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Sometimes I think expensive components—I'll let you decide what constitutes expensive—should come with a big red sticker on the box that reads "WARNING! This product will probably not meet your expectations!" That's because when you spend a lot of money on something, you expect that something to have no flaws and to sound nigh perfect. Why else would you have paid so much? As you gaze at it, touch it, and listen to it, it constantly reassures you that you made the right decision by picking it over all the other, less pricey candidates. It has to be unambiguously better than any component of…
Once in a blue moon, something happens in my listening room that feels like a full-circle event of rare occurrence, like a solar eclipse but indoors. It's when, following some change to my system, the soundstage suddenly appears so locked in, so unaffected by my oddly shaped room and its furnishings, it's as if it had been pushed out of the speakers and given a life of its own, one existing on a plane of self-sufficient ease. This holographic, out-of-(room-and-speaker)-body effect happened with the Leak in my system.
That same sense of soundstage integrity was evident on Patricia…
Sidebar 1: Specifications
Description: Solid state, Roon Tested, class-AB, stereo streaming integrated amplifier with DAC, JFET–based moving magnet/high-output moving coil phono preamp, dedicated headphone amplifier, tone controls, and remote control. DAC section employs ESS Technology's ES9038Q2M chip. Analog inputs: 2 pair RCA line-level, 1 phono. Digital inputs: HDMI ARC, USB-B, S/PDIF on RCA, TosLink, aptX HD Bluetooth. Analog outputs: 1 RCA pre-out, 1 ¼" (6.35mm) headphone, speaker binding posts. Digital outputs: 1 optical, 1 S/PDIF on RCA. Hi-rez support via USB input: PCM 32/768;…
Sidebar 2: Associated Equipment
Analog source: Rega P5 turntable with RB700 tonearm and Audio MusiKraft Denon DL-103 cartridge.
Digital source: Simaudio Moon 260D CD transport.
Integrated amplifier: Grandinote Shinai.
Loudspeakers: Focal Aria K2 936.
Cables: Digital: AudioQuest Carbon (RCA S/PDIF). Interconnect: AudioQuest Yukon (RCA). Speaker: AudioQuest Robin Hood Zero (w/ banana plugs). Power: Shunyata Research Black Mamba CX, LessLoss DFPC.
Accessories: Shunyata Research Venom PS8 power conditioner; a component rack and a wood plinth stand (under turntable) whose…
Sidebar 3: Measurements
I measured a different sample of the Leak Stereo 230, serial number LH000805CFD1195, than the one RS had auditioned. I performed the measurements using my Audio Precision SYS2722 system. I preconditioned the Stereo 230 by following the CEA's recommendation of running it at one-eighth the specified power into 8 ohms for 30 minutes. At the end of that time, the black grille on the amplifier's top panel was hot, at 118.1°F/47.9°C.
Looking first at the amplifier's behavior with its single-ended analog line input, with the Leak's volume control set to its…
Having just finished this review of The Replacements' Tim: Let It Bleed Edition, I thought I'd glance at a couple of online forums to see what the collective verdict was on the sound quality of the set's main attraction: a remix of the album by Ramones engineer Ed Stasium. At Steve Hoffman's forums, I saw this in one of the first posts: "It sounded like I expected Tim to sound when it came out in the fall of 1985. I've also listened to the newly remastered original album that comes with the set, and while it sounds good and I'm glad to have it, it pales compared to the 2023 Stasium mix."…
McIntosh CEO Charlie Randall, pictured outside the company's Binghamton factory in 2006. (Photo: John Atkinson)
To remain profitable, many hi-fi companies have outsourced production to faraway countries with lower labor costs. That, certainly, is a legitimate way of doing business. Yet many other hi-fi makers have chosen to work with suppliers that are local, regional, or at least domestic. There are good reasons for doing so, those manufacturers maintain.
Some of the advantages are obvious. Local labor may cost more, but shipping what they make is much cheaper. Cost "is only one…
During my cub reporter days at Stereophile, I was always on the lookout, casting about for midlevel analog components I might latch on to, ones that could join my long-term daily-driver reference system by complementing the character of my midlevel DeVore Fidelity Orangutan O/93 and Falcon LS3/5a loudspeakers. I was searching for these basic traits: alive and vigorous, clear and well-sorted, relaxed and natural. One of my first-ever Stereophile reviews, in the October 2014 issue, was of Sentec's EQ11 phono preamplifier, which featured six EQ choices, selectable from the front panel, Bakelite…
After living the previous month with PrimaLuna's 10-tube EVO 100 phono stage, I kept checking in with myself to see if I found the MasterPhono transistory—hard, shallow, gray—but it never did. Instead, it walked a narrow line between hard and soft, dry and wet, warm and cool—leaning maybe 10% towards wet and warm on the most atmospheric recordings. It did not attenuate reverberation or diminish atmosphere. I never consciously wished for tube treats I wasn't getting.
With the $1k Lenco
With the plastic Denon DL-103 cartridge, on the aluminum aftermarket headshell, I could probably get…
When I reviewed the Concept 50 loudspeaker from the UK's Q Acoustics in August 2022, I concluded that the Concept 50 lowers the sweet price spot for affordable tower speakers to $3000/pair. Now I have another pair of Q Acoustics loudspeakers in the house for review. Like the earlier speaker, the 5040 is a slim, elegant-looking tower with a vertical D'Appolito drive-unit array comprising a 0.9" fabric-dome tweeter positioned between the two 5" plastic-cone woofers. But the price is half that of the Concept 50: $1499/pair. Will this be a new sweet spot? We shall see.
The 5040
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