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.
Preamplifier: Ayre Acoustics KX-8.
Power amplifiers: Ayre Acoustics VX-8, Parasound JCA100 Tribute monoblocks.
Loudspeakers: MoFi SourcePoint 888.
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; manufacturers' own.…
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Sidebar 2: Associated Equipment
Before the show, I’d heard rumblings about the new Swiss-made Thales Reference turntable. Art Dudley had previously reviewed the Thales TTT-Compact turntable and Simplicity II tonearm, writing: “In 34 years of writing about playback gear, I have seen no products better made than the Thales turntable and tonearm, and precious few that equal them.”
So I walked into room 4.2 F213 expecting to love the Reference model (approx. $28,500), paired with the Thales Simplicity II tonearm ($9900) and the new Thales Magnifier phono preamplifier ($42,000, all prices approximate, converted…
At the Munich show, I ran into familiar faces: Mark Sossa of Well Pleased AV and Vinnie Rossi of Vinnie Rossi Audio, both far from their usual American stomping grounds. Seeing them overseas gave me a flicker of homesickness, but a journalist's job is to focus on the gear, not the friendships.
Sossa represents Merason DACs and QLN speakers; Rossi, his namesake electronics. Their Munich system included the new Merason Mountain DAC ($22,000), which had debuted at AXPONA; an Innuos Statement music server ($21,700); and an Innuos PhoenixNET network switch ($4250; all prices approximate,…
Japan’s Phasemation has always occupied a special place in my audiophile fantasies. I’ve heard the company’s products in the rooms of American Sound’s Angie Lisi at AXPONA, but auditioning a complete Phasemation system? Never had the chance—until Munich.
A Yukiseimitsu Audio AP-01 Rec-Player and tonearm ($49,975) was fitted with a Phasemation PP-2000 MC cartridge ($7999), which uses custom-made 35µm 6N oxygen-free copper wire wound around an iron core. Either a Phasemation EA-550 Phono Amplifier ($9600) or Phasemation EA-1200 Tube Phono Amplifier ($19,800) fed the recently…
I’d been in touch with Muarah Audio’s US distributor, Octopus Audio, ahead of the Munich show, as I’m currently reviewing the company’s entry-level MT3 turntable for AnalogPlanet. But having that deck in-house didn’t prepare me for the striking flagship MT1 EVO ($8700) or the new Ilumnia loudspeakers. And the room offered more surprises still.
The MT1 EVO, equipped with a $2250 Muarah MY-1/9 tonearm, was fitted with an Aidas Mammoth Gold LE MC cartridge ($11,300; all prices approximate, converted from Euros), and routed through the Polish-built Circle Labs V1000 phono…
This post has been edited to add newly received information.
Having recently read Tom Fine’s review of Amphion’s flagship floorstanders, the Krypton3X ($25,000/pair), in the June issue of Stereophile, I was eager to hear them. As luck would have it, the Finnish speaker company’s display in one of the MOC’s four huge halls included a small, sound-proofed listening booth. Before heading inside, I encountered Amphion CEO Anssi Hyvönen, who founded the company in 1998.
"Finland is a quiet place," he told me, smiling wryly through the opening-day din. "It’s good for speaker…
At recent shows, Switzerland-based CH Precision has most often presented its electronics with Wilson speakers. At High End Munich 2025, the company was planning to demo with a pair of Rockports; that plan was foiled when [edited] the M10s went full power and took out three of four woofers, according to Kevin Wolff, the head of international sales for CH Precision and Wattson Audio. ("I don't know of any other speaker that could have taken as much and had limited damage," Wolff added in an email following the show.)
CH hardly had to settle for second-rate speakers, or anything…
Serbian manufacturer NAT Audio produces a range of eclectic tube amplifiers, including the single-ended, class-A Transmitter EVO monoblock. At the amp’s core is the massive Siemens RS687 QB5/1750 power tetrode tube, which delivers between 40W and 80W of output.
That wasn’t the only overachieving component in this room. A Hungarian-made Rui Borges Ultima turntable ($22,000, all prices approximate and converted from Euros) fitted with a Supreme Analog Tangenta Reference 12.3" tonearm ($18,000) worked alongside Core Audio’s Daido Premium server/streamer ($15,500), Denpo Premium DA…
Over the course of Rush's five-decade career, the Canadian prog-rock trio never released much music from the vaults. When vaunted studio albums such as 1980's Permanent Waves and 1981's Moving Pictures were reissued in expanded form, in multidisc anniversary box sets, the bonus material has consisted of previously unreleased live recordings from the era—never any of their oft-whispered-about studio outtakes.
That changes with the new, career-spanning box set, Rush 50 (Ume/Mercury/Anthem), the first time the band has pulled back the curtain to share previously unreleased and highly sought-…
Soulnote, a Japanese brand established in 2004 by former Marantz Japan director Norinaga Nakazawa, made a strong showing at its third Munich High End. Present in Soulnote’s exhibition space were the handsome P-3 preamplifier ($22,990), M-3 monoblocks ($21,990 each), and a turntable outfitted with a DS Audio DS E3 optical cartridge ($2750). A pair of M-3 monoblocks are headed my way for review, so I’ll soon have a handle on what these babies can deliver in my system.
Each monoblock has a single push-pull output stage with four-stage, industrial-grade Darlington can-type…