But it wasn't only the system's musical truth that lifted my spirits. The exceptionally well-controlled and powerful bass, which was not something I had expected, lifted my spirits immensely during an energy low point that declared, once I had finished listening, it was time to break for the day before the day broke me.
The first track I heard was a 24/96 stream of Marcin's cover of "Cashmere." "Bass is excellent, midrange really nice," I scribbled. "This is an actual music system." There were several other tracks, all unfamiliar. At that point, I was too dazed by the quality of the sound to try to hunt down titles online. (Nor did my iPhone receive signal in the hotel's below-ground B2 rooms.)
This was the best sound I've ever experienced from Linn. Nor did it remotely resemble the sound from the Meridian active speaker system I encountered at Munich High End.
At the center of the system were Linn's 360 fully active loudspeakers ($105,000/pair) with four channels of amplification. The 360's beryllium-diaphragm tweeter and midrange both have their own 150W class-AB amplifiers. The upper bass ups the ante with 300W class-AB, and the two woofers together receive 600W class-D. Frequency response is 20Hz–32kHz ±2dB.
Signal flowed from the Linn Klimax DSM/3 digital music player HUB with Exakt audio outputs ($21,000), which processes PCM up to 24/384. (DSM = digital streaming media.) "Non-brand" high-quality shielded Ethernet cables extended from the Hub to the speakers. Linn's Kazoo software, which Alon Moscovitch of Shelley's Stereo describes as "Roon-like," fed digital signal to the 360 loudspeakers which performed D/A conversion internally. In addition, the system used the Shunyata Research Denali 6000/S V2 power conditioner and Typhon T2 power distributor connected with the company's Typhon 2 umbilicals and Alpha power cables.
Space optimization, a version of room correction that can be used with other speaker products as well as Linn's, was employed. It worked. Boy did it work.
Bravo!
