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The year continues to be a trial for us all in balance and direction. I hope you are making the transitions needed or wanted in the most healthy and happy ways. September 22nd marks a nice day in our planet's orbit to feel less wobbly and angular and more direct and equally distributed. Happy Equinox... Read More »

Freeze this moment a little bit longer Neil Peart GHOSTS…In keeping with my apparent predilection—as an obsessive chronicler of fructifying high end sonics and spiritually inspiring music—to focus my attentions on the fallen, and finally having access to a working computer (again, my long time PC vapor locked on me in pre-pandemic January), Radio Free... Read More »

To my ears, the Dutch label Just Listen Records is today capturing much of what is best about live, or nearly live, recordings in their direct-to-DSD256 productions. And occasionally live-to-DXD if needed by the recording and venue. In my days collecting vinyl, I always enjoyed direct-to-disc recordings...when they were well done. And not all were.... Read More »

I think it's fairly well-known in the high-end community that people tend to like what they like, and they tend to like different sounding systems. Many people like severely colored systems, but they like their kind of severely colored system and they don't like the kind of system their friend likes. Horn speaker people like... Read More »

When Dr. David, Ye Olde Editor at PF, invited me to write some music reviews with a principal focus on DXD and DSD256, I don't think he expected I might start with these particular albums from High Definition Tape Transfers. But, honestly, I just have to start with these wonderful recordings from the earliest days... Read More »

Part 4 – So what does the new system sound like and what are we listening to? Fair warning: my focus is on classical music with a smattering of jazz and acoustic. So, my comments about sources and music and what we're excited about will lean heavily in this direction. In earlier parts of this... Read More »

Part 3 - In which we get down in the weeds: the files, the library and how this all gets lashed together… "Nobody knows everything, nobody has everything [i.e., tools, equipment], but if you're lucky enough to add friendship to your life, you have so many more opportunities for joy and accomplishment and satisfaction." Scott... Read More »

Ye Olde Editor with an exceptional La Flor Dominicana Andalusian Bull (portrait by John Robinson) Oregon and trees…they go together. The forests of the Pacific Northwest are a joy to the soul and a medicine for melancholy, and are not to be misused or simply "consumed" to make "wood products." The back of my hand... Read More »

"I've learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel." Maya Angelou "…how you made them feel." What's true of human relationships is, in its own strange way, also true of certain audiophile designs and our connections to them. There... Read More »

Part 2 – In which this (now former) vinylholic seeks his solution for moving to an all-digital world, with headphones… [Please understand that this is simply the story of a personal journey. It is shared in hopes that it may help others faced with a similar transition in their listening environments. This is not intended... Read More »

Rushton Paul Well now! I'm pleased to say that we've gotten my friend Rush Paul back for another article here at PF. Longer-term readers may remember his article in PF Issue 88, September/October 0f 2016, "My DIY Approach to the Ultrasonic Cleaning of LPs" and his decades-long love for vinyl. But as you will hear... Read More »

PF Central…River City and up the Hill…has finally made the investment and switchover to solar power.  (Photograph and image processing by Ye Olde Editor) High-end audio does draw electricity. In some cases (e.g., Pure Class A electronics in particular), a lot of power. Summertime listening also puts a load on air conditioning, while leaving key... Read More »

Fred Hersch's hands frozen in transmission What are the Options? On a late summer day in August, I reflect on how little has changed since last I wrote. Cultural institutions remain shuttered as mandated, while trying to stay relevant by improvising online teasers. They initially responded to the Covid-19 lockdown with live streams via the... Read More »

Steven Hill, president of Straight Wire, Inc. (photo courtesy of Spencer Burke) "Many of our customers are engineers," says Steven Hill, 63, owner of Straight Wire, Inc., a straight-shooting, cigar-chomping graduate of University of Pennsylvania's Wharton Business School, former CPA, and 37-year veteran in the audio industry. Mr. Hill has no time for nonsense or... Read More »

Alright, so the JCAT Signature USB cable is one of the better USB cables I have heard, and fits right into my group of favorites in terms of being across the board excellent. And while I have a lot of cables here, I have not heard all that is out there—nor do I have any... Read More »

Bricasti Design is still keeping their promise of offering future-ready solutions to their existing customers. From my experience, the investment in their award-winning M1 DAC has now paid for itself three times over, thanks to these updates, that are all offered for a reasonable price. The latest update is the most sonically significant in the... Read More »

Many a long year ago, there was (really; truly; I kid you not!) an audiophile product called EarWax™. Apparently following the same logic that came up with the idea for "board wax" (used on surfboards to make the board and its rider glide more smoothly across the waves), a dab of this stuff was to... Read More »

At RMAF, evening cigars, Denver, CO, 2019 (photograph by Scott Hull; image processing by David W. Robinson) When you do a lot of audio reviewing and show-going over several decades, as I have, you get to see and hear a lot of gear and recordings. Some are good; some are bad; some are ugly. Like... Read More »

If you have the good fortune to have a smart TV connected to your stereo and are a fan of the genre, then I encourage you to participate in this Latin Jazz listening party. These are not cell phone audience recordings, but professional productions with good sound. Grab a favorite beverage, a dance partner hopefully,... Read More »