Digital sources: Roon Nucleus+ music server; Ayre Acoustics C-5xeMP universal player; MBL N31 CD player/DAC.
Power amplifiers: Parasound Halo JC 1+ monoblocks.
Loudspeakers: Canton Reference 7K (in for review), KEF LS50, Marten Diamond Edition Parker Trio.
Cables: Digital: AudioQuest Vodka (Ethernet), AudioQuest Diamond (USB), DH Labs (1m, AES/EBU). Interconnect: AudioQuest Wild Blue (balanced). Speaker: AudioQuest K2. AC: AudioQuest Dragon Source & High Current, manufacturers' own.
Accessories: Target TT-5 equipment racks; Ayre…
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Sidebar 2: Associated Equipment
Sidebar 3: Measurements
I measured the Verity Audio Montsalvat DAC/PRE with my Audio Precision SYS2722 system (see the January 2008 "As We See It"), repeating some tests with the magazine's Audio Precision APx555 system. Apple's USB Prober utility identified the Verity as "Combo384 Amanero" from "Amanero Technologies" with the serial number string "413-001." The Verity's USB port operated in the optimal isochronous asynchronous mode, and Apple's AudioMIDI utility revealed that the DAC/PRE accepted 32-bit integer data sampled at all rates from 44.1kHz to 384kHz. The AES/EBU and coaxial S/…
Francesco Cafiso: Irene of Boston
Cafiso, alto saxophone; London Symphony Orchestra; four others
EFLAT EF0003 (CD, available as download, LP). 2020. EFLAT, prod.; Riccardo Piparo, Mat Bartram, Francesco Lupi, Roberto Romano, engs.
Performance *****
Sonics ****
Cafiso, alto saxophone; London Symphony Orchestra; four others
EFLAT EF0003 (CD, available as download, LP). 2020. EFLAT, prod.; Riccardo Piparo, Mat Bartram, Francesco Lupi, Roberto Romano, engs.
Performance *****
Sonics ****
The first time I heard Francesco Cafiso, I thought I was hallucinating. It was 2005. I had flown to Australia from Seattle to cover the Melbourne Jazz Festival. Cafiso appeared the first night. He was 15. He played the most outrageous bebop I had ever heard outside of Charlie Parker records. I thought I was…
My incommodious room favors small standmount and panel speakers that some audiophiles would say require a subwoofer.
But I was never inspired to try one until a new category of subwoofer appeared: the "micro" (aka soccer-ball) subwoofer. The minute I saw the little KEF KC62, a 10" cube, I imagined it could do 0–100Hz and back to zero in record time. I reported on the KEF microsub last month, in Gramophone Dreams #49.
Just after I completed that report, I spied the SVS 3000 Micro. It, too, looked like a well-tuned, high-revving four-cylinder racer. When my request for a review…
One such "favored" deep-bass album is a dreamy live recording of Toshio Hosokawa's composition "Lotus Under the Moonlight – Concerto for Piano & Orchestra," a live performance from 2006 at the Concert Hall Art Tower Mito in Japan; Hosokawa/Mozart (Live) (16/44.1 FLAC, ECM/Tidal) is a perfect example of a record that, in order to be fully grasped, needs the scale and impact of its bass to reach the listener.
Performed by pianist Momo Kodama and Seiji Ozawa's Mito Chamber Orchestra, Hosokawa/Mozart is punctuated by strong, long, circa-40Hz drum booms with copious reverb…
Sidebar 1: Specifications
Description: Sealed-box, powered subwoofer. Drive-units: Two 8" vented aluminum cone woofers with twin toroidal ferrite magnets. Inputs: 1 pair unbalanced (RCA); USB-A for firmware updates. Outputs: 1 pair unbalanced (RCA), line-level. Amplifier output power: 800W RMS (2500W peak) with Intelligent Control Interface (ICI). Frequency response: 23–240Hz, ±3dB.
Dimensions: 10.9" (276mm) × 11.7" (297mm) × 10.7" (271mm). Weight: 26.7lb (12.5kg).
Finishes: Piano Gloss Black or Piano Gloss White.
Serial number of unit reviewed: 3KMC11201835.
Price: $799.…
Sidebar 2: Associated Equipment
Analog sources: Dr. Feickert Analogue Blackbird turntable with Schick 10.5" tonearm; Koetsu Rosewood Signature Platinum, My Sonic Lab Ultra Eminent Ex, K&K Audio Lundahl LL1931Ag SUT, Kitsuné KTE LCR-1 and Tavish Design Adagio phono stages.
Digital sources: Roon Nucleus+ music server; dCS Bartók D/A processor.
Preamplifier: Rogue Audio RP-7.
Power amplifiers: Parasound Halo A21+, Elekit TU-8600S, Feliks Audio Arioso.
Loudspeakers: Falcon Gold Badge LS3/5a, Harbeth M30.2, Magnepan .7.
Cables: Interconnect: Cardas Clear Cygnus, Black…
I grew up in a household that didn't have a record player and was pretty much devoid of music. In high school, I got a little stereo and began collecting records. By the time I entered Brooklyn College, in 1963, my "main man" was Trini Lopez; I also had a couple of Jack Jones albums. In New York, I discovered the Cafe Au Go Go.
The Cafe Au Go Go was in the heart of Greenwich Village, right across the street from the Bitter End. It was a long, rectangular basement room that seated about 300 people. The stage was along the middle of a long wall, so most of the tables were to the sides of…
In 1957, Switzerland-based Thorens introduced the TD 124 turntable, a record player destined to become a classic. (TD is an initialism for tourne disque, French for turntable.)
A Thorens brochure from that same year itemized the TD 124's "11 main elements that result in 41 advantages." It noted the turntable's "strongly ribbed, solid chassis, crafted in cast aluminum," and its two-part platter including a "flywheel [subplatter], crafted in stabilized cast iron, [which] possesses excellent characteristics for the magnetic shielding of the drive system, as well as great inertia."…
Sunk into the plinth's back panel are two pairs each of nickel-plated, single-ended (RCA) and balanced (XLR) output jacks, plus ground screw and power cord receptacle. Four adjustable aluminum/rubber composite feet support the plinth.
Finally, the powder-black TPN 124 power supply, measuring 4" W × 3" H × 9" D, includes a toroidal transformer that causes "very little scatter," Kürten wrote. Translation: It doesn't leak EMI/RFI all over the place.
Setup
A pair of 1m singled-ended (RCA) Shindo Laboratory interconnects connected the TD 124 DD to my Tavish Audio Design…