Innholdsfortegnelse for December 2016 i Stereophile

THIS ISSUE: Good sound is good for us. My friend was in dire straits. What had been rare occurrences of panic attacks—one every year or so—had turned into a full-blown panic disorder that made it impossible for him to enjoy peace of mind.. If you’ve never suffered a panic attack, the idea of one—of being, in the absence of any real threat, suddenly overwhelmed by fear—can seem inconceivably strange. Try to imagine fear flooding your mind with such fierce momentum that you struggle to catch your breath, so convincing is the sensation that everything is spinning horribly out of control. Once that happens and the fear has taken over, it doesn’t matter if the threat is real or not. In fact, my friend says, that’s the scariest thing about it—no…

ATTENTION ALL AUDIO SOCIETIES: We have a page on the Stereophile website dedicated solely to you: www.stereophile.com/audiophile-societies. If you’d like to have your audio-society information posted on the site, e-mail Chris Vogel at info@XLinkAudio.com. Please note that it is inappropriate for a retailer to promote a new product line in “Calendar” unless this is associated with a seminar or similar event. ARIZONA ❚ Tuesday, November 29, 7–9pm: The Arizona Audio Video Club will hold its monthly meeting at Trinity Lutheran Church (9424 N. Seventh Street, Phoenix 85021). This meeting will highlight the highly regarded and very reasonably priced Elac loudspeakers designed by Andrew Jones, of which we will have both a bookshelf and a floorstander. The Elacs will be powered by a Peachtree Nova 150 v2 DACintegrated amplifier. The equipment…

I’m a progressive who enjoys the company of his conservative friends, a Catholic who’s thankful for his atheist friends, and a carnivore who cherishes his vegetarian friends. I’m also a vintage-audio enthusiast who loves his audiophile friends who aren’t so inclined— so I was doubly happy to see, in the September 2016 edition of Michael Fremer’s “Analog Corner,” a hearty endorsement of Ortofon’s latest SPU: a 58-year-old phono-cartridge design that, like the coelacanth, continues to thrive despite expectations. Mikey is a longtime friend who harbors no love for vintage phonography—yet after playing his first record with the new SPU #1E ($659), he wrote: “I immediately, and much to my surprise, got what the SPU cult is all about.” The elliptical-tipped SPU #1E—also available as the SPU #1S ($599), with an…

For this review, I depended on my digital source components to stream DSD files to drive Bryston’s BDA-3 DAC. To make this possible, I first had to reconfigure each component’s setup menu. Before the Bryston BDP-2 media player could stream DSD files, its firmware needed to be updated. That done, I accessed the BDP-2’s Web user interface, selected Audio Devices, and checked the option “BDA-3 Audio 2.0-USB Audio.” The BDP-2 could then stream DSD64 and DSD128 files, but not DSD256. An e-mail to Bryston Service USA revealed that the BDP-2’s Linux operating system is incompatible with DSD256. My Lenovo P50 laptop also needed reconfiguring. First, I had to install the latest version of Bryston’s USB Audio ASIO driver. Second, my laptop’s installed version of JRiver’s Media Center 22 software for…

Analog Sources Acoustic Signature Ascona, Continuum Audio Labs Caliburn (with Castellon stand) turntables; Acoustic Signature TA9000, Kuzma 4Point, SAT tonearms; Audio-Technica ART-1000, Lyra Atlas & Atlas SL & Etna & Etna SL, Miyajima Labs Zero (mono) & Madake, Ortofon A95 & Anna cartridges. Digital Sources Audio Alchemy DDS Pro CD transport; Simaudio Moon Evolution 780D streaming DAC; Lynx Hilo A/D–D/A converter; Meridian Sooloos Media System; Pure Vinyl, Vinyl Studio software. Preamplification Ypsilon MC-10L & MC-16L step-up transformers; Audio Research Reference Phono 3, TruLife Argo, Ypsilon VPS-100 phono preamplifiers; darTZeel NHB-18NS preamplifier. Power Amplifiers Boulder 2150, darTZeel NHB-458 (all monoblocks). Loudspeakers Wilson Audio Specialties Alexandria XLF. Cables Interconnect: Snake River Audio Boomslang S/PDIF, Stealth Sakra & Indra, TARA Labs Zero Evolution & Zero & Air Evolution, Teresonic Clarison Gold, Wireworld Platinum…

