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Budget Component ReviewsDigital Processor Reviews
California Audio Labs Sigma D/A processor
Robert Harley  |  Dec 09, 2020  |  First Published: Oct 01, 1992  |  6 comments
Though their first CD player featured a vacuum-tube output stage, California Audio Labs is recently known for making good-sounding, moderately priced solid-state CD players, like the Icon Mk.II that Jack English reviewed in July 1992 (Vol.15 No.7). The Sigma, a $695 tubed D/A converter, furthers their reputation in both areas.
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Music and Recording Features
The Classical Voice: Finding Your Way In
Jason Victor Serinus  |  Dec 08, 2020  |  27 comments
How to explain the power that trained operatic voices hold over many of us? For me, the pull began days after I was born, when acoustic 78s of tenor Enrico Caruso and coloratura sopranos Amelita Galli-Curci and Luisa Tetrazzini played in the background. There was something about the way the dramatic-to-the-core Caruso sang, as if his life depended on it, while the high-flying coloraturas skipped lightly through impossible strings of notes. It moved me like little else.
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Analog CornerPhono Preamp ReviewsTurntable Reviews
Analog Corner #291: SME Synergy LP player, Boulder 508 phono preamplifier
Michael Fremer  |  Dec 07, 2020  |  First Published: Nov 01, 2019  |  19 comments
Since acquiring SME in late 2016, Ajay Shirke's Cadence Group has moved cautiously. First, it revamped and cleaned up the company's somewhat chaotic worldwide distribution. More recently, the new owners eliminated from the bottom of the line the SME Model 10 turntable, introduced in 2000.
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Music and Recording Reviews
December 2020 Rock/Pop Record Reviews
Anne E. Johnson, Phil Brett  |  Dec 04, 2020  |  1 comments
Saunder Jurriaans: Beasts, Tricky: Fall to Pieces and Doves: The Universal Want.
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Music and Recording Reviews
December 2020 Jazz Record Reviews
Thomas Conrad, Fred Kaplan  |  Dec 04, 2020  |  0 comments
Dave Pietro: Hypersphere, Thumbscrew: The Anthony Braxton Project, Bobby Hutcherson: The Kicker and Raphael Pannier: Faune.
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Music and Recording Reviews
December 2020 Classical Record Reviews
Kurt Gottschalk, Jason Victor Serinus, Stephen Francis Vasta  |  Dec 04, 2020  |  1 comments
Osvaldo Golijov: Falling Out of Time, John Luther Adams: The Become Trilogy, Alexander Scriabin: Le Poème del'extase and Honegger/Schoeck/Mitropoulos: Buried Alive.
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Gramophone DreamsSolid State Power Amp Reviews
Gramophone Dreams #43: First Watt F8 power amplifier
Herb Reichert  |  Dec 03, 2020  |  7 comments
I spent my childhood summers on the Reichert family farm near Turtle Lake, Wisconsin, where, inside the red 1880s barn, my uncle Harold played 78rpm records for his cows.

He used a wind-up Victrola sitting on a shelf directly in front of the cows, just below a framed reproduction of an Alpine landscape painting. He said the music and the mountain scene relaxed the cows, causing them to give better milk. Harold played the same Gustav Mahler symphony every day.

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Integrated Amp Reviews
E.A.T. E-Glo I integrated amplifier
Ken Micallef  |  Dec 02, 2020  |  29 comments
The story behind European Audio Team (E.A.T.) is that of one woman, company owner and CEO Jozefína Lichtenegger.

While studying for her MBA at the University of Economics in Bratislava, Slovakia, Lichtenegger (née Krahulkova) sold vacuum tubes for her brother-in-law, Alesa Vaic, then owner of Czech Republic–based tube brand VAIC. After VAIC shuttered in 2003, Lichtenegger founded her own retail business and engaged 100-year-old tube manufacturer Tesla Vršovice to supply 300B and KT88 tubes made to her specifications. When the owner of Tesla retired, she bought the company. She christened her new endeavor E.A.T. (The original Tesla continues as TESLA ElectronTubes, s.r.o.)

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Revinylization
Revinylization #12: Déjà Lou (Reed)
Tom Fine  |  Dec 01, 2020  |  5 comments
Lou Reed: New York
Rhino/Sire R2 628762/603497847556. 1988/2020. Lou Reed, Fred Maher, prods.; Jeffrey Lesser, eng.
Performance *****
Sonics **** (Because vinyl should have been sourced from analog tape.)

It's déjà vu all over again in New York City.

1988: The bankrupt Fear City NYC of the 1970s had given way to the go-go '80s, with many missing the fruits of the Wall Street boom. AIDS ravaged the city, unabated, and a rash of violence and crime fueled by the crack-cocaine epidemic made for a grim underbelly of urban blight and neglect.

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Digital Processor Reviews
Okto Research dac8 PRO D/A processor
Kalman Rubinson  |  Nov 30, 2020  |  First Published: Dec 01, 2020  |  6 comments
For a couple of years, I have been following Prague-based Okto Research. At first, Pavel Krasensky, the founder and hardware developer, offered audio design ideas and DIY modules that I found tantalizing. For example, there was a dandy-looking ESS 9038Pro Sabre–based output module and some appealing power supply modules—but to use those, the buyer had to manage inputs and integration on their own.

Then, finally, last year, Krasensky released the dac8 PRO, an 8-channel D/A processor with USB input and output, 8 channels of AES/EBU input, and 8 channels of balanced (XLR) analog output as well as a headphone output.

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