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Wally Tools WallySkater V2.1 Pro
They say you can't teach an old dog new tricks, and while I learn new things about setting up turntables all the time, I long ago settled into a set of skills I have been using to adjust turntables professionally for decades. What has changed is the tools available to assist that work, which have improved immensely over the decades. I have added many of those tools to my arsenal.

Founded by turntable setup obsessive and inventor Wally Malewicz in 1994, WAM Engineering introduced a range of innovative setup tools that dug deep into setup issues…

Also interesting to me was the company’s…

Scheduled for introduction in the U.S. in mid-April, the LINK range will include speaker cables (models L-LS3, L-LS4, and L-LS5), subwoofer cables (L-SUB3, L-SUB5, and L-SUB10), analog stereo RCA (L-RCA0.5, L-RCA1.5) and XLR cables (L-XLR0.5, L-XLR1.5), and digital cables including coaxial (L-COAX1, L-COAX2) and optical Toslink cables (L-OPT1, L-OPT2…

When it comes to playing records, I too have a ritual. It involves carefully cleaning the vinyl, first on a Pro-Ject VC-33, followed by immersion in a HumminGuru Ultrasonic vinyl cleaner. Before and after, I inspect the record's grooves with a pricey VisibleDust Quasar R magnifier (footnote 1). Only then—black coffee hot, glasses…

Setup
I wasn't required to set up the SMS, as Sikora and Fox enlisted a three-man crew to bring the turntable's four wooden crates up the stairs and into my apartment. Notable Audio's Jessie Bentley did the setup work.

This was not a reviewer perk. "All J.Sikora dealers are required to set up the 'table and tonearm for the customer," Jeff Fox explained. "If a dealer gets permission to ship a 'table to a location where there is no dealer, then the dealer must do the installation there."

Supplied accessories include a pair of J.Sikora–branded interconnects, an umbilical…

Description: Mass-loaded, belt-driven turntable with two EBM-Papst DC asynchronous motors, external power supply. Speeds: 33 1/3rpm, 45rpm. Upper platter: 10mm thick glass and aluminum. Platter: Delrin and cast iron, 13" (330mm) diameter, 40lb (18kg). Wow and flutter: ±0.03%. Base platter of brass, steel, copper; plinth and isolation platform of lacquered aluminum; inverted bearing, inverted bearing of steel and cemented carbide with ceramic (zirconium dioxide) ball.
Tonearm: Silicone-damped inverted-bearing unipivot with an armtube of Kevlar fiber and a…

Analog sources: Thorens TD 124 turntable with Korf TA-SF9R tonearm, Korf HS-A02 Ceramic Headshell, Kuzma CAR-30 MC EMT JSD Pure Black, MoFi Electronics UltraGold, Aidas Tru-Stone Gold Web phono cartridges.
Preamplifiers: Tavish Audio Design Adagio (phono), Manley Chinook (phono), Rogue Audio RP-7.
Integrated amplifiers: PrimaLuna EVO 300 Hybrid, Riviera Labs Levante.
Power amplifier: Rogue Audio Stereo 100.
Loudspeakers: Voxativ Ampeggio 2024, DeVore Fidelity Super Nine, Volti Audio Lucera.
Cables: Interconnect: Agent Pur, AudioQuest…

I was so enamored by the look of the BMR Monitor, I initially thought its name didn't do it justice. It sounded too nondescript. But with time and growing…

With nothing left to do but listen to music, I started with a mono recording, the Ahmad Jamal Trio's At the Pershing (LP, 20th Century Masterworks 350259). I immediately liked what I heard: The BMRs offered an introspective clarity. Images were in their own zones, well-distanced from each other. Decaying notes, lower frequency reverberations, and other ambient information including clinking dishes and conversations among patrons offered a vibrant, richly layered framework of connective tissue that made an event that happened over 60 years ago seem like it was happening all over again.…

I realize I've spent an inordinate amount of space talking about what essentially was my failure to set up the speakers properly in the first place, but trust me when I say there's method to my madness. My experience in positioning them was the beginning of my awakening to the traits that define these speakers' character. Two of those traits combined make this speaker magical.

But first I want to talk about this speaker's resolution, which is impressive by any standard, and the first of this speaker's defining traits that was revealed to me by that positioning exercise. The BMRs…