Analog Sources Linn LP12 Valhalla turntable, SME M2-9 tonearm, Dynavector DV 20X2L cartridge; Roksan Radius 7 turntable & tonearm & Corus Silver cartridge; Rega Research Planar 3 turntable & RB330 tonearm & Elys 2 cartridge. Digital Sources Integra DPPS-7.2 DVD-Audio player, Schiit Audio Yggdrasil DAC. Preamplification Dynavector P75 Mk.3, Lounge Audio LCR Mk.III RIAA, Parasound Halo JC 3+ phono preamplifiers; Bob’s Devices CineMag 1131, Dynavector SUP-200, Lounge Audio Copla step-up transformers. Power Amplifiers First Watt J2, PrimaLuna ProLogue Premium. Integrated Amplifier Line Magnetic LM-518 IA. Loudspeakers DeVore Fidelity Orangutan O/93, Dynaudio Excite X-14 & X-18, Falcon Acoustics LS3/5a, KEF LS50, Konus Audio Essence, Magnepan .7, Rogers LS3/5a, Technics SB C700, Zu Audio Soul Supreme. Cables Digital: Kimber Kable D60 Data Flex Studio (coaxial). Interconnect: AudioQuest Red River (balanced) & Cinnamon,…

Mytek Digital Brooklyn Editor: In response to the review of our Brooklyn D/A processor (November 2016), I note that Mytek’s 25-year recording-studio heritage was kindly mentioned by the reviewer, Jim Austin. Since 1992 we have designed more than 40 different models of analog-to-digital and digital-to-analog converters for the recording industry, with countless hit records, many of them in DSD format, produced with the help of Mytek equipment Accurate, high-fidelity sound capture and honest reproduction are the basic requirements for professional digital audio converters. The Brooklyn DAC is designed on the same principle, and the Brooklyn’s own “sound” results from this approach. During the design and prototyping, the complete A/D–D/A chain is repeatedly compared to a high-resolution test file of music. The aim of the design is to get the A/D–D/A…

Wes Phillips Editor: I am deeply saddened to read of Wes’s passing, at the end of August. He was a real gentleman, and a cool guy who understood why those of us in this “industry” are so passionate about what we do. It’s always been about the music for guys like us, and Wes was one of us. —Geoff Poor Balanced Audio Technology We noted Wes Phillips’s passing in the November issue (p.15) and at www.stereophile.com/content/wes-phillips-rip. PS Audio hosted a memorial for Wes at the recent Rocky Mountain Audio Fest.—John Atkinson Banjo? Editor: Just a note to point out that in Art Dudley’s October “Listening” column, the picture on p.33 shows a mandolin player and a guitar player . . . no banjo in sight. —Mike Nilan mnilan@syr.edu Thanks for…

It has been 20 years since I first became aware of the British company Data Conversion Systems, which manufactures audio products under the dCS brand. Rather than use off-the-shelf conversion chips, the groundbreaking dCS Elgar D/A converter, which I reviewed in our July 1997 issue,1 featured a then-unique D/A design that they called a Ring DAC. This featured a five-bit, unitary-weighted, discrete DAC running at 64 times the incoming data’s sample rate—2.822MHz for 44.1kHz-based data, 3.07MHz for 48kHz-sampled data and its multiples— with upsampling and digital filtering and processing implemented in Field Programmable Gate Arrays (FPGAs). Oversampling to a very high sample rate allows the word length to be reduced without losing resolution, and use of a low-bit thermometer DAC makes for very high accuracy in the analog voltage levels…

UK: WHITTLEBURY HALL, NORTHAMPTONSHIRE Paul Messenger In some ways, the Chester Group’s 2016 National Audio Show, held September 17–18 in a resort hotel 70 miles north of London, was a curious show—because few of the bigger brands put in an appearance, some visitors complained about the ￡16 ($21) entry fee. As a member of the press, of course, I didn’t have to pay, but I did find plenty of interest from a number of startup operations from the UK and elsewhere. here—at least two new UK makers of turntables, Planalogue and Onkk, exhibited at the National, as well as numerous established UK and imported analog brands. And as more and more audio brands chase fewer retail outlets, individual dealers are taking on the distribution—sometimes the exclusive distribution—of audio marques. There…

