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A Sunday Drive, an Unbeatable Experience

All photos: Micah Sheveloff.

“Big loud blue sedan” is the text message I receive as our Metro-North commuter train eases into the sleepy Milford, Connecticut station. I pull on my coat, grab my bag of CDs, step out of the train and onto the clean platform. It’s precisely 11:39am on Sunday, November 20, and there’s not a cloud in the sky.

The text message is considerate, but unnecessary: Even from the platform, my view compromised by the station’s waiting room, I can hear the handsome, steady purr of the engine, see the polished chrome of the bumper scattering sunlight in a…

JA Sings at the 18th Annual LAOCAS Gala

Clearly, my boss, Stereophile’s esteemed editor, John Atkinson, lost another bet.

Here we see him singing, furiously, at the Los Angeles and Orange County Audio Society’s 18th Annual Society Gala and Awards Banquet, held last weekend in the Grand Ballroom of the Buena Park Holiday Inn. He really hits his stride at about 40 seconds in. (Thanks to "The Audio Otaku" for capturing the magic.)

Besides JA’s cancan, there were lots of other fun and interesting things at this year's Gala: Bybee Labs’ Jack Bybee offered opening remarks; Vandersteen Audio’s Richard Vandersteen…

Greenhaus Events at Pitch Perfect Audio

Photo: DeVore Fidelity

Sunday, January 15, 5–9pm and Monday, January 16, 6–9pm: As a way to recuperate from the madness of the Consumer Electronics Show and with a hat tip to Devore Fidelity's popular Monkeyhaus listening parties, Pitch Perfect Audio (300 Brannan Street, Suite 209, San Francisco) will host their first “Greenhaus” events.

Jonathan Halpern of Tone Imports, John DeVore of DeVore Fidelity, and Anthony Abbate of Box Furniture Co. will be on hand to present their gear, play records, answer questions, and pour drinks.

On Sunday, a range of DeVore Fidelity…

Empirical Audio Off-Ramp 4 USB format converter

If an audiophile visiting an audio show in 1991 were to have been transported two decades into the future, at first he would not be aware of any difference: A two-channel system would be playing in a hotel room. But on closer inspection, he would notice that the CD player, the ubiquitous source 20 years ago, would be conspicuous by its absence. Yes, there might be a turntable—"Good to see that people are playing LPs in the future," he would think—but why is there a PC in the room?

Fact is, the predominant digital source at audio shows is now a computer, and Stereophile has been covering…

Empirical Audio Off-Ramp 4 USB format converter Page 2

Up to this point I'd been using a generic USB cable with the Off-Ramp. I now substituted the expensive AudioQuest Coffee cable ($295/1.5m). If I heard a difference, it was very small, but if I had to swear on J. Gordon Holt's unwritten autobiography, I'd say that the AQ continued in the same direction the improvement I'd heard with the battery supply.

I spent the rest of that day trying to measure the differences between these two USB cables. It proved as frustrating as a snipe hunt, though I did find a very slight difference in jitter between the AudioQuest and generic cables with the…

Empirical Audio Off-Ramp 4 USB format converter Specifications

Sidebar 1: Specifications

Description: USB-AES/EBU, -S/PDIF, or -I2S data format converter for use with PCs and Macs (driver software included). Drivers available for Windows 7/Vista, Windows XP/2003, Mac OS X 10.6 (Snow Leopard), Mac OS X 10.5 (Leopard), Mac OS X 10.4 (Tiger). Input: USB 2.0–compliant. Operates in asynchronous isochronous mode. Output: S/PDIF electrical on RCA jack, AES/EBU on XLR jack, I2S on RJ-45 jack. Sample rates supported: 32, 44.1, 48, 88.2, 96, 176.4, 192kHz. Input/output bit depth: 16 or 24. Power supply: 12V DC wall wart. Options: Monolith lithium-ion battery…

Empirical Audio Off-Ramp 4 USB format converter Associated Equipment

Sidebar 2: Associated Equipment

Digital Sources: Ayre Acoustics DX5 universal player; G4 Mac mini running OS X 10.5.8, iTunes 10.4.1, Pure Music 1.82; Logitech Transporter, dCS Debussy, Bricasti M1 DAC D/A converters; Halide S/PDIF Bridge USB-S/PDIF converter.
Preamplifier: Ayre Acoustics K-5xeMP.
Power Amplifiers: Classé CTM-600 monoblocks.
Loudspeakers: Sonus Faber Amati Futura, TAD Compact Reference, Vivid B1, BBC LS3/5a.
Cables: Digital: Kimber Orchid AES/EBU. USB: AudioQuest Coffee. Interconnect (balanced): AudioQuest Wild. Speaker: AudioQuest Wild. AC: PS Audio Lab…

Empirical Audio Off-Ramp 4 USB format converter Measurements

Sidebar 3: Measurements

I measured the behavior of the Empirical Audio Off-Ramp 4 using the Audio Precision SYS2722 system (see www.ap.com and "As We See It" in the January 2008 issue). I installed the correct version of the driver program for the Snow Leopard operating system, and played test tones at various sample rates and bit depths from BIAS Peak 7 on an Intel MacBook running OS X 10.6.8. The Macintosh USB Prober utility reported both the manufacturer and product strings as "Empirical Audio Async 192." The interface was identified as "vendor-specific," with no information offered…

Music Reference RM-200 Mk.II power amplifier

In his "Manufacturer's Comment" in response to my review of the original Music Reference RM-200 power amplifier in the April 2002 issue, designer Roger Modjeski admitted that being a manufacturer was not his first choice. "Frankly, I'd rather consult than produce," he claimed. "I'd rather be making a living doing stand-up comedy," I said to myself after reading his comment.

But a decade later here I still am, and Modjeski is still producing his own Music Reference brand of electronics and marketing computer-matched tubes sold under the RAM Tube name—not that both of us aren't also doing…

Music Reference RM-200 Mk.II power amplifier Page 2

JA's measurements of the various taps' total harmonic distortion plus noise vs frequency indicated that "When its output transformer is matched to or less than the load, the RM-200 offers superbly low distortion from the upper bass through the midrange to the mid-treble. With lower-impedance loads, the distortion rises significantly with the degree of mismatch between the output tap and the load."

So choosing the optimal tap should take into account your speakers' nominal impedance as well as the lowest impedance they dip to. My Wilson Audio MAXX 3s dip down to 3.4 ohms at around 20Hz…