Headphone Reviews

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Gramophone DreamsHeadphone Reviews
Gramophone Dreams #53: RAAL-requisite HSA-1b headphone/loudspeaker amplifier
Herb Reichert  |  Oct 06, 2021  |  5 comments
Today is Monday. Since Saturday, I have changed the amplifier driving my Falcon Gold Badge LS3/5a speakers three times—from the Parasound Halo A21+ (250Wpc into 8 ohms) to the Pass Labs XA25 (>25Wpc into 8 ohms) to the Elekit TU-8600S (9Wpc into 8 ohms). Now I am listening to the Falcons via the just-arrived RAAL-requisite HSA-1b headphone and speaker amplifier. This unusual, made-in-Serbia amp is priced at $4500. It's specified to produce 10Wpc into 8 ohms, 20Wpc into 4 ohms, 40Wpc into 2 ohms, and 55Wpc into 1 ohm, these values from the loudspeaker output
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Gramophone DreamsHeadphone Reviews
Gramophone Dreams #52: Naim Uniti Atom Headphone Edition & Focal Clear Mg headphones
Herb Reichert  |  Aug 24, 2021  |  23 comments
One summer afternoon in Brooklyn, after a sweaty too-long day doing construction, I stumbled upon a hi-fi shop I'd never noticed before. I thought, hmmm, I bet they have air conditioning.

Inside, the air was only marginally cooler, but before I could leave, an excessively happy salesman introduced himself. After a bit of low-level chit-chat, he asked me if I was into British audio. I told him I "Never heard of it."

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Digital Processor ReviewsHeadphone ReviewsTurntable Reviews
Two June FollowUp Reviews
John Atkinson  |  May 24, 2021  |  First Published: Jun 01, 2021  |  1 comments
The June 2021 issue of Stereophile included followup reviews of two recommended components, both which deserved further investigation of what they had to offer: the dCS Bartók D/A processor and the Schiit Audio Sol turntable.
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Headphone Reviews
Schiit Audio Vali 2+ headphone amplifier
Herb Reichert  |  Apr 21, 2021  |  12 comments
In Schiit's words: "Measurements, schmeasurements! If you want measurements, we got measurements: the Magni Heresy's got you covered. But if you're ready to have some fun with something completely different, Vali 2+ is for you. Enjoy tube sound without tons of noise, play with different tubes without having to get a second mortgage for a matched quad, and see what this whole tube thing is all about!"
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Digital Processor ReviewsFloor Loudspeaker ReviewsHeadphone Reviews
February FollowUp RoundUp
John Atkinson  |  Feb 15, 2021  |  5 comments
When Stereophile publishes a followup review in the print magazine, we add it as a "child page" to the website reprint of the original coverage. We have recently done so with three significant products: the Magico M2 loudspeaker, the Linear Tube Audio Z10e tubed headphone amplifier/integrated amplifier, and the Okto Research dac8 PRO multichannel D/A processor.
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Digital Processor ReviewsGramophone DreamsHeadphone Reviews
Gramophone Dreams #45: T+A Solitaire P headphones & HA 200 DAC-headphone amplifier
Herb Reichert  |  Jan 26, 2021  |  27 comments
What I categorize as mainstream, dealer-based, fancy-pants streamers and big-speakers audio is actually only the gold-plated tip of a gigantic asteroid-like monolith that extends (underground) from New York to Hong Kong, from the Arctic Circle to Antarctica.
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Headphone ReviewsSolid State Preamp Reviews
Benchmark HPA4 headphone amplifier/line preamplifier
Herb Reichert  |  Jan 20, 2021  |  33 comments
I am certain the quality of life I live is determined by two factors: who and what I give my attentions to, and my ability to observe all that I encounter with an open mind. This approach to living has served me well—especially during this review of the Benchmark Media Systems HPA4 headphone amplifier ($2999).
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Gramophone DreamsHeadphone Reviews
Gramophone Dreams #41: Auris Nirvana headphone amplifier & Focal Stellia Casque de Musique headphones
Herb Reichert  |  Sep 30, 2020  |  10 comments
"Future generations will be able to condense into the brief space of twenty minutes the tone pictures of a lifetime—five minutes of childish prattle, five moments embalming the last feeble utterances from the death-bed. Will this not seem like holding veritable communion with immortality?"—Berliner Gramophone Company ca 1877
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Headphone Reviews
Sennheiser HE 60 headphones
Thomas J. Norton  |  Sep 03, 2020  |  First Published: Mar 01, 1995  |  1 comments
In February 1994, when I reviewed the pricey ($12,900 with amplifier) Sennheiser Orpheus headphone system—HE 90 headphones and HEV 90 D/A processor/amplifier—I commented that the company had a similar, but less expensive, alternative available: the HE 60 headphones combined with the HEV 70 amplifier. At the headphone end, the HE 60s aren't so different from the HE 90s furnished with the Orpheus system. Both are extremely lightweight and supremely comfortable—even for long listening sessions (I logged up to four hours without a break on the HE 60s). In fact, the less-expensive HE 60s are about 100gm—4 ounces—lighter than the HE 90s.
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Headphone Reviews
Stax SR-Omega headphones
Thomas J. Norton  |  Jul 09, 2020  |  First Published: Mar 01, 1995  |  0 comments
Ah, yes, headphones again. The market for super–high-end headphones must be small, but manufacturers nevertheless keep introducing new designs. At least two manufacturers—Stax and Sennheiser—seem to have carved out a big chunk of this market for themselves, and are currently slugging it out with their respective takes on the best that electrostatic headphones have to offer.
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Gramophone DreamsHeadphone Reviews
Gramophone Dreams #38: HEDD HEDDphones, Schiit Jotunheim amplifier
Herb Reichert  |  Jul 02, 2020  |  30 comments
Today is March 22, 2020. Outside my door, the plague is gaining intensity. People are wearing masks and rubber gloves. But outside the window by my desk, there is a Callery pear tree, and every day its blossoms are becoming more intensely white. Each day its brightness (measured in units of luminous flux) increases noticeably. The optical radiance of its zillion-petal whiteness illuminates the whole garden.
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Headphone ReviewsJ. Gordon Holt
Koss PRO-4, PRO-4A and Pro/4 AAA Plus headphones
J. Gordon Holt, Bill Sommerwerck  |  Jun 09, 2020  |  First Published: Dec 01, 1963  |  10 comments
Almost a dead-ringer for the early-model Sharpe HA-10, Koss's PRO-4 ($45) is readily distinguishable by a large knurled protuberance sticking out of the lower part of the right-hand phone. This, in case you've wondered, is a mounting for a "boom-type" lip microphone, for use in speech labs and for communication purposes. (Sharpe and Permoflux also provide facilities for attaching a lip-mike.)
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Gramophone DreamsHeadphone Reviews
Gramophone Dreams #35: ZMF & Hagerman headphone amplifiers & ZMF headphones
Herb Reichert  |  Apr 02, 2020  |  11 comments
Almost a year ago, a headphone pal loaned me the Zach Mehrbach–designed ZMF Auteur LTD headphones. He said, "Herb, see if you like these." I took them home and right away thought, Wow, these headphones really disappear!

