Van den Hul Colibri XGP

[howiebrou]

Today was the day to swap out my excellent Benz Micro LP for a Van den Hul Colibri XGP. The Colibri is the top of the line VDH and this one had gold coils and a pretty low 0.22mV output, although I was pretty confident the AR Ref 2 Phono could handle it.

I hadn't moved by Benz for quite a while and had almost forgotten how to adjust the SMEV. Luckily a quick refresher of the instruction booklet helped re-ignite the grey matter.

The last time I heard a Colibri was when it was attached to a Cobra tonearm on the Continuum Caliburn tt playing through a MBL reference system. To say it sounded incredible would be a disservice.

After the necessary parameters were set, out came the Thorens Anniversary LP and Rickie Lee Jones. Wow! Even though it is brand new the difference was not slight. The VDH preferred a slightly lower loading than the benz but the clarity and energy for which this cartridge is known was amazing. It was as though a veil had been lifted and the music was even more lifelike, verging on feeling like a live concert.

I will have to play around with the settings a bit but so far this seems to be a winner combo.

howie

The Colibri in its box



AJ VDH's typical scribbles on the box



The Colibri which has no stylus guard. Be very careful!



Detailed look



Gettings its first run

[JSCC]

Killer!

Enjoy!!!

Luckily, I am NOT into TT that much. Or else my pocket will ...

[BearCubinNY]

Howie...that's Sweet! Happy listening!

Reg

[rossop]

Hi Howie..I too just received my Collibri. I set it up in my SME V arm like yours but on a Simon Yorke S7. I used the SME alignment protractor and set the VTA dead level. I applied 1.5 grams down force. It has only done a few hours and I know it will take 300 hours to break right in. It sounds good though I have noticed some excessive sibilance. I hope it will go away after more run in. It replaces a Black Beauty Special X, another VDH reference model, though not as good as the Colibri.

Any feedback you can give me as to your experience (especially re. sibilance) would be most appreciated.

Also those mounting bolts in your pics seem a lot longer than the ones that came from VDH in mine. whats the story there?

Thanks in advance

[tom]

Hi Howie

congratulations on your new cartridge. How do you find the output matches with the fer 2 phono. I have a benz LP and a ref2 phono and was thinking of the colibri or black beauty. I find the low gain a bit low at times need to be on about 106/140 on my BAT 52 pre.
66/140 on high gain.
I see your colibri is 0.2 'ish output is that enough for good volume. I find I start to hear a slight hum at 72/140+ with the the ref2 on high gain do you experience this?

[howiebrou]

Originally Posted by tom

Hi Howie

congratulations on your new cartridge. How do you find the output matches with the fer 2 phono. I have a benz LP and a ref2 phono and was thinking of the colibri or black beauty. I find the low gain a bit low at times need to be on about 106/140 on my BAT 52 pre.
66/140 on high gain.
I see your colibri is 0.2 'ish output is that enough for good volume. I find I start to hear a slight hum at 72/140+ with the the ref2 on high gain do you experience this?

I have never heard hum using the colibri or benz LP through either my nagra vps or AR ref 2 phono. I have the ref 2 on high gain too. The LP is a great cartridge as well.

howie

p..s would love to see a photo of your setup!

[howiebrou]

Originally Posted by rossop

Hi Howie..I too just received my Collibri. I set it up in my SME V arm like yours but on a Simon Yorke S7. I used the SME alignment protractor and set the VTA dead level. I applied 1.5 grams down force. It has only done a few hours and I know it will take 300 hours to break right in. It sounds good though I have noticed some excessive sibilance. I hope it will go away after more run in. It replaces a Black Beauty Special X, another VDH reference model, though not as good as the Colibri.

Any feedback you can give me as to your experience (especially re. sibilance) would be most appreciated.

Also those mounting bolts in your pics seem a lot longer than the ones that came from VDH in mine. whats the story there?

Thanks in advance

Hi Rossop,

Sorry I missed this post completely. The Colibri is a great cartridge. Mine is no where near to breaking in though so I will reserve too much comment about the cdh until a little later especially as I have just changed my amps to Soulution and near to readjust my ears.

howie

[Tonepub]

Howie, you need a second (or third) turntable... No single cartridge is ever the magic solution for all of it.

[howiebrou]

Originally Posted by tonepub

Howie, you need a second (or third) turntable... No single cartridge is ever the magic solution for all of it.

Absolutely! Try telling you know who after writing a cheque for the Sooloos, 808.3 then Soulution....

(I was eyeing up the totl Thorens the other day... but there are so many to choose from! )

[tom]

Hi Howie
here are some pics of my system
kuzma XL 4 TT
kuzma 313 arm
ref 2 phono
BAT 52se
ARC CD 5
ATC anniversary active 50s
I was speaking to the UK distributor of the Vdh carts and he suggested I would prefer the black beauty to the colibri. he thought the black beauty had more weight??
How do you find the colibri compared to the LP in terms of bass.
I have been seriously looking at the colibri to replace my LP.