Floor Loudspeaker Reviews

I don't make drastic changes to my audio system from month to month, because then it would be very difficult to tell what component is doing what to the sound. If the following list looks similar to my system list in prior reviews, that's because it largely is. The following equipment was used:

Analog sources: Thorens/Chadwick 125 Mk.II turntable mounted with a Graham 1.5 tonearm, with arm tubes fitted with Denon 103 C/van den Hul, EMT/van den Hul, Fidelity Research FR-1 Mk.III van den Hul, and AudioQuest BH-200 cartridges; in my large listening room, I used a VPI HW-19 Mk.V with a Bright Star TNT base and a Souther Tri-Quartz arm mounted with a van den Hul MC-1 cartridge.
Digital sources: SOTA Vanguard, Kinergetics KCD-40 Platinum, and Magnavox 582 with Boulder SoundWorks analog circuit mod.
Preamplifiers: Dennesen JC-80 Mk.II Gold, Atma-Sphere MP-1, Quicksilver, Encore Electronics 102.2, and Vendetta SCP-2A phono preamp.
Power amplifiers: Parasound HCA-2200 Mk.II, Boulder 250 AE, VTL Deluxe 300, Van Alstine 120C, and Atma-Sphere MA-1.
Reference loudspeakers: Apogee Full-Ranges and Vision Acoustics Soloists.
Interconnects: Straight Wire Virtuoso, AudioQuest Diamond, Virtual Audio ART, Esoteric Artus, and Wire World Eclipse (both balanced and single-ended). Speaker cables: Straight Wire Maestro bi-wire, Virtual Audio ART, and Wire World Eclipse.
Other accessories: RoomTunes CornerTunes, EchoTunes, and Ceiling Clouds; Acoustic Sciences Tube Traps; RoomTunes Just-a-Rack; Arcici Superstructure IIs; Audiostream equipment rack; Bright Star Big Foot and Little Rock (for CD player); Sorbothane pucks and Target speaker stands (for amplifiers); Fluxbuster; Shun Mook Wooden Pucks; The Original Cable Jackets; Music and Sound ferrite beads; AudioQuest ferrite clamps; Chang Audio Lightspeed CLS 6400 ISO power-line filter; AudioQuest record brush; Nitty Gritty record-cleaning machine; Radio Shack spl meter; SOTA record clamp; Virtual Audio ART record clamp; Kleenmaster Brillianize CD cleaner; and the collected works of George Bernard Shaw.—Steven Stone