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Randall Smith's sonic triumph is that he has designed an integrated amplifier that addresses head on the notion of what truly constitutes the live music experience and what represents quality music reproduction. That's because, while the Mesa Tigris certainly isn't colored, it ain't exactly neutral either. The Tigris has a definite point of view—several, in fact. It's a veritable tone machine that allows listeners the flexibility to have it their way—that is, to determine for themselves what constitutes the ideal sonic perspective and tonal balance.
Sidebar 1: Specifications
Description: Class-A push-pull dual-monoblock vacuum-tube integrated amplifier with auto-bias. Tube complement per side: two 12AX7, two 6V6, four EL84. Inputs: four line-level. Outputs: one fixed, one variable buffered with dedicated attenuator. Adjustable negative feedback from Zero Feedback to Stage III (5dB–8dB–12dB in full pentode, 4dB–7dB–10dB in two-thirds pentode, 3dB–5dB–8dB in two-thirds triode). Eight-pole industrial switch converts amplifier into dedicated headphone amplifier using entire array of output power tubes. Patented Tandem State Imaging;r…
Sidebar 2: Associated Equipment
Analog source: Rega Planar 3 turntable and RB300 tonearm, Grado Reference Master cartridge, EAR 834P tube phono preamp.
Digital source: CAL CL-15 CD player, CAL Delta transport, CAL Alpha 24/96 tube D/A converter.
Loudspeakers: Celestion A3, Joseph RM22si.
Cables: Synergistic Research and JPS Labs interconnects, speaker cables, power cords.
Accessories: Argent RoomLenses, EchoBusters room treatments, PolyCrystal brass speaker spikes, Shakti Stones, Upscale Audio NOS 6V6 and EL84 power tubes.—Chip Stern
Sidebar 3: Measurements
A complete set of measurements of the Mesa Tigris was made in the two-thirds pentode, Stage I feedback configuration. Additional selected measurements were made with other settings, but, unless noted otherwise, these results refer to operation in two-thirds pentode/Stage I.
The Mesa's voltage gain at maximum level measured 40.3dB. For the measurements I set the level control somewhat lower, at a position that produced 34dB gain (approximately 2:00 o'clock with Stage I feedback/two-thirds pentode). The amplifier's gain depends heavily, however, on its…
I was once in a sushi bar in Osaka; sitting next to me was a live abalone, stoically awaiting its fate. It stuck its siphon out of its shell, the waiter tapped the tip with a spoon, the siphon withdrew. Again the siphon appeared, again the waiter tapped it with a spoon, again it withdrew.
I was reminded of that abalone's blind persistence at Hi-Fi '94, Stereophile's recent High-End Hi-Fi Show in Miami, when the subject of blind listening tests once again raised its head in one of the "Ask the Editors" sessions (see Barry Willis's report on p.74).
Like Chuck Butler in this issue's…
The AES Workshop on Data Compression, January 1992 (Vol.15 No.1)
The 91st Convention of the Audio Engineering Society held in New York on October 4–8 1991 had an unusual theme: "Audio Fact and Fantasy: Reckoning with the Realities." Although anti-audiophile expression occurs at every AES function, this was the first time an entire convention appeared to be devoted to it. The event seemed like a kind of showdown where the audio engineering establishment would once and for all discredit those who use their ears to judge reproduced audio quality.
However, I was encouraged by the tenor…
Conventional wisdom has it that the perfect sculpture is present, but hidden within the raw material. And the same conventional wisdom similarly applies to magazine editing: all it needs is careful chipping away at the extraneous material in the raw text files we receive from our authors—sometimes the barest degree of reshaping, repointing, and restructuring—and you have a finished product that both maximally communicates the writer's message and makes the anonymous artisan-editor proud of a job well done.
Perhaps it's because of the similarity between editing text and editing music that…
As in any community bound tightly together by shared enthusiasms, the High End is regularly swept by tides of fashion. Some of the fads prove to be based on something of value, and outlast the initial burst: loudspeaker spikes and Tiptoes, for example, or the resurgence of tube designs, or making use of high-quality passive components. Other fads, particularly if not based on good engineering, fall by the wayside. (Does anyone still use a Tice Clock in their system? Or suspend their cables and interconnects on little acrylic bridges?)
Still other tweaks do seem to have a real effect on…
The acoustic environment for music reproduction is easily the most overlooked source of sonic degradation. Many fine playback systems are compromised by room-induced anomalies that severely color the reproduced sound. When we live in a world of directional wire, high-end AC power cords, and $4000 CD transports, paying attention to the listening room's contribution to the musical experience takes on greater urgency.
Audiophilia's underestimation of a room's effect on musical fidelity can be traced to two causes: 1) the science of acoustics is quite mathematical and arcane, and 2) acoustic…
This concept is far from new. Olson and May, in a 1953 Journal of the Acoustical Society of America paper, described a system called a "free field zone type sound reducer." It consisted of a microphone, amplifier, and loudspeaker set in a loop to define an acoustic region of low pressure. They further described mounting the device in the room corners to maximize its effect by presenting it with the large acoustic load present there.
When a room is pressurized by sound, the pressure is not evenly distributed throughout the room. Instead, high-pressure zones are created along most of the…