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What's playing in heaven: 20 perfectly written, perfectly performed singles.

1) "Waterloo Sunset," the Kinks
2) "Eleanor Rigby," the Beatles
3) "Lost Highway," Hank Williams
4) "If You Could Read My Mind," Gordon Lightfoot
5) "1999," Prince
6) "Street Fighting Man," the Rolling Stones
7) "Help!," the Beatles
8) "She Loves You," the Beatles
9) "Four Seasons in One Day," Crowded House
10) "Senses Working Overtime," XTC
11) "The Bitterest Pill," the Jam
12) "This Guy's in Love with You," Herb Alpert
13) "…

A new path for me is M2Tech's Young DAC, with its optional external battery power supply, the Palmer Power Station. I've listened to DACs with internal power supplies, wall warts, and expensive, cost-no-object…

It took a little over three hours to fully charge the Palmer, at which point I turned off the AC and was able to run it for a couple days of normal listening (I turned off the power to the DAC when I wasn't using it) before I started charging it again. The…

M2Tech Young: Solid-state, DC-powered D/A processor. Inputs: two S/PDIF (RCA, 75-ohm BNC), 1 AES/EBU (XLR), 1 optical S/PDIF (TosLink), 1 USB (female Type B). Output: single-ended on RCA female. Sampling frequencies (kHz): 44.1, 48, 88.2, 96, 176.4*, 192*, 352.8**, 384** (*not on TosLink, **only on USB). Resolution: 16–24 bit (S/PDIF, AES/EBU), 16–32 bit (USB). Frequency response: 10Hz–20kHz, +0.1/–0.5dB (Fs=44.1kHz); 10Hz–90kHz, +0.1/–0.1dB (Fs=384kHz). Signal/noise: 121dB (A-weighted, 24-bit/192kHz, 20kHz bandwidth). THD+N: 0.0003% (24-bit/192kHz). Maximum…

Digital Sources: Apple MacBook Pro computer (2.66GHz Intel Core 2 Duo, 4GB RAM, 320GB HDD) running OS 10.6.7, iTunes 10.6, Sonic Studio Amarra 2.3, Songbird 1.9.3, XLD; Western Digital 2TB NAS drive; Oppo BDP-103 universal Blu-ray player; Meridian (formerly Sooloos) Digital Media System (Control 15, TwinStore x3); Apple iPad 2, 3, iPod Touch 1G, iPhone 4S; Benchmark DAC1 USB D/A converter.
Preamplifier: Marantz AV7005 in Pure Direct Mode.
Power Amplifier: Classé CAM 350 monoblocks.
Loudspeakers: MartinLogan Prodigy, Descent subwoofers (2).
…

For the testing, I powered the M2Tech Young from the Palmer Power Station, which had been fully charged. I repeated some of the measurements powering the Young with its wall-wart supply. The testing was primarily performed with Stereophile's loan sample of the top-of-the-line Audio Precision SYS2722 system (see www.ap.com and the January 2008 "As We See It"), feeding data to the Young via an AES/EBU link. To test its behavior as a USB DAC, I installed the driver program on my MacBook Pro; the computer identified the Young as "M2TECH 384/32 async USB," with a…

"Sure, you can listen to the Ref 5 SE, but I'd assumed you were calling about the Reference 75 amplifier."

"Reference 75? What's that?"

"It's our newest…

Description: Tubed power amplifier. Tube complement: four KT120, two 6H30. Maximum output power: 75Wpc continuous, 20Hz–20kHz (18.75dBW into 8 ohms). Total harmonic distortion (1kHz): typically 0.6% at 75W, <0.05% at 1W. Power bandwidth: –3dB, 7Hz–60kHz. Frequency response at 1W: 0.7Hz–75kHz, –3dB. Input sensitivity: 1.4V RMS, balanced, for rated output (25dB balanced gain into 8 ohms). Input impedance: 300k ohms, balanced. Slew rate: 10V/µs. Risetime: 4µs. Power-supply energy storage: ca 520 joules.
Dimensions: 19" (483mm) W by 8.75" (222mm) H by 19.5" (…

Analog Sources: Rega Research Planar 3, VPI TNT IV turntables; Immedia, Syrinx PU-3 tonearms; Clearaudio Virtuoso Wood, Koetsu Urushi cartridges.
Digital Sources: Creek Destiny, Lector CDP-7TCD players.
Preamplification: Creek Destiny, Vendetta Research SCP-2D phono stages; Audio Research Reference 5 SE, Audio Valve Eclipse, Nagra Jazz, VTL 5.5 II Signature line stages.
Power Amplifier: Audio Research Reference 110.
Integrated Amplifier: Creek Destiny.
Loudspeakers: Dynaudio Excite X12, Epos M15i, Monitor Silver RX6, Nola Viper…