Fluance RT85 vs RT85N

Most turntable comparisons are a comparison of two machines. This one is not. The RT85 and the RT85N are the same turntable— same belt-drive chassis, same high-density acrylic platter, same 224 mm S-type tonearm, same servo-controlled motor, same MDF plinth, same three-point isolation feet, same 7.6 kg on the shelf, same absent phono stage — sold at the same list price with two different cartridges fitted at the factory.

The question that decides it: do you want the more analytical cartridge or the warmer one?

The short answer

• Buy the RT85 (Ortofon 2M Blue) if your records are mostly modern, well-pressed and quiet, and you want the extra separation and high-frequency reach a nude elliptical is built to give you.
• Buy the RT85N (Nagaoka MP-110) if a lot of your collection is second-hand, busy or brightly mastered, and you would rather the deck flattered those records than exposed them.

Everything below is why those two sentences are the whole comparison, and why the small differences in Fluance’s spec table are downstream of the cartridge rather than evidence of a better deck.

What is genuinely identical

It is worth being specific, because “N” on the end of a model number usually signals a new generation and here it does not.

Fluance publishes both decks as belt drive with a DC motor and a servo controller that reads motor speed 500 times a second, and quotes the same 0.07% wow and flutter for each. Both carry a 12-inch acrylic platter weighing 1.56 kgat 16 mm thick — the part that does most of the work at this price, because acrylic’s resonant behaviour is close enough to vinyl’s to damp the record rather than ring under it, and the mass gives the motor something steady to hold. Both use the same static balanced S-type aluminum arm with a 224 mm effective length and the same H-4 bayonet headshell. Both are 16.76 lb. Neither has a phono preamp inside.

Two rows do move, and both are cartridge consequences rather than build differences. Fluance quotes 69 dB weighted signal-to-noise for the RT85 and 68.5 dB for the RT85N— half a decibel, which is below what anyone identifies in a listening test and tracks the cartridges’ own output difference of 5.5 mV against 5.0 mV. And the tonearm effective mass differs, 27.5 g against 21.1 g, because effective mass counts whatever is bolted to the end of the arm and the two cartridges weigh 7.2 g and 6.5 g.

The cartridges, which is the actual comparison

Ortofon 2M Blue — the detail read

Ortofon publishes a nude elliptical stylus with an r/R 8/18 um tip radius, 5.5 mV output, 25 dB channel separation at 1 kHzand a frequency response of 20–20,000 Hz to a stated +2 / −1 dB tolerance. It wants 1.8 g of tracking force into a 47 kOhm load.

“Nude” is the word doing the work. On a nude stylus the diamond is the entire tip, mounted directly to the cantilever; on a bonded one, a smaller diamond sits on a metal shank. The nude version carries less mass at the point that has to change direction thousands of times a second, and lower tip mass is the mechanism behind the extra air and separation people describe when they move up the 2M range. Our 2M Red vs 2M Blue comparison walks the same ladder one rung lower.

Nagaoka MP-110 — the forgiving read

The MP-110’s published table gives a superfine polished elliptical bonded diamond at 0.4 x 0.7 mil, 5.0 mV output, 23 dB channel separation at 1 kHz, 20–20,000 Hz with no tolerance stated, a 1.5–2.0 g tracking range and a 6.5 g body. Its replacement stylus is the JN-P110.

On paper it loses on every line: bonded rather than nude, a slightly larger tip, 2 dB less separation, no stated response tolerance. In practice the MP-110 is one of the most persistently recommended cartridges in budget hi-fi, and the reason is that its balance is fuller through the midrange and gentler at the top. On a pressing with sibilance problems or surface noise — which describes a large share of any second-hand collection — that is not a worse read. It is a more listenable one.

The compliance numbers do not mean what they look like

Both cartridges publish a dynamic compliance of 20, and it is tempting to read that as identical. It is not, because the two makers are quoting different measurements: Nagaoka states its figure at 100 Hz and Ortofon does not state a measurement frequency at all on its 2M Blue page. Compliance falls as measurement frequency rises, so a 20 quoted at 100 Hz and a 20 quoted at an unstated frequency are not the same stiffness. We are not going to convert between them and pretend the result is a specification.

What matters practically is the outcome, and the outcome is fine either way. Both cartridges are moving-magnet designs of ordinary compliance on a medium-mass arm — Fluance quotes 27.5 g and 21.1 g effective mass for the two builds, which is the range these cartridges are designed to sit in. Neither pairing is a mismatch, and neither will land the arm/cartridge resonance somewhere it causes trouble.

The upgrade paths diverge later

You are not only choosing a sound today; you are choosing which stylus you buy in two years, because a stylus is a consumable measured in hours played.

On the RT85, the 2M Blue’s body accepts Ortofon’s 2M stylus range, so a worn tip can be replaced like for like or moved up the range without changing the cartridge or re-aligning anything. On the RT85N, the MP-110 takes the JN-P110. Both are simple, both are cheaper than a new cartridge, and both are genuinely available — Nagaoka’s distribution is thinner in the US than Ortofon’s, which is worth knowing but is not the obstacle it was a decade ago. Our replacement stylus guide covers what fits what.

And because both decks use the same H-4 bayonet headshell, the decision is reversible. A cartridge swap here is a pre-aligned assembly change, not the evening with a protractor that a fixed headshell demands — see how to set up a cartridge for what you would otherwise be signing up for. What makes buying the right one first worthwhile is money, not difficulty: each of these cartridges costs a substantial fraction of the turntable, so fitting the other one later means paying for two.

What neither of them includes

Both decks state “No — separate phono preamp required”in Fluance’s own table, and that is not a detail to discover after delivery. A turntable’s output is far too quiet and RIAA-shaped to plug into a line input, so one of three things has to be true: your amplifier has a phono input, your powered speakers have one built in, or you buy a separate phono stage. If none of those is true yet, start herebefore you compare cartridges — the preamp changes what you hear more than the choice on this page does.

The decision, in one paragraph

Buy the RT85 if you want the more revealing cartridge and your records deserve it: modern pressings, clean second-hand copies, a system you have already finished. Buy the RT85N if you want the deck to be kind to a mixed collection, or if you have heard a 2M Blue somewhere and found it a touch forward. Do not buy either one expecting a better turntable than the other, because Fluance publishes the same platter, the same arm, the same motor and the same 0.07% for both. If the two are ever priced differently on the day you look, buy the cheaper one and put the difference toward the phono stage neither of them includes.