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Passion In My Pants: Astell & Kern’s AK100 portable music player

In the Headzones room, Astell & Kern’s Owen Kwon introduced me to his company’s sexy little AK100 hi-rez portable music player ($699).

The AK100 is good-looking, powerful, and versatile: It uses a Wolfson WM8740 DAC; natively supports “Mastering Quality Sound” (MQS) files with resolutions up to 24-bit/192kHz; has 32GB of internal memory and provides two micro-SD slots, each supporting an additional 32GB of memory; offers micro USB, optical in/out, and headphone connections; and is compatible with FLAC, WAV, WMA, MP3, OGG, APE, AAC, ALAC, and AIFF files.

The user-interface was…

Merrill Audio: "Not For Tube Lovers"

Merrill Wettasingh of Merrill Audio says his class-D Veritas Monoblock amplifiers are "not for tube lovers." The crimson or black chassis is made of a solid 60lb billet of aluminum. Allowing only spade connection for the "best and biggest" sound, these 400 watt (8 ohms) power-houses seek "audio purity" rather than coloration, according to Wettasingh.

High Fidelity Meets High Fashion: Sennheiser to expand its Momentum line

I’ve become a big fan of Sennheiser’s Momentum headphone (seen here), which combines the company’s trademark sound with an improved sense of fashion; but, at $350, the Momentum is a bit out of my price range.

So I was pleased to learn that Sennheiser has plans to expand its fashion-conscious Momentum line to include at least two new, lower-priced models. Scheduled to be released this summer, the smaller, on-ear Momentum Super will be available in a range of fun colors and should cost around $229–$249.

I’m looking forward to it.

MrSpeakers Mad Dog headphone

Dan Clark’s MrSpeakers Mad Dog headphone ($299) starts as a Fostex T50RP, but adds extremely comfortable lamb-leather ear pads, a leather “comfort strap,” revised 3.5mm and 7mm headphone jacks, and modifications to the headphone cups and driver surfaces.

Clark’s goal was to make a closed-back headphone that would perform well at home and on the go. He says that additional upgrades can be made easily over time, so that customers can “treat each purchase as an investment.”

I listened to Four Tet’s “Rounds” through a Burson Audio headphone amp and was impressed by the detailed,…

Woo Audio, M•A Recordings, and Black Cat Cable

Woo Audio’s WA7 Firefly headphone amp ($999) uses a pair of 6C45 power tubes in a single-ended, class-A design, and employs a Texas Instruments PSM5102A 32-bit DAC chip. Around back, a USB input is specified to support 32-bit/192kHz playback, while a single set of RCA jacks are switchable for use as analog inputs or D/A outs.

While I loved the look of this little Firefly, the sound I heard through a MacBook Pro and set of AKG K701 cans was even more impressive. I listened to Ella Fitzgerald singing the appropriately titled “Fine and Mellow”—a vinyl rip made by Black Cat’s Chris…

Worry-free Sound from Audioarts

“To limit yourself to just vinyl,” says Audioarts’ Gideon Schwartz, “would be ridiculous.”

It’s not that Schwartz doesn’t like vinyl&#151several LPs were scattered about the beautiful demo room, said to have been the office of Leona Helmsley&#151but he simply believes that a good system should work well with all music formats, and more, should sound good in many different rooms.

First vinyl: The demo system sounded particularly fine, exhibiting accomplished senses of space, touch, tone color, and flow, with Al Jarreau’s cover of Elton John’s “Your Song.” I especially…

Bob’s Devices for VPI

Bob Sattin&#151the Bob in Bob’s Devices&#151introduced his new Step-Up Transformer/VPI Interface Box ($1650), “specially created to improve the performance of a VPI turntable when used with a low-output moving-coil cartridge.”

Sattin explained that the unit eliminates a set of interconnects and connectors in the phono playback circuit, and incorporates his highly regarded “Blue Series” CineMag 1131 step-up trannie and a Ground/Lift switch.

Photo: Ariel Bitran

It attaches directly to the VPI tonearm base and can be used on several VPI tonearms, including the…

The Kondo Kagura from Audio Note Corporation of Japan

The Audio Note Corporation of Japan&#151which offers products under the surname of that company's founder, the late Hiruyasu Kondo&#151has, in recent years, flown so far under the radar that some feared they were defunct. Now the leaders of Kondo have rededicated themselves to this market, with Rhapsody Music & Cinema as their new US distributor.

For NYAS 2013, chief designer Mr. Ashizawa&#151who, at the time of Mr. Kondo's passing, was already company President&#151was in attendance, showing off an all-Kondo system, alongside their forthcoming flagship, the Kagura…

Well Rounded Sound

Heard at the NYAS with a Leben CS600 integrated amplifier and an Arcam CD73 CD player, the smartly styled desktop loudspeakers from Well Rounded Sound impressed me far more than at previous shows. Their standard Corgi model ($799/pair), used in parallel with a pair of their passive Woof 4 woofers ($399 each) were surprisingly engaging on the Jimmy Cobb Quartet's Jazz in the Key of Blue: explicit without being bright, with decent color and impact. At NYAS 2013, Well Rounded also debuted two new models: the Jack Terrier SE ($349/pair, shown on the left) and the Corgi Mini ($399/pair, shown on…

Reimyo and Combak

I've noted the typically spacious, airy sound of Reimyo electronics at previous shows, and at NYAS 2013 the brand followed suit. Playing through a pair of Combak Audio's single-driver Bravo loudspeakers (ca $8000/pair), themselves supported by Combak Dinosaur stands ($4000/pair not including feet, the latter represented by options too numerous to list here), the Reimyo gear did a lovely job with the classic Fritz Reiner/Chicago Symphony Orchestra Scheherazade. (NB: The astonishing trumpeter on that 1960 recording, Bud Herseth, died only days ago.) Reimyo products in use included the CDT-777…