Back then, I made friends with a big-eared clique that would influence my future in hi-fi: audio writer Michael Lavorgna (currently editor at TwitteringMachines.com); NYU law professor Jules Coleman; former Stereophile deputy editor and current AudioQuest…
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In the mid-2000s, I worked at a "white-shoe" law firm on Wall Street, ran with renegades, and fancied myself a writer. Fast-forward some 18 years. The firm, like many cash-flush NYC firms, has moved to midtown and I've moved on. Those renegades are now respected members and players in the hi-fi community. I still fancy myself a writer.
Setup
John DeVore toted his O/babies from the Navy Yard and up my stairs then unsheathed them from heavy plastic. (The boxes were left in Brooklyn.) After much jogging, moving, taping, measuring, and listening, he secured them 64" apart tweeter to tweeter and 80" from my listening seat. After a week or two of listening, including one night playing hip-hop records brought by filmmaker Jeremy Elkin, I pushed them back 5" farther, endowing the sound with a deeper low-end with no sacrifice of presence, sparkle, or soundstaging.
John DeVore toted his O/babies from the Navy Yard and up my stairs then unsheathed them from heavy plastic. (The boxes were left in Brooklyn.) After much jogging, moving, taping, measuring, and listening, he secured them 64" apart tweeter to tweeter and 80" from my listening seat. After a week or two of listening, including one night playing hip-hop records brought by filmmaker Jeremy Elkin, I pushed them back 5" farther, endowing the sound with a deeper low-end with no sacrifice of presence, sparkle, or soundstaging.
Listening
As I started working on this review, I was…
Sidebar 1: John DeVore
Considering John DeVore's long legs, on his person and in the industry, I thought a historical Q&A was in order.
Ken Micallef: Why did you become a loudspeaker designer?
John DeVore: I've always been an audiophile. I always had music on and my hi-fi carefully set up, even as a teenager. I loved music, loved the gear, and was meticulous about the sound. In college, I realized I would probably never be able to afford the best speakers I was listening to at hi-fi stores, and so in the 1980s, I began reading up, studying, and eventually…
Sidebar 2: Specifications
Description: Two-way, rear-ported bass-reflex loudspeaker. Driver complement: horn-loaded 0.75" (19mm) Vifa textile-dome tweeter, 7" (178mm) SEAS paper-cone woofer. Frequency range: 38Hz–25kHz. Sensitivity: 90dB/W/m. Nominal impedance: 8 ohms.
Dimensions: 35" (889mm) H × 14.75" (375mm) W × 9.75" (248mm) D (including stands). Weight: 40lb (18kg).
Finish: White oak.
Serial numbers of units reviewed: B051B098 (both, auditioned); B0510001 (measurements), "handmade in Brooklyn, New York."
Price: $5700/pair. Stands: $995/pair. Warranty: Five years…
Sidebar 3: Associated Equipment
Analog sources: Michell TecnoDec turntable with T3 tonearm, Goldring 1006 and Dynavector 10X5 LOW cartridges. VPI Avenger Direct turntable, VPI Fatboy tonearm, VPI Shyla MC cartridge.
Integrated amplifiers: Parasound Hint 6, PrimaLuna EVO 400.
Preamplifiers: Sugden LA-4, Tavish Audio Design Adagio phono.
Power amplifiers: Pass Labs XA-25, LKV Research PWR-3.
Loudspeakers: Devore Fidelity O/96, Volti Audio Razz, Spendor BC-1.
Cables: Interconnects: AudioQuest Pegasus, Triode Wire Labs Spirit II. Speaker: Auditorium 23. AC: Triode Wire…
Sidebar 4: Measurements
I performed the measurements on a different sample of the DeVore Fidelity O/baby from those that had been auditioned by Ken Micallef. It had the serial number B0510001. I used DRA Labs' MLSSA system with a calibrated DPA 4006 microphone to measure the speaker's behavior in the farfield and an Earthworks QTC-40 mike for the nearfield responses.
DeVore specifies the O/baby's impedance as 8 ohms, with a minimum value of 6.75 ohms at 200Hz. Measured with…
A vital member of the second wave of Texas singer-songwriters that emerged in the 1970s and included Lucinda Williams, Butch Hancock, and Lyle Lovett, Nanci Griffith was a product of a time when, to paraphrase a once-ubiquitous bumper sticker, Austin was still weird. Gifted with a delicate, sweet voice and fierce determination, she started playing out at the age of 12 and getting paid at 14. While never having the ability to project Joan Baez–like volume, she could certainly fill a room. And while her voice could at times take on a flat, almost-nasal resonance, her tight vibrato was strong…
Register to win an AudioQuest Cobalt portable USB DAC (retail value $349.95; limited-time $199.95) we are giving away.
From the company:
In the December 2019 issue of Stereophile, John Atkinson pondered: “Is AudioQuest’s DragonFly Cobalt worth the extra $100 compared with the DragonFly Red? Yes. That sense of ease it offers with long-term listening is something I don’t want to do without.”
Now through December 31, 2023, AudioQuest’s multi-award-winning DragonFly Cobalt is available for just $199.95 ($259.95 CAD)—$50 less than DragonFly Red’s price at the time of…
Saturday, August 18, 1962, was quite a day in music. In England, Ringo Starr made his first appearance as a full member of the Beatles, at a Horticultural Society dance at Port Sunlight, Merseyside. In Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey, two jazz giants met in a recording studio for the first time. Duke Ellington showed up with a streamlined, potent ensemble: Johnny Hodges, Harry Carney, Ray Nance, Lawrence Brown, Aaron Bell, and Sam Woodyard. Then tenor sax legend Coleman Hawkins arrived.
Ellington and Hawkins had never recorded together, so there was an atmosphere of energy and something…
My adoptive mother, Lily Mae, was a retired businesswoman and former fashion model turned stay-at-home mom and artist-painter with famously good taste in everything. She raised me to have good manners, an "active awareness of color and texture," and "an eye for form." She expected me to critique her paintings, her decorating, and her wardrobe, urging me constantly to develop "good taste in everything."
In Lil's world, a perfect day was for me to skip school and go with her clothes shopping at Marshall Field's, where it was my job to sit in a plush chair offering comments about which…