September - October 2015
Audio Discourse
The Audio Circular No. 16: Learning (the) Vinyl Rules, Phase Two
There's anarchy afoot in the listening room; LP's are stacked everywhere, yet even in the shadow of chaos, there is a renewed love for that old...
The End of a Self–Imposed Audio Exile – The Return of...
I'm baaaack! Hey, this place looks really different. I like what you've done with the wallpaper and the new carpets. You look great too....
Raising the Sample Rate of DSD - Is There a Sweet Spot?
Andreas Koch of Playback Designs, RMAF 2014 Direct Stream Digital, or DSD, encoding has been used for years already for SACD and also as an...
Adventures in Real Sound with Mr. Shirokazu Yazaki
In Issue 78 I introduced you to the remarkable Mr. Shirokazu Yazaki of Tokyo, Japan (above, center, with friends), in my article about the SPEC RSA-M3...
Positive Feedback’s DSD seminar at Rocky Mountain Audio Fest...
Positive Feedback will once again be hosting, and I will be moderating, a panel on DSD at RMAF 2015. This year we'll be exploring a different...
The Neoteric Listener…Astell and Kern AKT5p Headphones and the...
Once you know better, who wants to live with worse? PF Editor Dave Clark once described the letdown of listening to speakers from one’s youth and...
HI-FI ONE: Rick Brown’s Gang Shakes Up Newport, or Re-visiting...
Preface Without Mirth How many years will it take to tame, or dissolve, mind-numbing noise suffusing "audiophile" events? Year after year,...
I Left My Speaker in San Francisco: A Prequel to the Coming...
It took a while but I am finally first—even if but by a scant three hours—at something (Well to be honest, I did win a few fencing...
Audio Ramblings – The Auralic Aries Music Streamer
This is going to be a sort of two-part review… first about the Auralic Aries and then about what I did to take my current file-based audio...
Psychiatry 5 Cents
Roger Skoff writes about some people he encounters on the internet... Although I use the internet daily, I'm not all that familiar with a lot of the...
Impressions: The Cembalo Audio Labs Spring 1 Headphone Amp
We live in the true Golden Age of fine audio. I've said this before, but I don't want readers to forget the fact that we're awash in a...
Journeys In Audio Subjectivism, Part Two
Hitting the Ocean, or: "What Are You Babbling about Now?" Those words contained about as much sympathy as you'd be likely to imagine they would. "What...
Impressions: The Merging Technology NADAC MC-8 DSD DAC
Product launches happen all the time in fine audio. We have well over 300 DSD DACs now, for example, new turntables and cartridges all the time, with...
Classics Online HD•LL Streaming Service
Sometimes it's not just the destination, it's the journey, whenever it is that you finally arrive. Trust me, this is, in fact a review of...
MONTEREY JAZZ, 2015: "A Man's Gotta Know His Limitations"
After laughter at the first GOP debate from Donald Trump's chauvinist dump on Rosie O'Donnell, jazz hounds, east and west, now look eagerly...
RIVA Roadtrip – Commentary on the RIVA Turbo X Bluetooth Audio...
AL: Freshly graduated from Syracuse University and done with my last school year, it was time to go home to California. With a daunting eight-day and...
Impressions: Remembering Stan Ricker
David W. Robinson and Stan Ricker, VSAC 2003 (photograph by Dave Glackin) I got the word last week from an audiobud online. Stan Ricker, recently...
Hardware Reviews
The Mola-Mola Suite - Makua Linestage & Kaluga Mono Amps
Mola-Mola Kaluga circuit board Some of you may recall when Class D amplification began to appear in high-end journals. There were birthing pangs, to...
Phoenix Engineering LLC RoadRunner and Eagle PSU
You would be surprised if you actually measured your turntable's platter. It may be several RPM off and you didn't even know it. I started to...
Music Hall de-be Headphones
Admittedly, I am not a headphone enthusiast. I have an old pair of open backed Grado SR 60s used occasionally for casual listening around the...
Making a Case for Convenience: Audeze EL-8 Closed Back Headphone
Audeze has come a long way from its first planar magnetic offering. The upstart company from the United States has steadily grown and offered what some...
Master & Dynamic MH 40 Meets the Schitt Valhalla 2 Single...
Today, headphones are designed for DJs, hipsters, style mongers and those willing to spend $3k on high-end "Wearable Technology." The $399...