Imeasured the dCS Rossini with my newly recalibrated Audio Precision SYS2722 system (see the January 2008 “As We See It,” http://tinyurl.com/4ffpve4). As well as test CDs and the Audio Precision’s serial digital outputs, I used WAV and AIFF test-tone files sourced via USB from my MacBook Pro running on battery power and played with Pure Music 3.0. I began the testing with the first sample, but continued with the second sample. The Rossini Clock was used for all tests. Apple’s USB Prober utility identified the Rossini as “dCS Rossini Player USB class 2” from “Data Conversion Systems Ltd,” and revealed that its USB port operated in the optimal isochronous asynchronous mode. Apple’s AudioMIDI utility revealed that it accepted 24-bit integer data via USB sampled at all rates from 44.1 to…

Analog Sources Linn Sondek LP12 turntable with Lingo power supply, Linn Ittok tonearm, Spectral cartridge; Day-Sequerra 25-year Anniversary FM Reference tuner. Digital Sources Bryston BCD-1 CD player & BDP-2 media player with IAD sound board; Oppo BPD-103 universal Blu-ray player; Sony SCD-C555ES SACD/CD player; Lenovo P50 computer running Windows 10 Professional (64-bit), Bryston USB driver, JRiver Media Center 22. Preamplifiers Bryston B-26, Mark Levinson No.526. Power Amplifiers Mark Levinson No.334 (stereo) & No.536 (monoblocks). Loudspeakers Revel Ultima Salon2, JL Audio Fathom f212v2 subwoofers (2). Cables Digital: Wireworld Starlight (coaxial). Interconnect: Bryston (balanced), Mark Levinson Silver & Red Rose Silver One, Pure Silver, Totem Acoustic Sinew (single-ended). Speaker: Coincident Speaker Technology CST 1, Pure Silver R50 (biwire double ribbon), QED X-Tube 400, Ultralink Excelsior 6N OFHC. Accessories JL Audio CR-1 electronic…

Iperformed a full set of measurements on the Pass Laboratories INT-60 using my Audio Precision SYS2722 system (see the January 2008 “As We See It,” www.stereophile.com/content/measurements-mapsprecision). I preconditioned the amplifier by running it with both channels driven at one-third power into 8 ohms for 60 minutes. This is, thermally, the worst situation for an amplifier with a class-B or -AB output stage, as onethird power is when the output transistors dissipate the most heat. At the end of the hour, the highest temperature on the side-mounted heatsinks was 114.7°F (45.9°C), and that on the top panel, which was highest toward the rear, was 107.1°F (41.8°C). The THD+noise measured a constant 0.084% throughout this hour. The volume control operated in accurate 1dB steps, and the voltage gain into 8 ohms with…

The invite from David Chesky was simple enough: “Hey Robert, John McEuen, David Bromberg and a lot of other people are going to make a record in this abandoned church that a friend of mine owns in Brooklyn, you wanna come by?” Knowing the resourcefulness, not to mention good ears, of David and Norman Chesky, owners of Chesky Records, I soon arrived in Greenpoint, Brooklyn, to find Stereophile contributing editor Herb Reichert munching on cookies and listening through headphones to what was going into the computer. Ahh, that freelancer lifestyle. Meanwhile, out in the unheated, poorly lit former sanctuary of what was, indeed, a half-dilapidated Brooklyn church—nothing like thick, decaying carpets to damp the sound—a group of musicians was busily at work, aiming to cut an entire album in two…

“And in comes Romeo, he’s moaning / ‘You Belong to Me, I Believe.’” “Now Ophelia, she’s ’neath the window / for her I feel so afraid” —BOB DYLAN, “DESOLATION ROW” While the music that was originally part of some of Shakespeare’s plays is now mostly lost to history, the man, who died 400 years ago last spring, and his glorious poetry continue to energize composers and musicians. Beginning after the Restoration with the work of Henry Purcell, Shakespeare also sparked operas by Bellini, Verdi, and Gounod, and instrumental works by Schumann, Berlioz, and Elgar. Some 25 modern musicals have been influenced if not based on his plays, including West Side Story (Romeo and Juliet), Kiss Me Kate (The Taming of the Shrew), and The Lion King (Hamlet). The Bard has…