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by the$inmusicisallmine_Archive
here's my take on S arms vs. straight arms. I think that S arms (for a given arm tube thickness) have more mass - the S shape necesssarily uses more material than a straight tube. More mass is usually bad, since, even with counterweights and anti-skate, you are basically taxing the cartridge's suspension more with a high mass arm. Stiffer (low compliance) cartridges might like more mass, but not necessarily on the arm tube. a straight tube can also be a higher quality material - fancier metal, carbon fiber, etc, and since there is less of it (shortest distance between two points) than there would be on a curved arm, the mfg. costs are lower. Thinking of the Regas here. The engineering costs for, say a carbon arm that is the correct stiffness, and has varying wall thicknesses to control internal resonances, must be less for a straight arm than for a curved arm. Thinking of Wilson-Benesch here. Virtually all of the high end arms I am familiar with (excludig the radial trackers) have straight tubes. I can only think it is a combination of the above factors at work that makes this so.