AudioPrism WaveGuide Common Mode Noise Filtration System: Return...
There's every probability you already have an opinion about audiophile tweaks and the folks who review them. Sometimes it seems like half the...
E.A.R. Acute 4/DAC 4 CD/SACD Player (US Premier Review)
I was truly unsure that in 2015 any of us would be needing a two box, multi-function digital source for portable transportable media. I took a CD...
NAD Masters Series M17
I understand why there are so few surround sound gear reviews in high end audio. Two channel reviews occasionally dip into technology (not from...
AudioMachina Maestro GSE
There are good reasons to review everything else other than loudspeakers. And the logistics is not even the worst reason. But there's a whole range of...
Merrill Audio Jens Phono Stage
"I don't recall the name. It's a new product distributed by Merrill Audio of New Jersey." We were just starting a session when...
Blue Circle O22i Integrated Amplifier
Gilbert Yeung, the owner and proprietor of Blue Circle, is an engineer and an artist. He is one of the most brilliant audio designers working today....
Merlin Music Systems VSM Black Magic Edition Loudspeakers
One of the classics in the world of automobiles is the Porsche 911 and, in my opinion, the closest that any high-end audio product has come to...
Audio-Technica OC9 III Cartridge
In this wonderful hobby of music reproduction, there is perhaps no other discipline as dark and murky as the world of moving coil cartridge...
Digital Amplifier Company - KING 60V Desktop Maraschino
As class-D amplifiers continue to evolve, it's exciting to have the opportunity to test examples such as Digital Amplifier Company's small...
Premier Review of Zesto Audio Leto 1.5 Vacuum Tube Preamplifier
Change is good, particularly in high-end audio, as the Leto from Zesto Audio becomes the version 1.5 and positively improves its standing as a top...
TARA Labs The Zero Evolution Interconnect with HFX
Spatial Holography Last I checked the principles of Newtonian physics still apply. That's why I see my role as communicating the real-life...
Ortofon Quintet Bronze Cartridge
Reviewing phono cartridges, be they of the moving magnet, moving coil, or moving iron variety, involves that old "devil in the details."...
AudioQuest JitterBug USB Data and Power Filter
"EMI and RFI run deep, into your DAC they will creep. Stop, now, what's that sound, everybody look what's going down..."—with...
Soundstring Cable Generation II Special Edition Cables
Talk about the proverbial can of worms. Recently Soundstring Cable Company's Len Miller asked if I would like to review two full complements of...
Zesto Audio Andros 1.2 Phonostage - The Quiet Wonder
The Zesto Audio Andros 1.2 phonostage has been one of my tougher reviews to finish. I know it sounds cliché, but the Andros 1.2 is one of those...
Interviews
Reviewers' View, THE Show Newport 2015: David Robinson and Peter...
Watch David Robinson and Peter Breuninger of AV Showrooms.com, share their thoughts on the THE Show Newport 2015 on YouTube Part 2 Courtesy of AV...
Music Reviews
The Electric Recording Company and Their Reissue of...
"The sun is the same in a relative way but you're older, Shorter of breath and one day closer to death." —From...
I Really Had to Fight to Relate… Silversun Pickups
I think I made a mistake, one of those forest-for-the-trees kinds, in hunting for a radio-friendly single on the new Silversun Pickups album. I'd...
Notes of an Amateur: Mullova's Prokofiev, Eighth Blackbird,...
Prokofiev. Viktoria Mullova. [Violin Concerto No. 2; Sonata for Two Violins, Solo Violin Sonata]. Viktoria Mullova, violin. Frankfort Radio Symphony...
Wagner and More
Tannhauser – Richard Wagner. Music and Libretto: Wagner, Romantic Opera in Three Acts. Composer: Richard Wagner. Conductor: Axel...
Suk's Asrael Symphony
The digital era's exploration of the repertoire's byways led to a new interest in the music of Josef Suk—not only the son-in-law of...
Premier LP Review of Reference Recordings: Copland Fanfare and...
Pressed by QRP on 200 gram vinyl, 33.3, half-speed mastered, this recording from 2000 is receiving its LP release for the first time. The original...
Notes of an Amateur - Nelsons’ Shostakovich 10 with the...
Shostakovich, 'Under Stalin's Shadow.' Symphony No. 10. Andris Nelsons. Boston Symphony Orchestra. Deutsche Gramophone DG 479-5059. I...
