Yamaha EC headjoint

Hi.

I just had a quick question. I was talking to a person at a music store about the Yamaha EC headjoints and they mentioned that they have both machine made and handmade ones. I was previously not aware of this. What is the main difference between the two, besides the obvious and the price?

It would not be possible to say definitively what the difference is, aside from the fact that some are hand cut and some are not, precisely because some are handcut. The hand cut EC's will all be slightly different, and thus it is difficult to pin down one particular trait that the handcut EC's have that the machinemade heads don't.

A handcut headjoint can have subtle differences in the actual cut which will make some particular 'special' headjoints real gems. Unfortunately the handcut headjoints can also get screwed up in subtle ways and end up as 'lemons'. I had just such a headjoint, a handcut CY headjoint by Yamaha that was a little asymmetrical, and not nearly the player that a silverplated, machine-cut CY headjoint was that I compared it to.
If you want to do it 'right', and you want a handcut 'EC' headjoint, order 3 to 5 (or more if you're game to keep them all sorted out) of them, and try them against each other to find the best one for you. Flute World does this almost as a matter of course.
If you order a machine-cut EC, you should get a pretty darn good one without really having to worry about getting a bad one. The robotic technology that does the actual cutting is extraordinarily consistent.
I do have a hand cut wood Powell headjoint, and it must have some really good Karma going for it. It is amazing, and most of the good flutists that have played it fell in love with it. I got very lucky on this one, I don't know if I could replace it even if I had the money to buy a new one. (I got this one used.)

Is the headjoint that comes on the 600 series Yamahas a machine or handcut?