Through distributor Ana Mighty Sound, high-end Aidas cartridges are now available in France, Switzerland, Belgium, and Luxembourg.
Starting out as a cartridge repairer in the late 1990s, Aidas Svazas quickly became a refinisher, then a designer. At first, this resulted in models that were even better than those on the market once they had passed through the Lithuanian’s hands. Then, in 2010, the inevitable happened: the first AS-1 cartridge from a new brand, simply named after its creator: Aidas.
All moving coil (MC) cartridges, they are now available in four series. The first, labeled CU, uses copper coils and wood for its chassis. This series includes the Panzerholz, Durawood, Durawook BE, and Composite (all priced at 4 500 €). With an AlNiCo5 magnet system and a Japanese Namiki boron cantilever, these cartridges, like all the others, use a MicroRidge stylus.
The AG series features a 6N silver-plated copper coil (0.03 mm) in the unique Malachite Green model, made of green hard stone (5 500 €). Then the AU-CU series makes way for a gold-plated copper coil, with the Tru-Stone Gold Web, African Blackwood, and Brazilian Purpleheart Wood models, the latter two in a rare wood chassis from Gabon and Brazil. In this range, while the stone version may be risky on certain tonearms due to its 12.6 g weight, the wooden versions weigh just 8 g, and the first black wooden version even offers a “Baby” version, weighing 6.8 g (still 5 500 €).
And to top off the range, an AU series now incorporates pure gold for its coils. But while the Tru-Stone Violet Gold stone version (6 700 €) is already impressive, the cartridge that everyone remembers at each of the brand’s presentations is the latest: the Mammoth Gold. Available in a classic version (11.2 g; 9 000 €) and a Baby version (6.8 g; 7 900 €), this cartridge is simply made from one of the lightest and most resistant materials: ivory. But to protect living animals, the use of elephant ivory is prohibited, which we fully support. Aidas Svazas simply recovered a piece of mammoth tusk that could not be used by museums. This provided him with material for a limited and exclusive number of cells, which can be heard very soon in Paris in the new Ana Mighty Sound showroom, right next to the Eiffel Tower.
26/12/2025
