Pickering XUV/4500Q (circa 1975)
The XUV/4500Q was Pickering's mid-1970s phono cartridge for Quadradisc (CD-4) playback. The surviving record on it is thin. The main contemporary account is a High Fidelity review (December 1975, p.76), which framed the cartridge as the company's entry in the "feather-touch" low-tracking-force race. Nearly all the firm specs come from that review: list price $139.95, a "Quadrahedral" stylus assembly, and the built-in record-cleaning brush that was then customary on Pickerings. Bench measurements there put output at 3.8 mV on the left channel and 3.6 mV on the right - comfortably within the input requirements of the CD-4 demodulators then available.
Pickering's own advertising, in Audio (June 1975, p.19), claimed the XUV/4500Q tracked at one gram or less in both stereo and discrete four-channel. It also claimed the cartridge handled SQ and QS matrix records. By 1977 the model had become the house reference point. Pickering's ads for the lower-priced XSV/3000 quoted reviewers as saying the new cartridge offered the XUV/4500Q's stereo performance at a lower price.
Beyond those period sources, little is documented. The archive holds no full original frequency-response curves or service literature for this model. What the period record firmly shows:
- Price: $139.95 (reviewed)
- Output: 3.8 mV left / 3.6 mV right
- Stylus: "Quadrahedral" assembly; built-in cleaning brush
- Claimed tracking: 1 gram or less, stereo and discrete
- Formats: CD-4, SQ, QS, and stereo
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