News

Two silly-expensive preamplifiers, from Dan D'Agostino Master Audio Systems and Lamm Industries, are featured in the August Stereophile and both offer sound quality and measured performance that are beyond reproach. Rounding out this issue's amplification theme are a tubed integrated amplifier from Octave Audio in Germany and a high-quality class-D integrated amplifier from the American Rogue company. Contrasting with the preamplifiers, the Rogue is affordably priced, as is a Tascam CD player that John Marks raves about in his "Fifth Element" column and the Musical Fidelity V90-DAC, which gets the full review treatment from John Atkinson.

"Our goal is not just to create a portable digital copy of an analog LP; it is to honor the high-fidelity aspects of vinyl by making a digital copy that sounds indistinguishable from the original." So spoke Rob Robinson, PhD (above), creator of Channel D's Pure Vinyl and Pure Music Mac apps, at the start of a recent presentation members of the Bay Area Audiophile Society.

New York's CE Week occurs every June and is a miniature version of the January CES held in Las Vegas. The proportional representation of serious audio gear is similar but, given the small number of total exhibits, audio pickings are usually very thin. This year, however, there was more audio buzz than ever before.

Joseph Audio’s immaculate Perspective loudspeaker is featured on the July issue’s cover and is treated to an in-depth review from John Atkinson. Revel’s superb Performa F208 tower speaker is also featured this month, along with the Classic reissue of Phase Technology’s best-selling PC-60 bookshelf. Art Dudley tries out the sound of DSD files with Luxman’s DA-06 processor, while radically different, ididosyncratic amplifiers from Miyajima in Japan and LFD in England are put under the aural spotlight.

Magico's Alon Wolf will be appearing in person at The Audio Salon, Saturday June 14, from 3pm until 8pm. Alon's presentation will feature Magico's newest S-Series speaker, the S3 (above), which costs $22,600/pair, and a discussion about the technology behind the 10th Anniversary M Project.

Wilson Audio Specialties' Sasha Series 2 loudspeaker ($29,500/pair), which began shipping in March, celebrated its formal California debut on Saturday, May 24, at Music Lovers Audio in San Francisco. Handsomely accompanied by recording engineer Peter McGrath (above), Wilson's Director of Sales for North America, and Rich Maez of Boulder Amplifiers, whose electronics joined a dCS front end and cabling from Shunyata, Transparent, and Synergistic Research, the Sasha Series 2, aka Sasha 2, more than lived up to its promise in a less-than-ideal room whose set-up included Synergistic Research’s HFTs and FEQ and Grand Prix Audio’s Monaco equipment racks.

Our June 2014 issue is now on newsstands, with MBL's cool-running, hot-sounding Corona C15 amplifier on its cover. The C15 combines a class-D output stage with a hefty linear power supply to produce performance that finally convinced John Atkinson that class-D designs need not produce compromised sound quality. JA also outs his hearing ability on the line by reviewing EnigmAcoustics' cost-no-object electrostatic supertweeter. The bulk of the Sopranino's output lies above the venerable JA's hearing limit, so did he hear any improvement? Read the review to find out...