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"New York is an ugly city, a dirty city," John Steinbeck wrote in 1953. "But there is one thing about it—once you have lived in New York and it has become your home, no place else is good enough." Decades later, the novelist's insight about this appalling, incomparable city still feels true. New Yorkers love to complain about the summers, with their wafting miasma of hot garbage and urine; about the superannuated subway system, which only sometimes resembles a psilocybin trip gone really wrong; about the purgatorial agony of finding an apartment; about the affronts of existing shoulder-to-…
More surprising still was the GT2's nimble way with rhythm and timing—not the forte of many belt-drive turntables. Sonically, Bootsy Collins's bassline on "Unfunky UFO," from an early pressing of Parliament's Mothership Connection, offered solidity, tunefulness, and long decay, but it also forced my friend J and me to get off of the couch and dance, always a welcome development. Certain lightweight, light-on-their-feet record players—like the ones from Linn and Rega—seem to waltz their way through recordings, a propulsive quality I find appealing, but that is not what I heard here. The…
It takes a while for audio-related technologies to mature. Tubed amplifiers were invented by Lee de Forest in the nineteen-teens, but while there are still some adherents of early high-distortion triode designs, the age of mainstream high-fidelity amplification dawned with higher-power/lower-distortion amplifiers developed by Williamson and McIntosh followed by the Ultralinear take on the Williamson concept. That was 30+ years down the technology-evolution timeline after de Forest.
And when it comes to solid state amplifiers—the usual kind—does anyone prefer the state of the (germanium)…
The Warp 1 in the listening room
Bill Leebens, Underwood HiFi's PR guy, told me that the amp I was sent for review was "broken in" and verified as working, so I got right down to listening to music. I recently had my Benchmark AHB2 power amp connected to my listening room system, driving a pair of Bowers & Wilkins 808 speakers. Ahead of the power amp is the Benchmark LA4. Sources were a dCS Bartók DAC/streamer and a recently installed phono rig: Technics SL-1200MK7 turntable, vintage Shure V15 Type III HE cartridge, and Pro-Ject Phono Box RS2 phono preamp. Connected to the Bartók via…
Bill Leebens, Underwood HiFi's PR guy, told me that the amp I was sent for review was "broken in" and verified as working, so I got right down to listening to music. I recently had my Benchmark AHB2 power amp connected to my listening room system, driving a pair of Bowers & Wilkins 808 speakers. Ahead of the power amp is the Benchmark LA4. Sources were a dCS Bartók DAC/streamer and a recently installed phono rig: Technics SL-1200MK7 turntable, vintage Shure V15 Type III HE cartridge, and Pro-Ject Phono Box RS2 phono preamp. Connected to the Bartók via…
Sidebar 1: What Is LSA?
Living Sounds Audio started out in the early 2000s. Founded by Larry Staples, a former Thiel Audio director of sales, the company designed speakers that were built in China. In 2005, the company bought out Daniel Khesin's DK Designs, which designed and sold amplifiers made in China and "upgraded" in Everett, Washington (footnote 1). Walter Liederman's Underwood HiFi was an LSA dealer.
According to Liederman, LSA ran into financial trouble following the 2008 economic turbulence. Underwood eventually became the company's sole dealer and bought out its…
Sidebar 2: Specifications
Description: Class-D stereo power amplifier. Analog inputs: Balanced (XLR/TRS Neutrik Combo jack), single-ended (RCA). Outputs: 1 pair binding posts. Input impedance: 47k ohms balanced, 47k ohms unbalanced. Rated output power: 150W into 8 ohms (21.76dBW), 250W into 4 ohms (21dBW). Frequency response: Not provided. THD: 0.0025% (1kHz, 8 ohms, 50W). Compatible speaker impedance: 2–8 ohms. Damping factor: >300. Voltage gain: 28dB set at factory; DIP switches allow for 22–36dB gain.
Dimensions: 4" (101.6mm) H × 14" (355.6mm) W × 11" (279.4mm) D (including…
Sidebar 3: Associated Equipment
Analog sources: Technics SL-1200MK7 turntable, Shure V15 Type III phono cartridge with Hyper-elliptical stylus.
Digital sources: Oppo DV-981HD universal disc player, coaxial S/PDIF output; dCS Bartók DAC/streamer, music streamed from Qobuz and in-house NAS via MinimServer using the dCS Mosaic app.
Preamplifiers: Pro-Ject Phono Box RS2; Benchmark LA4.
Power amplifiers: Benchmark AHB2, Aragon 8004.
Loudspeakers: B&W 808.—Tom Fine
Sidebar 4: Measurements
I performed the measurements of the LSA Discovery Warp 1 with my Audio Precision SYS2722 system. The Warp 1 runs cool—after 3 hours of testing, the chassis was still at room temperature. Because the amplifier has a class-D output stage, I inserted an Audio Precision AUX-0025 passive low-pass filter between the test load and the analyzer. This filter mitigates noise above 80kHz and eliminates noise above 200kHz that would otherwise drive the SYS2722's input circuitry into slew-rate limiting. Without the filter, 378mV of ultrasonic noise with a center frequency of…
A phenomenon formerly unique to Japan, which in recent years has been emulated in cities around the world, is the jazz café (known as jazz kissa in Japan; footnote 1), where salarymen can find respite from their hectic lives, loosen their ties, and enjoy hi-fi jazz over coffee or a drink. Jazz kissaten are typically charming, smaller shops, traditionally furnished and paneled in beautiful wood, which serve superb artisan coffee in artful ceramic cups.
Such respect for artistry, craftsmanship, and attention to detail—the Japanese word is shokunin—is reflected in many aspects of Japanese…
I began my evaluation by listening to what some may consider an odd choice for a tube-preamplifier comparison: the Mytek Brooklyn DAC/preamplifier (used as a preamp) with the Mytek Brooklyn AMP+ class-D power amplifier (250Wpc into 8 ohms, 300Wpc into 4 ohms). The amp is a few years old and the Brooklyn DAC is discontinued, but this combo remains reliable, powerful, full bodied, and creamy sounding. It proved perfectly suited for this comparison. In this setup, the phono stage was the Pathos In the Groove, in for review at AnalogPlanet.com.
And then there was light
An…