If one thing is certain about Home Theater, it's the reason for its growth. Listening to music is as noble a pastime as it ever was—if I didn't think so, then I'd find reviewing audio equipment a hollow exercise indeed. But the fact remains that we're most willing to spend money on that with…
search
The future is rarely what anyone expects it to be. I still remember reading, as a child, predictions in Popular Science that everyone would have a personal helicopter by 1980. It never happened, though it sure seemed like a reasonable projection of events. Events, however, have their own agenda.
I've heard my share of Krells, Levinsons, Rowlands, and the like in other people's systems—expensive solid-state amplifiers are not my usual beat. With the exception of an inexpensive Adcom a few years back, for more than a decade I've owned and reviewed only tube amps. In fact, until the $7500 Ayre Acoustics V-1 showed up, I'd not had one in my system. Similarly, I'd had only tube preamps until I reviewed the Ayre K-3, which so impressed me that I asked to hear the more expensive K-1—and ended up buying it.
So Ayre's Charlie Hansen was quite comfortable having me review his big…
Not a big problem—I don't believe many audiophiles buy balanced products to use unbalanced. Sure enough, running those Cardas cables from the K-1's balanced output to the V-1 brought the amplifier to life. For the V-1, "life" did not mean the speedy, crystalline highs and faster-than-live transients some listeners associate with solid-state amplifiers. Nor did it mean ironfisted bass. At least not in my room and system.
Nor were the V-1's frequency extremes "tubelike"—not that tube amps these days have to sound "tubelike" either. While some listeners might find the V-1's top end to be…
Ayre vs Levinson
After allowing the Mark Levinson No.335 to warm up sufficiently (with music), I began the head-to-head. I used DCC's reissue of Nat Cole's Love is the Thing, MoFi's Getz/Gilberto, Classic's 45rpm editions of Pictures at an Exhibition and Time Out, the late Mel Tormé's Mel Tormé and Friends Live at Marty's, and the Rolling Stones' Tattoo You—all on vinyl. I also auditioned the incredibly fine-sounding HDCD gold CD reissue of Patricia Barber's Café Blue.
After allowing the Mark Levinson No.335 to warm up sufficiently (with music), I began the head-to-head. I used DCC's reissue of Nat Cole's Love is the Thing, MoFi's Getz/Gilberto, Classic's 45rpm editions of Pictures at an Exhibition and Time Out, the late Mel Tormé's Mel Tormé and Friends Live at Marty's, and the Rolling Stones' Tattoo You—all on vinyl. I also auditioned the incredibly fine-sounding HDCD gold CD reissue of Patricia Barber's Café Blue.
First up was the Barber CD through the Levinson. I've never heard an amplifier control the bass on my Audio Physic…
Sidebar 1: Specifications
Description: Solid-state, stereo power amplifier. Output power: 200Wpc into 8 ohms (23dBW), 400Wpc into 4 ohms (23dBW). Voltage gain: 26dB. Input impedance: 10k ohms per signal phase (10k ohms unbalanced, 20k ohms balanced). Frequency response: not specified. THD: not specified. Power consumption: 30W in standby mode, 300W in operating mode, no signal.
Dimensions: 18" W by 7" H by 18" D. Weight: 95 lbs.
Serial number of unit reviewed: 4E0D01F.
Price: $7500. Approximate number of dealers: 30. Warranty: 5 years parts & labor, transferable.
…
Sidebar 2: Associated Equipment
Analog sources: Graham 2.0, Immedia RPM2, Rega RB600 tonearms; Crown Jewel SE, EMT TU, Lyra Parnassus D.C.t, Grado Statement cartridges; Simon Yorke, Kuzma Stabi S, Basis Debut turntables.
Preamplification: Ayre K-1; Audio Research Reference, Musical Fidelity X-LP2 phono sections.
Power amplifiers: Mark Levinson No.335, KR Enterprises VT 8000.
Loudspeakers: Audio Physic Virgo, Sonus Faber Amati Homage.
Cables: Yamamura Millennium 6000, Cardas Golden Reference, Electra-Glide interconnects; Yamamura Millennium 6000 speaker cables; Yamamura…
Sidebar 3: Measurements
A complete set of measurements was performed on the Ayre V-1 in the balanced mode, with selected readings repeated in the unbalanced (single-ended) configuration. Except where noted otherwise, the following results refer to balanced operation.
Following its one-hour preconditioning test, the Ayre's heatsinks were quite hot, but could be touched for several seconds with no discomfort. The DC offset was 8.2mV in the left channel, 9.0mV in the right. The V-1 is noninverting at its unbalanced input; pin 2 of the balanced input is wired as positive. The S/N…
As part of this issue's coverage of the recent Consumer Electronics Show (see Sidebar), I report on my dissatisfaction with almost all the surround-sound demonstrations I experienced in Las Vegas. As a music-lover, the last thing I want is to have trumpets and drums attacking me from behind, yet almost without exception, that is what record producers seem to feel is an essential part of the DVD-Audio and SACD experiences.
As an increasingly gray-haired baby boomer, I'm old enough to remember the fiasco of quadraphony. Yes, there were competing systems and standards—never a recipe for…
Sidebar: Digital & Surround at the 2001 CES
Covering digital technology at CES used to be a relatively easy assignment that mainly involved incremental improvements in CD playback. But the 2001 Show was as confusing for this journalist as his market segment appears to be for the "civilian." Both are faced not only with two higher-quality media—Super Audio CD and DVD-Audio, both heavily promoted at CES for their surround capability—but the reality is that the sonically compromised two-channel MP3 format seems to be generating the most commercial heat. That's even with, as I write, the…
When PR guy Adam Sohmer first told me about the Fosgate Audionics FAP V1, I thought that the impressive-looking device would be the first all-tube preamp-processor—heck, the first tube anything—in my multichannel system. Then I looked closer at the user's manual I'd downloaded from Fosgate's website. Hmmm. No Dolby Digital, no DTS—just Dolby Pro Logic. Of course, the FAP V1 is Jim Fosgate's signature expression of Dolby Pro Logic, and I guess that counts for something. But the more I thought about it, the more interesting a prospect the FAP V1 seemed.
The FAP V1's attractions…