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Product: Fidelity Research FR-64S vintage tonearm
Manufacturer: Fidelity Research - Japan
Approx. price: approx $2000
Reviewer: Jeff Maxson - TNT-Audio USA
Reviewed: February, 2024

Consider this article a follow-up to Harmut Quaschik's detailed TNT-Audio report on the arm from 2010. Though I don't have the arms that Quaschik was using around the time of the review, I will compare it against the Sperling arm I reviewed in TNT-Audio as well as another popular vintage choice, the SME 3012R.

Fidelity Research, Japanese maker of cartridges, tonearms, step-up transformers, etc. was founded in 1964 by Isamu Ikeda. In those heydays of vinyl, FR's success at mass production led them to be listed on the Tokyo Stock Exchange as well as to count as users members of the Japanese Imperial family. With the rise of digital, Ikeda closed down FR in 1985, but went on to establish Ikeda Sound Labs, where he still hand makes tonearms, cartridges and wiring. The FR-64S first appeared in 1978.

Used examples of the FR-64S can be had these days for $1500-$2000. It's 12-inch sibling, the rarer FR-66S, fetches more in the $6000 range, so the 10-inch 64S could be considered a deal. At least two outlets refurbish and rewire these tonearms, one of which is Ikeda itself. The other, Richard Mak, audio reviewer and producer of Audio Magik set-up software recommends all owners have the bearings cleaned and lubricated. The vintage sound users appreciate is an artifact of their tonearms' age, and his service will bring them up to date. I'm not in a position to judge this claim, but as you'll see below, if what I'm hearing now is not the best the tonearm can do, I'd be impressed.

It's practically a cliché among audio reviewers to decry the chest-puffing, trolling and general vitriol of online audio message boards. True, one can find such behavior, but there is expertise and helpful support to be found as well. As background for this review, I put "FR-64S" into the search box on the user forums of the audio-equipment sales site affectionately known as Agon. I was greeted by 864 hits, about half of which I reviewed and from which I selected nuggets to discuss below. Almost to a post, Agoners are enthusiastic about the FR, in contrast to Quaschik, who weighs strengths against weaknesses.

Construction and Set-up

The FR-64S is a gimballed design with a concentric (not underhung) counterweight secured by a setscrew. It mounts through the armboard with a DIN connector at the bottom of the armbase. The armtube is S-shaped with an SME-style headshell connector. An L-shaped antiskating lever with a sliding weight on its lower arm engages with a rod attached to the armtube. It has a nice arm rest that holds lightly or firmly and also locks.

Effective mass

The 64S is a heavy tonearm at 35g effective mass including headshell. However most comments recommend discarding the pressed-metal headshell. FR makes better cast headshells, or there are those from a variety of other manufacturers in a range of masses to try. Without headshell, the arm has an effective mass of a medium-high 14.5g, so the accepted wisdom is to pair low compliance cartrides with higher mass headshells and vice versa. More recently, some have questioned calculations that render a single resonance frequency based on cart compliance and tonearm effective mass. Particularly Alex Korf proposes that low compliance cartridge on a light arm is more an issue than high compliance on a heavy arm (his calculator offers complexities beyond my scope). The new Kuzma Safir arm at ±60g effective mass and reportedly suitable to modern medium-compliance cartridges serves as another data point. I did use heavy headshells with low compliance carts, but I found that the Soundsmith Voice at 28 cu compliance with a 10g Yamamoto headshell worked fine.

Geometry

The manual specifies a 230mm pivot-to-spindle distance and 15mm overhang for Stevenson alignment, a scheme favored by a number of Japanese tonearm manufacturers. Deiter Brakemeier, principal of Acoustic Systems and a great fan of Fidelity Research arms recommends (on Agon) using a mounting distance of 231.5 and 12mm overhang for the more standard Baerwald alignment. As I already had an armboard meeting the Stevenson spec, I did not have another one cut, but I did download a Stevenson protractor and used that for alignment.

Wire

FR offered two versions of this arm, the standard with copper internal wiring and the more sought-after one bearing the sticker "Silver inside leads" on the armtube. While Quaschik preferred the copper, rejecting silver categorically, I bought the silver one for its cool factor, and don't have a copper version to compare. One Agon poster writes that Isamu Ikeda advocates a mix of wire types and suggests that if an arm was wired with silver cable then a copper phono cable might be a good complement. Mine came with what looks like the original DIN cable, labeled Belden and likely copper, but Quaschik and others recommend using a better one. So following their and Ikeda-san's advice, I'm using an AudioTekne (copper) cable.

Dynamic vs static VTF

The arm has a dynamic balance mechanism to set VTF--you turn a graduated dial with indents at each half gram. But I found the spring that loads the mechanism may have lost some tension over the years. Trying to set it under 2g, I had to turn the dial to over 3. One comment on the web was that static balance (using only the counterweight) sounded better than the dynamic setting. Another said that a combination, getting close with the counterweight then adding a little dynamic was best as that would keep the spring from resonating by putting some tension on it. I tried this method--way more convenient than setting the VTF using only the counterwieght--and kept using it throughout the review.

