A true mono moving coil with a Shibata stylus and two-coil generator, built on the S Series MK II platform for the best possible playback of mono LPs.
The S Series MK II is master designer Masao Okada's update to Hana's best-selling cartridges. The headline change is a new tapered aluminum cantilever with higher rigidity and less mass at the tip, carrying the same nude diamond Shibata stylus. The yoke, pole pieces and gold-plated terminal pins are now cryogenically treated, a process borrowed from the Umami Red, Umami Blue and ML. The body is reshaped along the lines of the M Series, damped with a matte soft-feel black elastomeric paint, and topped with a brass cap that carries threaded mounting holes. That cap raises the weight from the original's 5 g to 8.6 g, which Hana says gives better coupling and compatibility with a wider range of tonearms. The SL Mono MK II is a dedicated mono design: Hana's point is that playing a mono record with a stereo cartridge introduces crosstalk, noise, phase errors and distortion from the differences between the two channels, and a mono switch only partly fixes that. Its two-coil generator can be wired three ways, as a normal four-pin stereo connection (the usual choice, feeding both channels identically), as two pins into a phono stage with a left/right selector, or into a mono amplifier. The nude diamond Shibata is cut to a 0.27 × 1.57 mil profile, output is 0.4 mV from a 23 Ω coil, and Hana suggests a load of 230 Ω or higher.
The Absolute Sound's Paul Seydor gave it a 2025 Golden Ear Award and described a luscious midrange and lower midrange with exceptional body and dimensionality, full upper bass, weighty midbass, real power at the bottom, and a top end with air and a pleasing bite on cymbals and triangles, with excellent tracking and resolution; he called it a pickup he never tires of. It is a low-output cartridge, so you need an MC phono stage with about 60 dB or more of gain or a step-up transformer. Loading from 230 Ω up to 1 kΩ is sensible. At 8.6 g it suits medium-mass arms, and the four-pin wiring means it drops into any standard headshell. If you have a serious collection of mono jazz, classical or early rock pressings, this is the cartridge to put on a second arm or headshell.
| Type | Low-output moving coil (MC), mono, two-coil |
| Output | 0.4 mV at 1 kHz |
| Internal impedance | 23 Ω at 1 kHz |
| Recommended load | 230 Ω or greater |
| Tracking force | 2.0 g (70 µm trackability at 2 g) |
| Compliance | Not published by Hana |
| Weight | 8.6 g |
| Stylus | Nude diamond Shibata, 0.27 × 1.57 mil |
| Cantilever | Tapered aluminum |
| Magnet | Alnico |
| Frequency response | 15 Hz – 32 kHz |
| Channel separation / balance | Mono (two coils) / within 1.5 dB |
| Body | Black, soft-feel elastomeric paint, brass cap with threaded mounts |
| Also available | Hana SL MK II (stereo, 0.4 mV) and SH MK II (stereo, 2 mV) |
Pearl Audio is an authorized Hana dealer. Call or visit our Portland showroom to talk about matching a cartridge to your tonearm and phono stage.
