LATEST ADDITIONS

The Compact Disc clearly hasn't read the script. At a time when, in the autumn of its commercial life, the format is supposed to be stepping aside to allow younger blood to succeed it, CD has instead in recent years enjoyed something of a revival in audiophile opinion. While SACD and DVD-Audio, rather strutting and fretting their hour upon the stage, are doing more plain fretting than anything, the best in CD sound quality has improved sufficiently for some to question whether we need the new media at all.

In conversation with <A HREF="http://www.stereophile.com/interviews/399">Cary founder Dennis Had</A> at a recent audio convention breakfast, I learned that he had a long career in electronics, specializing in military/industrial high-power radio-frequency amplification and transmitters. However, his dream was always the re-creation of single-ended tube amplifiers, especially zero-feedback designs.

Reader Franklyn Ayensu is wondering, dollar for dollar, do <I>Stereophile</I> readers think today's digital sources sound better than today's analog front ends or the other way around?

The rumored economic recovery may not be simply spin and hype, if recent reports from the consumer electronics industry are any indication.

From the January 2004 issue, Michael Fremer writes about the "SUV-like, limited-edition, 20th-anniversary" <A HREF="http://www.stereophile.com/amplificationreviews/104mf">Musical Fidelity Tri-Vista kWP preamplifier & Tri-Vista kW Monobloc power amplifier</A>. No doubt the "bank-vault-like" designs will get your attention, but as Fremer discovers, after you close your eyes, it's "sheer sonic pleasure."

To the great surprise of not that many people at all, at Home Entertainment 2003, as at the two immediately previous shows, the room featuring loudspeakers by Joseph Audio was voted by showgoer ballot "Best Sound of Show" (see September 2003, p.62). I'm not going to pick a fight over that. Not only was the sound very, very good; the entire vibe was confidently relaxed, while at the same time being purposeful in a manner businesslike yet friendly.

When some people record music, they make an effort to record the ambient sound of the hall or other performing space along with it. On the other side of the coin, some engineers work to capture only the sounds of the performers, so the recordings they make sound comparatively dry. And, of course, there are engineers who don't make an effort one way or the other, and whose work contains whatever hall sound does or does not come their way by accident.