Lateral balance

The FR is unique in my experience in providing a cylindrical weight suspended on a rod at the pivot point and perpendicular to the arm tube. The manual instructs the user to lift the front of the turntable 2-3mm and adjust the weight's position on the rod until the tonearm no longer drifts to the right or left. But the manual says this shouldn't be necessary if the turntable is level, and that the weight should be normally positioned about 5mm from the end of the rod. One Agoner suggests differently, that the lateral balance compensates for the offset angle of the tonearm, and that getting it right reduces the required antiskating force. I did find moving the lateral balance out farther on the rod helped with mistracking while running the Koetsu Onyx, the only cartridge that also needed more than minimal antiskating to track well.

Etc.

I used the FR on my vintage JVC TT-81 on DIY plinth and on the DIY outboard arm pod of my Teres 255. I used a variety of LOMC cartridges with Yamamoto, Jelco and even the RS Labs pivoting headshell. At one point, to counteract some sibilance, I tried a tonearm wrap, a long clear adhesive strip resembling packing tape looped the length of the arm tube. I'd been holding onto this unidentified material sent to me by a long-forgotten forum participant. It seemed to help with unwanted resonances so I left it on for most of the review.

Listening

I started on the downstairs system, with the Stax F-81s driven by Emotiva amps and cycled through several cartridges. When I first replaced the Sperling TA-1 with the FR-64S, I felt it embodied an awesome clarity vs. the romantic stage setting of the Sperling I highlighted in that review. As I listened more, though, I saw more similarities than differences: a full, all-engrossing sound not analytical at the expense of the music. Both were detailed, but with emphasis on the nuances of the voice, not audiophile fireworks. Replacing the Sperling again, I heard a wider soundfield with less center-fill than the FR. Comparing Anais Mitchell's "Bright Star," I felt the FR got more of the gestalt of the tune--the presence/coherence of the vocal and accompaniment--while bass might have been more delineated on the Sperling.

Moving upstairs to the Lowther/SET system, I now had an easy comparison with the SME 3012R since I could swap headshells as opposed to tonearms. The only caveat was that the FR was on an outboard armpod while the SME was mounted on the Teres plinth. Here the contrast between the two tonearms was more pronounced. I've always loved the SME's ease with music. Like the Viv Labs arm, which the FR replaced on the armpod, it just lets the music shine through--relaxed and unassuming. In contrast the FR was brash and in-your-face. Two Joni Mitchell cuts show this difference: on "Barangrill" from For the Roses, with the Vermillon in play, the SME set the soundstage smaller, the voice and instruments more precise. Conversely on the noisier "Talk to Me" from Don Juan's Restless Daughter, the SME sounded a tad more congested, while on the FR, the stage was wider and Jaco Pastorius's interplay with Mitchell was easier to see. Likewise on Crooked Still's well-recorded Shaken by a Low Sound, the bass booms undergirding Aoife O'Donovan's voice on "Come in My Kitchen" were more dynamic on the FR, more precise on the SME, tho unlike with the Sperling, they were no less well articulated. Quaschik compared the FR to the SME-M2, a newer--arguably less refined--iteration, finding it lacking in resolution. I'd agree, but consider it a worthy trade-off for the punch, the bravado of the FR.

In all, the FR proved copacetic with my Koetsus. An Agon poster writes that Koetsus benefit from tonearms with (1) rigid bearings, (2) high effective mass and (3) minimal to no damping. Meet two of these criteria, and you still may get good sound; meet only one and you probably won't. But, says the poster, the FR-64S offers all three. The SME, though, at 13g effective mass and with its knife-edge vertical bearing checks only 1 1/2 of these boxes. With the FR--though the non-platinum Onyx needed a lot of antiskating and still mistracked a bit--the Vermillion according to my notes, gave me "just the music--questions of what the tonearm is doing (whether it's revealing or enhancing) irrelevant."

Quaschik found that his SPU put too much energy into the arm causing it to ring. I didn't hear this with the SPU Classic GM MkII, so I decided to remove the arm wrap. Sure enough, on Sarah Vaughan + 2 I noticed a sort of shadowy doubling on more modulated parts of the vocal. This was less pronounced with the FR-7fz integrated headshell cart, but still there. So I rewrapped the arm, and heard the vocal more clearly with fewer resonances. Quaschik also found the FR to be particular about headshells, preferring light SME-style over wood and magnesium. I didn't notice this effect; matching cartridge to headshell worked fine. Maybe the wrap--something Jonathan Carr, designer of Lyra carts, reportedly uses on his FR arms--helped here too.

Conclusion

I liked the FR quite a bit better than Quaschik. I found it lively and engaging, especially with my Koetsus, and a match made in nirvana with the FR-7fz, which I got soon before finishing this review. If you're looking for a bold, brash, brazen arm, I'd give it a try.

Copyright © 2024 Jeff Maxson - jeff@tnt-audio.com - www.tnt-audio.com

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