RMAF 2013

Kimber/EMM Labs—JA's Equal Best Sound at RMAF

John Atkinson  |  Oct 22, 2013

Ray Kimber always gets great sound at shows, but this year, although he was still using four Sony SS-AR1 loudspeakers hooked up with Kimber Select cables and an EMM DAC to play his four-channel IsoMike DSD master files, there was something extra-magical happening in the room. Both pianist Fan-Ya Lin's album Emerging and the Romantic Album from violin and piano ensemble the Formosan Duo, sounded tangibly real. The key, it turned out were the gigantic, 300lb MTRX class-A/B monoblocks from EMM Labs, can be seen in my photo. This brute will output 1500W into 4 ohms and, in Ray Kimber's words, extracts "cheerful obedience" from the speakers it is tasked to drive.

COMMENTS
donunus's picture
Submitted by donunus on October 23, 2013 - 3:31am

Sony speakers getting high ranks at RMAF? Wow I never knew they had speakers at this level that can scale up to what the front end components give out.

Dr.Kamiya's picture
Submitted by Dr.Kamiya on October 24, 2013 - 7:37am

I was rather surprised too the first time I heard about Sony's Reference line, but yes apparently they do have some very good speakers (and I have been living under a rock).

http://www.stereophile.com/content/sony-ss-ar1-loudspeaker

JL77's picture
Submitted by JL77 on October 23, 2013 - 2:19pm

Congrats to Ray and crew. Always a high-level showing at CES and RMAF.

Alex Tien's picture
Submitted by Alex Tien on October 25, 2013 - 2:37am

Missed RMAF this year, bummer...
Hope the MTRX monoblocks will be on Munich HighendShow and on tour to Netherlands?

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