REVIEW

The Vertere Sabre moving magnet cartridge costs £845 and certainly looks the part. But how does it sound? Stuart Smith finds out for HiFi Pig.

The moving magnet generator is housed in a precision-milled body and held in place with screws.

You may recognise the name Touraj Moghaddam, the chap behind the Vertere brand, as he was also instrumental in the original and legendary Roksan brand. The Vertere brand is unashamedly high-end and is perhaps best known for their series of superbly put together record players – yes, like us Vertere call a vinyl spinner a record player.  As well as their four record players Vertere also make tonearms, cables, a phonostage, motor-drives and other accessories. Oh, and they have a record label. As well as all that the company has three cartridges in their portfolio, the Magneto, the Sabre, and the Mystic. The former two are Moving Magnet and the latter is a Moving Coil with the Sabre sitting in the middle of the bijou range by way of its price and costing £845, which is quite a bit for a Moving Magnet cartridge.

BUILD AND FEATURES

The packaging for the Sabre is fantastic with the metallic orange cartridge being bolted between two pieces of Perspex by the thumbscrews you’ll later use to tighten the cartridge to your headshell. It’s not a big thing but this attention to detail is a great starting point as it inspires confidence in the product and you also get that Christmas morning effect – after all, this is not a cheap cartridge. Etched into the bottom Perspex plate are the Vertere logo, the key information you will need to set the cartridge up (output, tracking weight, and recommended load – 4.0mV, 2.0g and 47kOhms) and “Made in England”.

Great packaging that can’t be faulted.

The generator part of the cartridge is housed in a precision-milled aluminium alloy case that is there to offer support and do away with mechanical vibrations. Interestingly, rather than be glued into the housing, the generator is held in place by four “spike” screws which Vertere tells us are “precisely positioned and torqued for maximum rigidity and performance.” On top of the cartridge are two mounting holes that are threaded for you to attach to your headshell with the aforementioned stainless steel thumbscrews. I really liked this latter point and it meant that there was no fiddling about with lilliputian screwdrivers or hex keys, which invariably get misplaced eventually anyway. The thumbscrews get a big thumbs up from me! The top of the cartridge (the bit that fits to the tonearm) has three machined contact areas and on the front of the cartridge, there’s a series of lines to help with alignment.

The magnet inside the generator is an Alnico, the stylus is an elliptical diamond (nothing overly exotic there) and the cantilever is an aluminium tube. All this is pretty normal fayre and nothing appears to be particularly exotic with regards to this cartridge.

The full specs are at the end of the review for those interested.

For the purposes of this review, the Sabre was attached to the standard arm of a Technics 1200G with an Ortofon headshell. Set up was a breeze and I seriously think ALL cartridges from here on in should come with these thumbscrews – really, they make life so much easier!

SOUND QUALITY

From whatever angle, this is a good looking cartridge.

Once set up properly onto the headshell and arm, the output from the cartridge was fed into our suitably configured melto 2 phonostage by Greek brand LAB 12.

I have to point out at this point that I’m a committed user of Moving Coil cartridges and have been for a number of years, although I do have a Sumiko Olympia in my collection by way of having something to compare against from the Moving Magnet stable. Obviously, I’ve owned many Moving Magnet cartridges over the years, but to draw on aural memory from so far back would be impossible and so the Sabre will be judged on its own merits and within the company of the cartridges I currently own.

I suppose it’s useful to give an idea of what I’d look for in a cartridge before going on to try and describe the attributes of the one we have here. I’m looking for something that tracks well, retrieves as much information from the grooves as possible and presents this in a dynamic and detailed way without adding overly by way of its own flavour.

I will be honest and say now that I really wasn’t expecting a great deal from the Sabre, despite its undoubtedly high-end outward looks. However, I always approach reviews with an open mind and with ears ready to be either surprised or disappointed.

Tracking ability of a cartridge I think is best left to the trusty old Ortofon Test Record and the 7 tracking ability tracks – not exactly foot-tapping stuff, but it gets the job done and ticks off an important part of the review of a cartridge. The Sabre, set at the correct tracking weight of 2g never faltered and sailed through each of the tracks without any problem at all. So the cartridge will certainly be able to track anything musically that gets thrown at it and that’s one thing that needn’t concern me anymore with regards to its abilities. I don’t like using measurements and whatnot, but I do think for a cartridge it’s important to have this kind of record as an easy to access benchmark.  However, I’m well aware that it’s the old lugholes that are the key measurement tool when listening to music.

Normal pins around the back hold no surprises.

On with the music then and Suicide’s eponymous album. The surefootedness of the Sabre can’t be faulted and it really didn’t miss a beat on what can be a pretty tortuous record. Soundstaging and separation of sounds in the mix were both excellent and whilst I thought I was getting more in the way of detail, particularly at the top end when I switched in the GoldNote Tuscany Red (€5000), I don’t think there was €4000 of difference. The soundstage didn’t seem as wide and, particularly, high as the Red, but certainly more so than with the Sumiko Olympia (€230) on the arm. Detail-wise was a similar story, with me feeling that the Red gave a more sparkly and detailed top-end and the Olympia less so. That said, the Sabre certainly does get a whole load of detail from the record, though perhaps a more sophisticated stylus shape could have dug even deeper. What I did really like was the rhythm and feeling of rock-solidness to the music – somehow I feel that this cartridge is a great partner for the Technics turntable and whilst certainly a more sophisticated cartridge than I used when DJing way back in the day, the music had a similar kind of solidity to it. I struggled to hear any distortion on this record, but then I’d set the cartridge up with the aforementioned test record and so I shouldn’t have!

