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BBC Radio 3's Night Tracks program, streamed with Roon, alerted me to Corin, an electronica artist with whom I was completely unfamiliar. After an ambient choral beginning, the title track from her Lux Aeterna (24/44.1 FLAC, UIQ/Qobuz) features a sequence with high-level, low-frequency synth notes. The Q Acoustics had no problem playing this passage with sufficient authority—not what I was expecting from a pair of relatively inexpensive speakers with 5" woofers.

I was careful to keep the sound pressure level at the listening seat below 87dB(C), slow ballistics. These are 5"…

Description: Two-way, reflex-loaded, floorstanding loudspeaker. Drive units: two 5" (125mm) impregnated-and-coated-paper–cone woofers; 1" (25mm) fabric-dome tweeter. Crossover frequency: 2.5kHz. Frequency response: 39Hz–30kHz –6dB. Nominal impedance: 6 ohms. Minimum impedance: 3.0 ohms. Sensitivity: 91.5dB/2.83V/m. Recommended amplifier power: 25–150W. Supplied accessories: foam port-blocking plugs, aluminum stabilizers, carpet-piercing spikes, and protective spike covers.
Dimensions: 38.1" (967mm) H × 11.5" (293mm) W × 14.2" (361mm) D including spikes and…

Digital sources: Roon Nucleus+ file server; Ayre Acoustics C-5xeMP universal player; MBL N31 CD player/DAC; Ayre Acoustics QA-9 A/D converter; NetGear Nighthawk router.
Integrated amplifiers: Audio Research I/50, Musical Fidelity Nu-Vista 800.2, NAD M10.
Power amplifiers: Parasound Halo JC 1+ monoblocks.
Loudspeakers: KEF LS50.
Cables: Digital: AudioQuest Vodka (Ethernet), AudioQuest Coffee (USB), DH Labs (1m, AES3). Interconnect: Ayre/Cardas (balanced). Speaker: AudioQuest Robin Hood. AC: AudioQuest Dragon Source & High Current,…

I used DRA Labs' MLSSA system, a calibrated DPA 4006 microphone, and an Earthworks microphone preamplifier to measure the Q Acoustics 5040's quasi-anechoic behavior in the farfield. (The 5040's manual doesn't mention an optimal listening axis, so I examined the farfield frequency- and time-domain responses on the tweeter axis.) I used an Earthworks QTC-40 mike for the nearfield and in-room responses and Dayton Audio's DATS V2 system to measure the impedance magnitude and electrical phase angle.

But for me, taste has a deeper significance. I see it as regulated by an internalized moral and socio-spiritual code that forces me to recognize how little I know about whatever subject I am judging. With fine art and music, that code compels me to ask myself why I prefer one artist, style, or genre to…

From 1972's Can't Buy a Thrill to 1980's closing act Gaucho, Bard sages Walter Becker (1950–2017) and Donald Fagen occupied a place in pop music as unique as their songs' references to "wild gamblers," "midnight cruisers," "bodacious cowboys," and a female protagonist who "prays like a Roman with her eyes on fire." Much later, Becker…

In prior screeds, I have discussed the category of turntable designers I like to call deep thinkers, who twist their brains to come up with fresh thinking about how to approach the task of playing a vinyl record. If there is a poster boy for deep thinkers, it's got to be Simon Brown.

Brown is based on the South Island of New Zealand. I'm thinking that being in such a far-flung part of the world must have given his head plenty of space to get creative. First, in 2011 he created The Wand tonearm, a striking unipivot design that features a fat carbon-fiber…

A Visit to SME
It's no secret that I have long been a fan of SME turntables and tonearms. But despite having worked on, set up, or owned hundreds of their products over the last 40 years, I have never had an opportunity to visit the place where they are made. Until now.

Nestled in a sleepy village called Steyning in the south of England, SME still operates from the purpose-built factory they moved into more than 60 years ago (above), although it has been expanded several times.

What struck me first, as I approached the facility, is how the…

When was the last time I'd encountered a Plinius product? I found no talk of the 40-year-old New Zealand brand between a brief mention in a 2015 column by John Marks and 2022, when Robert Schryer spied a Plinius component at the Montréal Audio Fest. The most recent Stereophile review of a Plinius component was Erick Lichte's 2011 take on the SA-103…

We placed the amps on Grand Prix amplifier stands. In place of the RA-150's supplied two-piece height-adjustable feet, I used…