Esoteric SACD Player/DAC, Audio Research Amplifiers, Acora Speakers, Cardas Cables

The Acora Acoustics room was another standout. The Canadian company has been building speakers for only a year, but they are on to something with their SRC-1 speaker ($CAD37,995/pair), whose enclosure, as per their marketing literature, is "handcrafted using granite by only the finest artisans in Canada." Sure, they must be a pain to move around, but one could say the same of the amps that were powering them, the cinderblock-shaped Audio Research Ref 10/750Se amps ($CAD95,200/pair).

Mobility issues aside, what I heard of them being fed by an Esoteric E-02 phono preamp ($CAD12,000), an Esoteric N-03T network player, and an Esoteric Grandioso K1 SACD Player/DAC ($CAD40,000), all of it wired with Cardas, was a sound with rich overtones and great physicality.

COMMENTS
Anton's picture

Do the left and right speakers match?

The one on the right looks narrower, probably these old eyes.

I bet they do.

tonykaz's picture

Should we wonder if the venerable ARC has been influenced by Jason Stoddard's exposed Tube designs?

Why doesn't $100,000 ( one hundred grand $$$,$$$ ) include a pair of the nicest Cages we've ever seen ?

I don't think that I could own these things, to be honest, I've owned a small few ARC Amps that were not all that impressive musically.

Hmm. $95k indeed

Tony in Venice

ps. an engineer mentioned that those Tubes need a certain amount of their own space, as do we all.

ps. my wife saw the included picture and thought the ARC Amps were small file cabinets like she has in her office. ( with a bunch of my junk, sitting on top, collecting dust. ( wives )

Bogolu Haranath's picture

Those top of the line Audio research pre-amp/mono-block amps combo costs less than the darTZeel NHB-468 amps ........ May be MF could review the Audio Research combo? :-) ........

X