Analog sources: VPI Avenger Direct turntable with VPI 12" Fatboy Gimbal tonearm and Hana Umami Blue MC cartridge.
Digital sources: HoloAudio May DAC, Sonore opticalRendu, Roon Nucleus+, Small Green Computer power supply, TRENDnet switch, Apple iPad mini.
Preamplifiers: Sugden LA-4, Ayre K-5xeMP line preamplifiers; Manley Labs Chinook, Goldnote PH-5 phono stages.
Power amplifier: Pass Labs XA-25.
Loudspeakers: Volti Audio Razz SE.
Cables: Interconnects: AudioQuest Pegasus Zero-Tech, Triode Wire Labs Spirit II (RCA). Speaker: Analysis Plus…
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Sidebar 2: Associated Equipment
Sidebar 3: Measurements
I measured the Ayre Acoustics VX-8 with my Audio Precision SYS2722 system. Before performing the measurements, I preconditioned the VX-8 following the CEA's recommendation, operating it at one-eighth the specified power into 8 ohms for 30 minutes. At the end of that time, the top panel was hot, with a temperature of 113.4°F (45.3°C). Unusually, the bottom panel was even hotter, at 144.5°F (63.1°C). To reduce the possibility of overheating, I continued the testing with the amplifier raised off the test bench with inverted ceramic cones.
The Ayre VX-8…
Brahms first scored what was to become his Quintet in F minor, Op.34, for piano, two violins, viola, and cello for two violins, one viola, and two cellos—no piano. The scoring and perhaps the music was inspired by Schubert's similarly piano-less, two-cello Quintet in C major. The original Brahms score has been lost.
Cellist Terry King, a protégé of the great Gregor Piatigorsky and the first American-born teacher to teach a Tchaikovsky Competition Gold Medal winner, long wondered what the original quintet sounded like. He sent me this quote, from Clara Schumann, from just after she read…
Writing a regular column can be a funny thing; the repetition it requires brings up questions that grow increasingly urgent. Chief among them: What are we doing here, and what is this for? For all the handwringing about story-telling and prose style, what we're up to in the equipment-review section of this magazine is writing about metal boxes filled with wire, capacitors, circuit boards, and other bits of hardware. Life is difficult and goes by in a flash, love and satisfaction are fleeting at best—so why should we care? Well, because some of these boxes manage to connect us to beauty and…
The Manley Mahi
No matter what manufacturers may claim about the neutrality, transparency, and vanishingly low distortion of their products, every audio component has a flavor, something you might justly call a personality. (If they didn't, what would we write about in these pages?) This is particularly true of tube amplifiers, the patchouli-and–rose-quartz–wearing art students of hi-fi. At this moment, I have a good half-dozen tube amps living in my loft, and each has a vividly expressed character that I can describe in a few sentences.
Except one. Well, two. Over a good…
John Atkinson reviewed the HiFi Rose RS250A in October 2023 (Vol.46 No.10):
Although I reviewed the original version of this elegant South Korean streamer not too long ago, in the December 2021 issue, it has already been updated. The RS250A ($2695, footnote 1) replaces the RS250's ESS ES9038Q2M two-channel DAC chip with the higher-performance ESS Sabre ES9028PRO chip and now supports PCM data formats up to 32/768 and DSD formats up to DSD512.
MoFi Distribution sent me a sample of the new RS250A. I installed the Rose HIFI app on my iPad mini and connected the RS250A to my NetGear…
Hi-fi is at a crossroads. One road takes us toward modernized versions of the gear we grew up with, stuff that has been around since the 1950s. The other road faces the future. While sometimes accommodating physical media, including vinyl records, that's not where that road leads. On that road, streaming is the norm, and equipment may be hooked up with traditional signal cables or with no cables at all, just GHz-range electromagnetic radiation, the digital kind. In the more extreme cases, the music may remain digital all the way to the amplifiers, which themselves are likely to be class-D.…
After break-in, I plugged my studio's monitor controller into the balanced analog inputs on the primary speaker using standard XLR cables. (The Neutrik universal-balanced sockets on the 4329Ps, which are common on pro and prosumer equipment, also allow a ¼" TRS connection.) I switched the input to balanced analog and cranked the volume up all the way to listen for hum or hiss. Hearing none, I turned the volume back down to a civilized level and listened to some music played back from the studio computer.
My downstairs space is about 10' × 20', with an 8' ceiling. I set up the…
Sidebar 1: Specifications
Description: Two-way bass-reflex, standmount digital loudspeaker system with integrated D/A conversion, class-D amplification, and on-board DSP. Drive units: 1" compression-horn tweeter, 8" paper-cone woofer in a front-ported enclosure made of ¾" MDF finished in wood veneer. Crossover frequency: 1675Hz. Frequency response: 28Hz–25kHz (–6dB). Dispersion: 90° horizontal, 60° vertical (2kHz to 15kHz). Digital inputs: Bluetooth 5.3, Wi-Fi, Ethernet, S/PDIF (TosLink), USB2 Type B, USB-A (for attaching a thumb drive). Analog inputs: One pair balanced (XLR/ TRS combo…
Sidebar 2: Associated Equipment
Analog sources: Technics SL-1200MK7 Anniversary Edition turntable, Shure V-15 Type III cartridge, Pro-Ject Phono Box RS2 preamp.
Digital sources: Apple iPhone 7S, Lenovo ThinkPad L530 laptop, Oppo DV-981HD universal disc player.
Preamplifier: Benchmark LA-4.
Power amplifiers: Benchmark AHB2, LSA Warp 1.
Loudspeakers: Amphion Two18, B&W 808.—Tom Fine