Ortofon MC-100U (c. 1985–86)
Documentation on the Ortofon MC-100U is thin. No original brochures, manuals, or confirmed production dates have surfaced in the Archive; what survives is the period review record. HiFI-Stereo (August 1985, p.40) ran a full lab test on the MC-100U, and the cartridge still appeared in the magazine's February 1986 cartridge-and-tonearm buyer's guide (p.117).
From that buyer's guide listing, the MC-100U was a low-mass moving coil cartridge with a wide-range damping system, a nude elliptical diamond stylus, and a stated output of 0.09 mV. Frequency response was rated at 20–20,000 Hz (+3, −1 dB), channel separation at 25 dB at 1 kHz, and the replacement stylus was the D1200. The price printed with the entry was $150.
HiFI-Stereo's lab report measured the cartridge's actual output at about 0.12 mV through a 1:40 step-up transformer, with channel levels matched within 0.25 dB, and recorded a vertical stylus angle of 20 degrees. The testers characterized it as a relatively undamped MC and found it sensitive to loading: when the frequency response was flattened, phase shift extended into the audio band and stereo imaging suffered.
That is essentially the whole known record. Where the MC-100U sat in Ortofon's mid-1980s lineup, how long it was produced, and why it left so little imprint — none of that is documented in the available sources.
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