Look at that photo, with the beautiful wood-plinthed KT88 amp. What do you notice? That's not a dCS digital stack lying on the table bottom-right: It's an iPad. A fancy red cable, whose name I forgot to get, is connecting a portable music source to the line-level input of a $1850 single-ended stereo integrated headphone amplifier called the Mogwai.
ELAC America introduced a new 100Wpc, class-A/B integrated amplifier with a switching power supply, the "Debut Series DA101EQ" ($499), which looked so Walter Gropius' Bauhaus: Moderne. I was deeply impressed by its industrial design quotient. Hidden inside its elegant 2.1-channel skin, the ELAC integrated includes an "Auto Blend" control feature that measures the nearfield response of your main speakers and subwoofer and then corrects phrase and adjusts crossover frequency to suit the listener's room.
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 mindstories 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.
The one that has me the most stoked is the Rogers High Fidelity 65V-1 class-A, single-ended EL34/KT88 integrated amplifier ($3999). Not to mention: I have never seen an amp painted with industrial-black crinkle paint that I didn't love.
I am an Anglophile and a Brit-fi guy. I just am. Back in 1982 I really wanted a wood-cased A&R Cambridge A60 to drive my Rogers LS3/5a speakers. But I couldn't afford its modest price. Somewhere around then, this venerable UK company simplified their name to Arcam.
I have been beating the headphone drum at Stereophile since I started in 2014. By 2016, when I reviewed Linear Tube Audio’s inaugural product, the microZOTL2.0 line-stage/headphone amplifier, I was falling asleep with AKG K812s on my head. (Now I’m falling asleep with HiFiMan Susvara and RAAL-requisite SR1a ribbon headphones.) To me, headphone listening is the gateway to audio’s newest wonderland.
The surprising combination of the superb-sounding (but prototype) Technical Audio Devices Laboratories (TAD) loudspeakers with the wonderfully affordable Audio Alchemy electronics manifested some penetratingly beautiful Roy Orbison music.
Before I knew who she was, I saw Roslyn in the hall handing out chocolate chip cookies that she baked herself. She was vivacious, with a heart-melting smile, and talking to everybody. Each hand-wrapped bag held two cookies and was tied with a ribbon in a bow, with a business card. (As I chatted with her I snuck cookie-bag after cookie-bag into my jacket pockets. I don’t think she noticed.)
In red letters on the first page of Chinese audio manufacturer Audio-GD's website are these words: Wisdom in mind, enthusiasm at heart.
I like this goodwill greeting because it sets a mindful tone. I presume that sentiment was issued by one Mr. He Qinghua, because farther down the page, it states, "All Audio-GD's products are designed and developed under the leadership of Mr. He Qinghua." When I began my auditions, I took this salutation as an advisement, making it my plan to study Audio-GD's Vacuum HE1 XLR line-level preamp with as much wisdom as I could muster and the enthusiasm of high expectations.
I am a sucker for the new breed of desktop "wireless" loudspeakerswhen they look and sound as natural and dynamic as the new Audioengine B2 Premium Bluetooth loudspeaker, I can dance around, sing, dream on Bartok, or play air guitar while streaming Tidal or WFMU. You are invited!