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Just two weeks before PS Audio premieres the BHK Signature 300 mono amps at Newport Beach, the company showcased its BHK Signature 250 stereo amplifier ($7499) in Munich. This was my first opportunity to hear this Bascom H. King specialty in the context of an all-PS Audio system, and despite the sub-optimal room acoustics, it did not disappoint. In the context of PS Audio's DirectStream DAC ($6000), PerfectWave transport, P10 Power Plant, and power cables, the BHK Signature 250 joined Magneplanar 20.7 loudspeakers, a REL subwoofer, and Analysis Plus interconnects and speaker cable to project…
In addition to jazz chanteuse Lyn Stanley, who was sponsored by Purist Audio Design, the High End Society presented three quasi pop-up ensembles that, unless you followed the schedule, appeared without notice in hallways and at the top of stairways. Thus, while moving between Aurender and AudioQuest, did I encounter the Karinettensextett Karlischnättra. The six or eight bars of blessedly unamplified music I heard at the very end of their presentation sounded lovely.
According to "Press-Release No.11, High End 2015–Final Report," "the world's largest trade fair for the audio industry" saw…
Editor: DEQX Speaker calibration requires anechoic (no reflection) measurements often made in listening rooms for convenience. But room effects must be removed to allow the speaker's own phase and frequency response to be calculated and adjusted.
The DEQX speaker and measurement microphone is positioned to maximize the time before the microphone picks up the first reflected sound occurring after the speaker's direct sound. DEQX-Cal software then removes the reflected sounds at the operator's discretion.
Since every installation is unique, the process is usually performed by our…
This coming Tuesday, May 26, The Audio Salon will host a special Multichannel Music Event.
Peter McGrath of Wilson Audio Specialties will play a selection of his multichannel recordings on a system that features both the Alexia and Duette Series 2 loudspeakers. He will discuss the philosophy behind this style of recording and demonstrate why he believes it is an evolutionary step in the recreation of live events.
Dominique Brulhart, visiting from Switzerland, will discuss the development of the Merging Technologies stereo and multichannel NADAC, its range of features and…
The countdown to the start of THE Show Newport in Orange Country, California has begun. The largest three-day consumer audio show in America kicks off for the public on Friday, May 29 in the newly remodeled Hotel Irvine, with an optional trade day for press and invited guests the afternoon/eve before. With every exhibit space sold out, THE Show Newport promises to keep audiophiles busy with 406 exhibitors holding forth in 150 hotel rooms (including 10 larger suites), up to 25 larger rooms, 80 booths in a 6000 sq. ft. Headphonium Pavilion, and a packed Marketplace.
Richard Beers, President…
So, audiophiles, riddle me this: What does a DAC actually look like? I don't mean the box it hides in—I mean the little doodad that does the actual converting from digital to analog. Is it bigger than a phono cartridge? Is it made of rain-forest wood, gemstone, or porcelain? Do people show it to their friends, who gawk in awe and envy? Does it have an exotic, geisha-sounding name like Jasmine Tiger, Koetsu Onyx, or Miyajima Takumi? When it breaks, does a watchmaker type rebuild it for a not-insubstantial fee? Do people hoard them in vaults, like NOS tubes? Can you trade a DAC for a rose-gold…
The Carmen is an ebony-bodied replacement for Soundsmith's esteemed SMMC3 MI model (now discontinued, footnote 3). It is of medium mass (6.8gm), medium compliance (22µm/mN), and high output (2.2mV RMS), and features a nude elliptical stylus (6 by 17µm) and an aluminum-alloy cantilever. It should work well with most MM phono stages and tonearms of low to medium mass. I used the Carmen with a vertical tracking force (VTF) of 1.5gm into a 47k ohms/100pF load (though I recommend experimenting with capacitive loads of up to 450pF). I played it every day for almost six months, with four tonearms…
Editor's Note: In Stereophile's second decade of publication, things were starting to unravel, with long gaps between each issue. There were just seven issues published between January 1974 and January 1978. The late Harry Pearson has gone on record that he founded The Absolute Sound in 1973 part because he was tired of waiting for the next issue of Stereophile to reach his mailbox. In this "As We See It" essay from the "Surface Noise" issue in August 1976, founder J. Gordon Holt owns up to it appearing 8 months late!
It is probably unnecessary for us to point out that this issue is late…
To some, the measure of a company has less to do with the amount of money it makes than with the honesty of the things it sells: the assurance that every product in its line is designed not as a marketing exercise but as a straightforward and presumably unique answer to a real consumer need.
Consider Harbeth, founded in 1977 by ex-BBC engineer Dudley Harwood, the first syllable of whose surname is immortalized on thousands of loudspeakers whose shared heritage is unmistakable. That in itself is testament to the durability of Harwood's point of view, and to the no-less-apparent…
Thus supported, the Harbeths best suited my 19' by 12' listening room when toed-in slightly but not fully toward the center of the listening area, and when each was approximately 41" from its sidewall and 56" from the wall behind it (all dimensions measured from a central point on the front baffle). My 25Wpc Shindo Corton-Charlemagne monoblocks, their use preapproved by Harbeth's US distributor, sounded super with the Supers—but so did the 45Wpc Croft Phono Integrated, which I used to drive the Harbeths in my considerably larger living room (ca 23' by 27').
A final note: The Super…