Innholdsfortegnelse for July 2017 i Stereophile

THIS ISSUE: Are audiophiles ignoring the most affordable means of achieving true high-end sound? Are You Experienced? There are no ifs, ands, or buts about it: Headphones sound different from speakers. For different reasons, I like both, but all speakers come with one undeniable disadvantage: the room you play them in. I don’t care if you’re running pint-size Falcon Acoustics LS3/5a’s or giant Wilson Audio Alexandria XLFs—they’re at the mercy of your room’s acoustics. Losses are inevitable. Sure, some rooms are better than others, but their size, shape, and furnishings alter your speakers’ sound in ways their designers can never fully anticipate, leaving it up to you to dial in the best sound you can. With headphones, those variables and uncertainties are much smaller—just pop on the ’phones and you’re…

Recently, on AnalogPlanet, I wrote about Shinola’s Runwell turntable.1 The review was mostly positive, but I thought the Runwell had some serious problems that needed addressing. Instead of being angry at getting a lessthan- glowing review, Shinola thanked me for pointing out the problems, so that they could be fixed. Likewise, rather than getting hot under the collar, Acoustic Signature’s Gunther Frohnhöfer noted what I’d written in my December 2016 column about his Ascona Mk.2 turntable and TA-9000 tonearm, and set about improving both. He then asked me to give them another listen, and I happily accepted. The original TA-9000 tonearm was surprisingly lively. A light tap on its armtube with the volume at a moderate level produced a loud, seemingly undamped sound through the speakers. In the update, the…

The design fits into a solid tradition of Mark Levinson monoblocks. Dinesh Paliwal, CEO of Harman International Industries, was addressing engineers and the audio press in a crowded conference room at the opening of Harman Luxury Audio’s new Engineering Center of Excellence (ECOE), in Shelton, Connecticut. Paliwal singled out as the ECOE’s first beneficiary the Mark Levinson brand, with the goal of revitalizing it as Harman’s flagship marque. (Other brands in the HII stable include Harman Kardon, Infinity, JBL, Crown, AKG, Lexicon, and Revel.) To achieve this, he gave the ECOE team access to Harman’s R&D budget of $400 million; brought on Todd Eichenbaum, formerly of Krell, to be its Director; and hired 11 more engineers. Paliwal spoke with pride of the facility’s output of six new Mark Levinson models…

Karen Carpenter’s husky tones sounded appropriately intimate via the Arcam. For digital playback, in recent months I’ve been breathing some rarefied air, pricewise. In December 2016, I reviewed dCS’s Rossini Player and Clock,1 followed in May 2017 by Meridian’s Ultra DAC,2 and in June by Chord’s DAVE DAC. The Rossini Player costs $28,499 without the Clock, the Meridian $23,000, and though the DAVE is less expensive than either at $10,588, that’s still a fair chunk of change. Even PS Audio’s PerfectWave DirectStream DAC, which I bought following Art Dudley’s review in September 2014,3 costs $6899 with the Network Bridge II, which hardly counts as “affordable.” High time, therefore, that I lived with a D/A processor priced more in reach of the cash-strapped middle class. Arcam’s irDAC-II was released a year…

THIS ISSUE: A belt-drive turntable with a skeletal plinth, an acrylic platter, and an apparently lowish-torque DC motor. From Serbia. From Serbia with Love Sometimes I feign interest in living in the Soviet Union of the 1950s and ’60s. This happens mostly when I’m shopping for toothpaste at my local supermarket, where the toothpaste aisle is as long as a football field. “I don’t want so many choices,” I say in my Abe Simpson voice, “because all these choices are stupid. I wish I lived in the USSR: Shopping for toothpaste wouldn’t take so long.” But I’m only kidding. Now I see dozens of high-end audio manufacturers popping up every year, with new turntable companies leading the charge. Virtually all of them offer at least a half-dozen different turntables, and…

Most of it was acoustic. While there were vocals here and there, much of it featured instrumentalists playing solo or in groups. Some of it was meant to alleviate stress. Some of it was marginally connected to a similarly named movement in spirituality. Environmentalism and respect for nature were constant themes. Some New Age artists created moody, ambient sounds that were intended as background music, to promote healing and relaxation. As the genre grew, some might say by attracting marginally talented musicians who were searching for musical direction, record labels specializing in New Age, such as Windham Hill, Narada, and Private Music, appeared on the scene and made stars of such diverse musical talents as harpist Andreas Vollenweider, native American flutist R. Carlos Nakai, saxophonist Paul Winter, keyboardist Kitaro, and…

