CES/Lyra News

[MylesBAstor]

Don't know how many saw this post from Jonathan on another site:

12-28-11: Jcarr
Yes. Atlas.

The first production units are presently being built, we too delivery of the product boxes perhaps two weeks ago, and I received the very first printed manuals today. The Atlas is a very time and labor-intensive cartridge to make, and the only way that we will be able to make a bare handful of cartridges by the time the CES starts is if we don't take any days off for New Year.

Yesterday and today we have been inside the studio taking photos; next I need to write some accompanying text. I hope to be able to get a (probably brief) introduction page up on our website by Saturday.

kind regards, jonathan carr
Jcarr (Threads | Answers | This Thread)

No price announced yet. You can see a picture (no info) on the cartridge at:

http://www.lyraaudio.com/

[JackD201]

Looks like a lot more waiting for me then

[MylesBAstor]

New Atlas specs:


Specifications for LYRA ATLAS
　　
Designer: Jonathan Carr
Builder: Yoshinori Mishima
Type: Medium weight, medium compliance, low-impedance moving coil cartridge
Stylus: Lyra-designed long-footprint variable-radius line-contact nude diamond (3um x 70um), slot-mounted
Cantilever system: Diamond-coated solid boron rod with short one-point wire suspension, directly mounted into cartridge body via high-pressure knife-edge system
Coils: 2-layer deep, 6N high-purity copper, cross-shaped chemically-purified high-purity iron former, 4.2ohm self-impedance, 11uH inductance
Output voltage: 0.56mV@5cm/sec., zero to peak, 45 degrees (CBS test record, other test records may alter results)
Frequency range: 10Hz ~ 50kHz
Channel separation: 35dB or better at 1kHz
Compliance: Approx. 12 x 10-6cm/dyne at 100Hz
Vertical tracking angle: 20 degrees
Cartridge body: One-piece machining from solid titanium billet, with reduced-surface higher-pressure headshell contact area, predominately non-parallel and asymmetrical shaping, phase-interference resonance-controlling mechanism, and body threaded directly for mounting screws
Cartridge mounting screws: 2.6mm 0.45 pitch JIS standard
Distance from mounting holes to stylus tip: 9.5mm
Cartridge weight (without stylus cover): 11.6g
Recommended tracking force: 1.65 ~ 1.75g (1.72g recommended)
Recommended load directly into MC phono input: 104ohm ~ 887ohm (determine by listening, or follow detailed guidelines in user manual)
Recommended load via step-up transformer: 5 ~ 15ohm (step-up transformer's output must be connected to 10kohm ~ 47kohm MM-level RIAA input, preferably via short, low-capacitance cable)
Recommended tonearms: High-quality pivoted or linear (tangential) tonearms with rigid bearing(s), adjustable anti-skating force, preferably VTA adjustment

Products >> Transducers >> Atlas >> Specifications

[MylesBAstor]

More Atlas info:

LYRA ATLAS (Currently shipping "assymetric, new angle" model)

Introducing the ATLAS, the world's first asymmetric MC phono cartridge.

The Atlas is Lyra's new flagship. It is also the first time that anyone has made an asymmetrically structured phono cartridge. Why asymmetric? Because, by literally misplacing the barriers to great sound that are present in every other cartridge today, it confers a number of important performance benefits.

First, having differently-shaped structures on the left and right sides suppresses the formation of standing waves inside the cartridge body, thereby creating a less resonant, more neutral cartridge body. Second, the asymmetric construction offsets the front magnet carrier and its associated mounting system so that it is no longer in line with the cantilever assembly. Doing so opens up a direct, solid path between the cantilever assembly and tonearm headshell so that vibrations from the cantilever can be quickly drained away once they have been converted into electrical signals, again suppressing resonances.

Lyra remains the only cartridge manufacturer to mount the cantilever assembly directly into the cartridge body and thereby achieve a seamless, totally rigid connection between cantilever assembly and headshell. The effectiveness of this system has been increased with the asymmetrical structure of the Atlas. Control over spurious resonances is further assisted by the use of a narrowed mounting area, which couples the Atlas more tightly to the headshell and facilitates the transfer of vibrational energy into the tonearm.

While the Atlas retains the yokeless dual magnet system, diamond-coated boron rod cantilever and variable-radius line-contact stylus of the Titan, the double knife-edge cantilever assembly mounting structure has been revised for greater rigidity, and the signal coil system is completely new. Rather than a square, the coil former is in the shape of an X, which allows each channel to operate with greater independence from the other. This gives better tracking, tighter channel matching, improved separation, and lower distortion due to crosstalk.

At the same time we were able to increase both the performance and efficiency of the generator coils. The Atlas has 12% higher output voltage than the Titan, but accomplishes this while reducing the amount of wire in the coils by 22%. The mass reduction further improves tracking performance, while the enhanced output and electrical characteristics allow phono stages to perform better.

The Atlas uses Lyra's "New Angle" technology, which mechanically pre-biases the signal coils so that they are perfectly aligned to the front and rear magnets when LP playback takes place. This equalizes out discrepancies in vertical and horizontal compliances, and enables the Atlas' coils to move with equal ease in all directions for optimal performance.

As with the Titan and Olympos, the Atlas uses a body that is meticulously carved from a solid billet of titanium, through a process that involves both contact (for the exterior) and non-contact machining (for the interior body structures). But by making most of the Atlas' body surfaces non-parallel, avoiding dimensions that are multiples of other dimensions, and adding a pre-stressed phase-interference resonance-controlling system, resonances have been inhibited further.

We firmly believe that the Atlas represents an important step forward in LP playback.

[JackD201]

I have the 1:10 just waiting for this cart. These posts are sheer cruelty Myles. I hate you!

[MylesBAstor]

I have the 1:10 just waiting for this cart. These posts are sheer cruelty Myles. I hate you!

Yeah I'm doing it just to torture you Jack

[JackD201]

You know what really sucks? Two of us ordered this cart and I'm SECOND in line. Stig had better send two of them!!!!!!!!

I would appreciate it if you gave Jonathan a nudge though

If you think about it the wait has been much, much longer. Much as I wanted the Titan and Titan i, the shadow of the Olympos has been a large one. I ducked the Titans waiting for the time they'd come out with a replacement for the Olympos that didn't require a Parnassus.

I know exactly what I'll say before I set that stylus to the groove one day...

RELEASE THE KRAKEN!

Haven't decided which LP yet. Probably Witches Brew.

[MylesBAstor]

You know what really sucks? Two of us ordered this cart and I'm SECOND in line. Stig had better send two of them!!!!!!!!

I would appreciate it if you gave Jonathan a nudge though

If you think about it the wait has been much, much longer. Much as I wanted the Titan and Titan i, the shadow of the Olympos has been a large one. I ducked the Titans waiting for the time they'd come out with a replacement for the Olympos that didn't require a Parnassus.

I know exactly what I'll say before I set that stylus to the groove one day...

RELEASE THE KRAKEN!

Haven't decided which LP yet. Probably Witches Brew.

Did you get a price on the Atlas? Wrote Jonathan but didn't hear back yet.

[JackD201]

Nope

[MylesBAstor]

Just so there's no misunderstanding out there, the Atlas isn't a replacement for the Titan i. The Atlas stands above the Titan i in Lyra's cartridge line-up and the Titan remains in production.