The Sabre tracking the Ortofon test record tracks with no issues.

I dug out an old copy of Slam’s Positive Education that had seen better days, and whilst there was a fair bit of surface nose the Sabre dealt with this track very well. Again, there was the whole separation of the mix into its constituent parts. It strikes me that I talk a lot about separation and soundstaging when I’m reviewing kit, but it is important to my way of thinking. There’s a lot going on in this mix despite it having the feel of being pretty basic musically, but the Sabre injects the same feeling of dynamic rhythm to the music I heard before. The Sabre lacks a degree of that edge of your seat excitement that the Red brings to this record,  but then more so than the Sumiko. Hi-hats pan between left and right speakers in this track and the cartridge picks this out well. The Sabre also feels fairly neutral, though I would say it’s a touch less lively than the Red in the tops and perhaps there’s a bit of warmth in the upper mids. The bass kick on the Luke Slater mix (I think, but it’s not labelled as such) sounds dry and hollow as it has always sounded and to me, this would indicate that there’s a degree of neutrality to the Sabre in the lower registers.

Another shot of the Sabre not breaking a sweat.

John Martyn’s Solid Air (Half-Speed Master) is a record I pull out of the rack a lot for reviews. It’s a good record to use to listen to the way a bit of kit adds its own tonality to the music – or that’s how I use it, anyway. There’s a purity of tone here that suggest the Sabre is quite a neutral cartridge with regards to what it adds to the record. There is still that slight warmth when compared to the Red but that’s not to suggest that the Sabre is flat or dull, it’s just not as (and I know this is a crap description) sparkly. It is, however, a lovely and relaxed listen that doesn’t seem to accentuate any of the frequency band overly. The contra-bass has a real depth of tone to it that the cartridge pulls out well and there’s a good degree of detail to the guitar.

In reality, there’s not a whole lot not to really like and I’ll be holding on to this particular example, for sure.

CONCLUSION

There’s no doubt that this is a very good moving magnet cartridge, but it’s also an expensive one. However, not everyone wants to go down the moving coil route and it does save the expense of having to buy SUTs or a dedicated MC phonostage. Moving coils also tend to be more hassle to set up and get singing at their best – the Sabre was a doddle.

Sonically I’d suggest that the Sabre is on the warmer side of neutral through the upper-mids and has a less pronounced upper-frequency response when compared to the moving coil cartridge I set it against. It’s got a similar kind of warmth to the Olympia moving magnet but with a greater degree of solidity and bounce when listening to music – it’s more surefooted, more stable feeling, and sounds a more detailed cartridge. The slight warmth is actually quite a nice thing to listen to and you may well love the easy to get on with nature of this cartridge  – I did, particularly through the important mids and upper-mids!

Soundstaging is excellent, though less pronounced than the better but more expensive moving coil cartridge I tested it against, but then it is better than the Olympia moving magnet.

Overall the Sabre is an easy to get on with cartridge that many will really enjoy for the no-nonsense way in which it presents the music you listen to. Its not showy in its delivery and sounds honest and straightforward.

AT A GLANCE

Build Quality:

Packaging is great and I love the thumbscrews – all cartridges should come with these as standard!

The build is solid and it does look like an expensive chunk of kit

Technically the cartridge isn’t anything ground-breaking, but it just works

A different stylus shape may bring a different “feel” to the Sabre

Sound Quality:

Tracks brilliantly

Not as exciting at the top-end as the €5000 GoldNote Tuscany Red

Dry and neutral in the lower registers with a hint of warmth through the mid and upper-mid band

Easy to listen to and untaxing

Value For Money:

For a moving magnet, there is no escaping that this is not a cheap cartridge, though £150 cheaper and it would have got our Editor’s Choice award!

We Loved:

The build and packaging give a feel of a quality product and this is followed through the sonic signature of the Sabre

A lovely relaxed listen that isn’t pushing anything to try and make it sound better than it is

It’s a well-rounded, honest, and solid performer

We Didn’t Love So Much:

The price seems a lot for a moving magnet

Price: £845

Elevator Pitch Review: The Vertere Sabre moving magnet phono cartridge costing £845 is a great looking and well-packaged product that has a high-end feel to it. Sonically it delivers a nicely balanced and easy to get on with performance that is relaxed and honest. Price may put some people off, but the make-up of the Sabre makes less pernickety and likely longer-lasting than a similarly priced moving coil cartridge.

Review Equipment: Technics 1200G, LAB12 melto2 phono, LAB12 Pre1, Krell KST100, Audiovector R6 loudspeakers. Cables by Vermouth, Atlas, Tellurium Q, and Way.

SUPPLIED BY VERTERE

Stuart Smith

Technical Specifications

Frequency Response: 15 Hz -25 kHz

Channel Separation: Minimum 22 dB

Output Level: 4.0mV (1kHz, 5cm/sec.)

Recommended Phono Input load: 47 kΩ
100 pF – 220 pF

Recommended Tracking Weight: 2.0 g (1.9 g – 2.1 g)

Frequency response: 15 Hz -25 kHz

Channel separation: Minimum 22 dB

Cantilever: Aluminium Alloy Tube

Stylus: Elliptical Diamond
7.5 x 15.5 μm

Mounting: Special Tri-Point contact with M2.5 Threaded Fixing Holes

Generator Fixing: Special Quad-Point Contact with M2.5 Stainless ‘Spike’ Screws

Dynamic Compliance: 10 x 10-⁶ cm/dyne

Coil Resistance: 1 kΩ (per Channel)

Recommended Load Capacitance: 100 – 200pF

Weight: 10.3 g

Dimensions: 17.3 (H) x 17.0 (W) x 28.2 (L) mm