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Innuos Unveils Stream3 & Stream1—Modular Server/Streamer Lineup Explained | AXPONA 2025

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News

Music Lovers' Open House in San Francisco, Friday

Stereophile Staff Jul 21, 2014

We’re big fans here at Stereophile of dealers putting on events for their customers to meet manufacturers and enjoy some high-quality tunes. So we’re letting everyone know that next Friday, July 25, from 58pm, San Francisco’s Music Lovers (2295 Bush Street) will host an open house. Guest speakers will be AudioQuest's Bill Low (founder and CEO), Joe Harley (SVP, Marketing and Product Development), and Skylar Gray (Director, Ear Speaker Division) . . .

Capital AudioFest 2014 News

A Capital Show Starts Friday

Jason Victor Serinus Jul 21, 2014

The annual Capital Audio Fest (CAF), the Mid-Atlantic States' premier playground for audio, returns to the Sheraton Hotel in Silver Spring, MD on July 2527. With the addition of its CanMania, whose list of vendors continues to grow; Saturday's Headphone Meet; and a new focus on high-resolution downloads, the annual show expects to draw a younger and bigger crowd of up to 2000 attendees to its eminently accessible location.

Fred Kaplan

Kenny Burrell: Midnight Blue from Music Matters Jazz

Fred Kaplan Jul 20, 2014

Music Matters Jazz is going 33. As all high-end vinylphiles know, MMJ is the LA-based company that's been reissuing classic Blue Note albums cut at 45 rpm, spread out over two slabs of 180 gram virgin vinyl, encased in a gatefold cover that meticulously reproduces the original's artwork on the outside and gorgeously reprints session photos of the musicians on the inside.

But now, after doing this with 112 titles, the company's proprietors, Ron Rambach and Joe Harley, are re-reissuing some of the greatest Blue Note titles on single-disc LPs cut at 33¹/₃rpm . . .

Robert Baird

Johnny Winter

Robert Baird Jul 18, 2014

"I made my first record when I was 15, started playing clubs when I was 15. Started drinking and smoking when I was 15. Sex when I was 15. Fifteen was a big year for me,"

Budget Component Reviews Digital Processor Reviews

Musical Fidelity V90-DAC D/A processor

Sam Tellig, John Atkinson Jul 18, 2014

They can't sound very goodthey're not big enough. As we all know, in hi-fi, big products mean big performance. Musical Fidelity's V90 series can't be any good. They don't cost enough. With your golden ears, you must pay through the nose.

The V90 components turn all this around. They are tiny. Inexpensive. Beautifully built.

Audacious Audio CD Player/Transport Reviews Digital Processor Reviews

Accuphase DP-80L CD player & DC-81L digital processor

John Atkinson Jul 18, 2014

$13,000! You could buy two Hyundai Excels for that kind of money. Or one 5-liter Ford Mustang. Or two-thirds of a Saab 900 Turbo. How could the purchase of this Accuphase two-box CD player be justified on any rational grounds? What if it did offer state-of-the-art sound quality? Would it really be 50 times better than a humble Magnavox? Would it even be 4.3 times better than the California Audio Labs Tempest II CD player? And would it approach the sound quality routinely offered from LP by the similarly priced Versa Dynamics 2.0 turntable?

News

Audio Advice in North Carolina: July 23 & 24

Stereophile Staff Jul 18, 2014

Wednesday, July 23, and Thursday, July 24, 6 to 9pm: Hosted by North Carolina’s Audio Advice, Digital Living 2014 will take place on Wednesday, July 23, in Raleigh (8621 Glenwood Avenue), and again on Thursday, July 24, in Charlotte (11409 Carolina Place Parkway, near Carolina Place Mall). Representatives from Sony, Sonance, Savant, Lutron, Classé, Bowers & Wilkins, and AudioQuest will present their latest products, all with the goal of simplifying, improving, and creating a more enjoyable modern digital home. AudioQuest’s Steve Silberman and Jett Logan will share the significant impact high-quality cables can have upon the ubiquitous Apple TV media streamer.

Robert Baird

Before Elvis

Robert Baird Jul 17, 2014

“Until now, rock ‘n’ roll has largely been viewed as a bolt from the blue, an overnight revolution provoked by the bland pop that preceded it and created through the white appropriation of music that had previously been played only by and for blacks,”

Stand Loudspeaker Reviews

Dynaudio Focus 160 loudspeaker

Sam Tellig Jul 16, 2014

These are great times for hi-fi gear, especially loudspeakers.

I latched on pretty fast to Dynaudio's Excite X12, but I wasn't the first at Stereophile to discover that loudspeaker. That was Bob Reina.

Drat!

Recording of the Month

Recording of January 1979: The Art of Fuguing

Margaret Graham Jul 16, 2014

Bach-Malloch: The Art of Fuguing
The Sheffield Ensemble and California Boy's Choir, Lukas Foss, cond., recorded live at First Presbyterian Church, Hollywood.
Town Hall Records S-20 & S-21 (each 2 LPs, 1979), Sheffield Lab 10047-2-G (CD, 1995). Lincoln Mayorga, prod., Ron Hitchcock, eng., Lincoln Mayorga Doug Sax, CD mastering eng. AAA (LP), AAD (CD).

These 2-disc albums are of unusual interest for several reasons. First, although both are of exactly the same program material, there were recorded with completely different microphone techniques. One was done with the usual (for commercial recordings) multi-microphone set-up and mixdown (S-20). The other (S-21) was done with a single stereo mikethe technique preferred by most audio perfectionists. [This is the version on the 1995 CD reissueEd.]