The HiFiction Thales AV
Designed and manufactured by Micha Huber, a fastidious young Swiss mechanical engineer, musician, and watchmaker, the HiFiction Thales…
search
Rockport's Andy Payor eventually redesigned the 6000, changing its effective vertical mass to get the arm's resonant frequency within the optimal range. But by then I couldn't justify to myself the hassles and tradeoffs inherent in any so-called tangential-tracking arm. I think the amount of distortion added by a properly set up and well-designed pivoted arm is lower than what's added by the rest of a typical audio system.
If you set your stylus rake angle (SRA) to 92° using an LP of medium thickness (150gm), that setting should suffice for all thicknesses of vinyl, given how much movement would be required at the rear end of the arm to produce a change in SRA of even 1°. If you set it by ear, just be careful, and tighten the grub screw when you're done.
Setting the antiskating force requires you to turn a disc on a threaded rod under the rear cardanic bearing. Here, again, you must exercise extreme caution. Without a test LP such as Telarc's out-of-print Omnidisc, setting antiskating on the Thales AV is…
Sidebar 1: Specifications
Description: Parallel-tracking, pivoted tonearm.
Price: $12,360.
Manufacturer: HiFiction AG, St. Gallerstrasse 20, CH-8352 Elsau, Switzerland. Tel: (41) 52-202-43-12. Web: www.tonarm.ch. US distributor: High Water Sound LLC, 274 Water Street 2F, New York, NY 10038. Tel: (212) 608-8841. Fax: (212) 571-5809. Web: www.highwatersound.com.
Sidebar 2: Associated Equipment
Analog Sources: Continuum Audio Labs Caliburn, Cobra, and Castellon turntable, tonearm, and stand; Audiostone Pythagoras turntable; Graham Engineering Phantom II tonearm; Ortofon A90, Lyra Titan i, Miyajima Premium BE (mono) cartridges.
Digital Sources: Playback Designs MPS-5 SACD/CD player-DAC, Camelot Roundtable Anagram Technologies DAC, BPT-modified Alesis Masterlink hard-disk recorder, Benchmark ADC1 A/D converter, Meridian Sooloos music server.
Preamplification: Einstein The Turntable's Choice, Boulder 2008, Esoteric E-03 phono preamplifiers;…
Why bother with three phono preamps most of us can't afford? For the same reason the enthusiast automobile magazines cover the newest Ferraris and Lamborghinis: just reading about them is fun.
All three of these expensive phono preamps I review this month—the Boulder 1008 ($12,000), Vitus Masterpiece Series MP-P201 ($60,000), and Abbingdon Music Research PH-77 ($11,995)—share certain sonic attributes not found in less costly, less ambitious units: all are free of "electronica" and glaze. Their edge definition of aural images is smoothly and naturally delineated. All three…
For instance, AMR's own website claims that the original Mercury Living Presence series used Decca/London's ffss (stereo) and ffrr (mono) curves. Yet the jacket of my original copy of Antal Dorati and the London Symphony performing Prokofiev's The Love for Three Oranges Suite (LP, Mercury Living Presence SR 90006, only the label's sixth stereo release) says that the record "should be played according to the RIAA standard"—as do all of the other Mercurys in my collection, both US and UK pressings. Ditto UK-pressed Deccas. AMR also claims that "original Miles Davis and Dave Brubeck" LPs on…
Sidebar 1: Specifications
Description: Tubed MM/MC phono preamplifier with one Direct Input with custom loading RCA socket, three Switchable Inputs, singled-ended, balanced, and USB outputs, 24/96-capable A/D converter, adjustable input impedance and capacitcance, and multiple equalization options. Tube complement: EZ80 (rectification), Mullard ECC81/12AT7 (1st gain stage), Philips 5687WB (2nd gain stage). Gain: 72, 66, 60, 54dB (MC Low); 48, 42, 36, 30dB (MM/MC High); Mute. Frequency Response: within ±dB of RIAA; 12Hz–95kHz +0.3/–3dB. Noise (A-weighted): below –145dBV (<0.056µV)…
Sidebar 2: Measurements
"The PH-77 is a sweet, tonally well-balanced, quiet performer that produced a large, authoritative sonic picture packed with honest detail," summed up Michael Fremer, adding that "its weakest suit was its inability to produce full macrodynamic expression." I am not sure what measurement would indicate that to be the case, but from its flight-case packing to its substantial construction—it weighs 65 lbs—and its informative blue front-panel display, the PH-77 is an impressive piece of gear.
I measured the PH-77 (serial no. 2410003) with Stereophile's loan…
The loudspeaker coming under the microscope this month emanates from north of the border. The Canadian loudspeaker industry has benefited enormously in the last few years from having the measurement, testing, and listening facilities of Canada's National Research Council in Ottawa made available to it on a commercial basis. Unlike the US or even the UK, where a new speaker designer has pretty much to rely on his own resources, having to invent his own test procedure as well as design the product, the Canadian equivalent can have his loudspeaker tested under standard conditions, quickly…
Sidebar 1: JA's 1988 System
The test procedure followed that established for my previous loudspeaker reviews: each pair was used both with a Krell KRS2/KSA-50 combination and the Linn LK1/LK2 remote-control amplification system. Source components consisted of a Marantz CD94 CD player used via its optical digital output to feed a Marantz CDA94 outboard DAC unit, and a Linn Sondek/Ittok/Troika combination sitting on a Sound Organization table. Interconnect for the Krell system was Monster M1000, with Monster M1 speaker cable. The Linn system was used with Linn interconnect and speaker…