Nothing about their sound attracted my attention. The only thing I noticed, casually, was how relaxed and unbelievably transparent they were.

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Gramophone DreamsHeadphone Reviews
Gramophone Dreams 32: RAAL-Requisite SR1a headphones
Herb Reichert  |  Jan 08, 2020  |  31 comments
Tell me now: When you're there in the scene, watching Lord Voldemort chase Han Solo through the Cave of the Klan Bear, how often do you notice that the sounds you're experiencing are being pumped at you from five black-painted room boundaries, while the flickering-light images approach from only one? Moreover, in a parallel, more quotidian reality, you're sitting upright in your seat, noisily chomping popcorn while absorbing—and processing—massive amounts of sensory data: Did you ever consider the sensual, mechanical, and psychological complexity of a moment like this, and how fundamentally unnatural it is?
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Gramophone DreamsHeadphone Reviews
Gramophone Dreams #31: Feliks Audio, Focal, Grado, JPS
Herb Reichert  |  Dec 04, 2019  |  9 comments
My current romance with audiophile-quality headphones began in earnest with the appearance, about 10 years ago, of Audeze's LCD-2 planar-magnetic headphones—these predated the company's patented Fazor elements, said to guide the sound around the transducers' magnet structures—and Schiit Audio's original Asgard headphone amplifier. Together, these groundbreaking products rekindled my interest by making headphone listening into something new and exciting—something less distorted, more dynamic, denser, and more intensely lifelike than what I was getting from my speakers on the floor. Best of all, I could listen while lying in bed with my eyes closed.
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