Julie Price’s bassoon emerged from the mix with clearly realistic tone. “ As the original L2 circuitry was virtually flawless, it was the emergence of new electronic components that opened up a possibility of [even better performance] . . .” So begins one of two booklets— one a collection of specifications and interior photos, the other a distinctly thorough user’s manual—included with the new L2.1 Reference linelevel preamplifier from Brooklyn’s Lamm Industries, earlier products from which have impressed me as among the best available. Indeed, coming from almost anyone else, the above quote would strike me as trivial boasting—but I know from experience that there’s nothing trivial about designer and company head Vladimir Lamm, a university-trained electronics engineer who’s been building artisanal tubed and solid-state audio amplifiers for nearly 55…

THIS ISSUE: A second listen to a high-performance LP player. The words right and wrong and good and bad make me uncomfortable. Assigning virtue or value is against my religion. And thinking that I know the best way to design a loudspeaker, amplifier, or record player would only prove that I’m a conceited old fool. Therefore . . . When I feel the urge to upgrade my analog pleasures, I keep an open mind and endeavor to shop outside my comfort zone. And, because I can, I consult with me ol’ runnin’ buddy Michael Trei, contributing editor to Sound & Vision, and collector and setter-up of turntables. I also study the wisdom of Stereophile senior editor Michael Fremer. Last year, after I’d reviewed the Technics SL- 1200GAE1 and Roksan Radius…

SUBMISSIONS: Those promoting audio-related seminars, shows, and meetings should e-mail the when, where, and who to JAtkinson@enthusiastnetwork.com at least eight weeks before the month of the event. The deadline for the September 2017 issue is June 20, 2017. Alvin Gold’s passing will leave our industry the poorer. UK: ALVIN GOLD, 1948–2017 Paul Messenger I am particularly sad to report the death of audio writer Alvin Gold on April 7. He was one of the good guys, notable for his righteous senses of loyalty and fair play, and his passing will leave our industry the poorer. Our musical tastes differed—Alvin was well known for proselytizing Mahler before this became fashionable. As professional audio writers, we attended many industry events together, though Alvin always seemed to be freelancing for magazines that were…

Zesto Audio’s new two-box Andros Téssera tubed phono preamplifier measures 17" wide by 5.5" high by 15" deep, weighs 25 lbs, and costs $12,000. The case is made of 16-gauge steel. The Téssera is actually conjoinedtwin phono preamps, each twin referred to by Zesto as a channel. (The terminology is confusing at first, seeing as how each of those channels also includes left and right stereo channels.) A front-mounted switch lets you choose between Channel A and Channel B. That done, within both channels you can then select between movingmagnet and moving-coil inputs. So the Téssera can handle up to four different tonearms, as long as two of those arms are fitted with MC cartridges and the other two with MM cartridges. (Of course, all those arms could have MC…

THIS ISSUE: Computer-based multichannel music playback becomes easier with new hardware and software from Fidelizer, Baetis, exaSound, and Roon. It’s been going on for a while now: Despite support for multichannel in audio/video receivers and A/V processors priced from as little as $200 to $30,000, there are still very few offerings that cater to the music listener. They may offer stereo-only streaming features through their USB or Ethernet inputs, but these inputs don’t see your multichannel files. To handle such files, they would require you to add a music server with HDMI output. However, I know of no turnkey music servers that will output multichannel audio via HDMI. Sure, servers based on PCs and Macs will output lossless, high-resolution multichannel via HDMI, and for years I’ve been running a Mac…

The Zero turntable looks and feels like a classic 1958 MGA motorcar. My main task is to describe an audio component’s basic character. How was it made? How did it fit into my system? How effectively did it deliver musical performances? My goal is to create stories that generate sounds and images in your mind—stories that will allow you to imagine how the component might perform in your system. I can hear the moans from all you objectivist guys: Please, Herb, spare us your purple prose. But guys! Our full appreciation of music, art, and perfectionist audio depends entirely on our ability to imagine. The most practical measure of any hi-fi component’s usefulness, hence its value, is to listen to diverse recordings and notice how they grip (or don’t) our…