Notes of an Amateur: Bach, Vasks, and more Bach.
Helen Callus [viola]. Luc Beauséour [harpsichord] Bach - Krebs - Abel. Analekta. AN2 9879. There are reasons not to buy this album of Bach (and...
John Fedchock Big Band: Like It Is (Mama Records)
This kick-ass New York jazz orchestra's fifth album, scheduled for release on Friday, August 7, is leader John Fedchock's...
New Old Stock - Articles from Our Days in Print
Nordost SPM Interconnects and Loudspeaker Cables
This article, by Dave Clark, Victor Chavira, Francisco Duran, and Sherman Hong, originally ran when audioMUSINGS was in print - Issue 1, 1998. At the...
Our Friends at HIFI Statement
Auralic Taurus MKII
Wie auch die CanJam in Essen beweist, die in diesem Jahr schon zum dritten Mal stattfindet, haben sich Kopfhörer und dafür entwickelte Verstärker zu.... . . Read More »
XiVero Headphone Experience
Ich bleibe unserem Sommer-Thema Kopfhörer treu und stelle Ihnen – von unseren kostenlosen Downloads einmal abgesehen – das bisher günstigste.... . . Read More »
Audio Exklusiv E 12
Audio Exklusiv erweitert sein Programm um drei Verstärker, die das bisherige Angebot preislich nach unten abrunden. Neben einer Vorstufe und einer.... . . Read More »
Bryston BHA-1
Brystons kleinste Stereoendstufe 2B LP Pro ist bei Aufnahmen, die ich über Lautsprecher abmischen kann, seit Jahren die verlässliche Kraftquelle für.... . . Read More »
Ayon S-3
Digital-Analog-Wandler haben in den letzten Jahren eine rasante Entwicklung erfahren und die Zeiten, in denen Musik von der Festplatte von High.... . . Read More »
First Statement From The Allgäu Alps: Netnakisum featuring...
Wie die Staus auf den umliegenden Autobahnen beweisen, ist Bayern momentan ein attraktives Urlaubsziel. Wir hatten es glücklicherweise nicht weit bis.... . . Read More »
Melco HA-N1A, Teil 1
Sie möchten Ihre Sammlung digital gespeicherter Musik bequem verwalten und vor allem auf hohem klanglich Niveau genießen, sich in Ihrer Freizeit aber.... . . Read More »
Our Friends at High Fidelity
KBL Sound Signature Series Himalaya Interconnect + Speaker Cable
It is hard to find own niche on the market. The smaller the industry the smaller potential customer group and thus the more difficult is to reach them....
Combak Corporation Hijiri Million Interconnects
I guess not many of the owners of high quality audio components even realize that brands that made their devices often actually belong to the same...
KRAKOW SONIC SOCIETY: Meeting 97 - Siltech Triple Crown
Gabi was standing in the door, looking at us condescendingly while we were discussing acoustics, the microphones used and distortions. A moment before...
SPEC REAL-SOUND PROCESSOR RSP-901EX Loudspeaker Filter
There is not too many people like Mr Shirokazu Yazaki. I was tempted to write something like: are extremely rare, but I managed to hold myself back. He...
Xavian PERLA Loudspeakers
Edwin van der Kleij, the owner of Siltech, is a great fan of speakers designed by Franco Serblin. Over the years he bought all his designs with Sonus...
Show Reports
Heaven or Hell? The Lady or the Tiger? The Rocky Mountain Audio...
Driving north on I-25 after the first day of the show. It's dark, we're tired, and only one lane of three is open. It's just as bad on the...
RMAF 2015
Another year and another RMAF show is in the books. I'm going to tell you about some of the rooms that I considered to sound very, very...
Capitol Audiofest 2015
Audio is about listening. All of the good things in the high end community come out of listening and thinking about what you listened to. All of the...
Lone Star Audio Fest 2015 Show Report
With the bluebonnets in bloom spring is a lovely time to travel in Texas. Bluebonnet the Lone Star state flower For music loving audiophiles no better...
Reviewers' View, THE Show Newport 2015: David Robinson and Peter...
Watch David Robinson and Peter Breuninger of AV Showrooms.com, share their thoughts on the THE Show Newport 2015 on YouTube Part 2 Courtesy of AV...
