Being the (relatively) new audiophile on the block with high hopes to entice the masses, the concept of forming a trade body to promote high-end audio was immediately appealing to me. Dying to know more, I…
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As I was scanning the comments under Jason Victor Serinus's insightful piece, "What If They Gave a CES and Nobody Came?", Bill Leebens's words caught my eye (footnote 1). "[ . . . ] several subsequent attempts to form industry associations have come and gone. I was involved in them all, and even I can't remember all their names!" wrote the industry veteran of 40 years (and counting).
By the time you read this, in the fall of 1967, the "Dolby system" will probably be old hat to you. Every other audio publication has been describing it, discussing it, and hailing it as the greatest invention since sex.
We've seen that kind of press ballyhoo before, about such significant advances as the Edsel, the 16-rpm LP and the "thin-profile" loudspeaker, so our first inclination was to be a wee bit skeptical of the Dolby. It seemed too good to be true.
Since then, we've learned more about the Dolby system, and we've listened to some Dolby-ized records with a show-me…
Editor's Note: One-bit DAC chips in the 21st century, where the analog output signal is reconstructed from a very high-rate stream of pulses, are ubiquitous. But a quarter-century ago, those chips were only just beginning to stream from the chip foundries. In this feature, we aggregate Stereophile's 1989 coverage of the then-new technology, starting with Peter van Willenswaard on the basics.—John Atkinson.
Peter van Willenswaard Opens
1989 may well become the year of the D/A converter (DAC). CD-player manufacturers have, almost without exception, launched research projects focusing on…
John Atkinson wrote about Bit Stream DACs in June 1989 (Vol.12 No.6):
Following hard on the heels of Peter van Willenswaard's report in the May issue that the Dutch company Philips had developed a 1-bit D/A converter that offered 16-bit resolution, called the "Bit Streamer," I visited both Philips' research laboratories (footnote 9) in Eindhoven, Holland, and their CD-player factory in Hasselt, Belgium, and was given more details about this system.
The disadvantage inherent to a conventional multi-bit linear D/A system is these days well-known: errors in the relationship between…
Peter W. Mitchell wrote about MASH DACs in January 1990 (Vol.13 No.1):
In October 1989, Technics flew a dozen North American hi-fi writers, including myself, to Japan for a busy week including seminars about MASH 1-bit digital decoding. The "1-bit" digital decoder, is suddenly appearing everywhere. In recent years, competition among makers of CD players has taken the form of "bit wars," the use of ever-higher numbers of bits to decode the CD. Linear 16-bit decoders led to pseudo–18-bit decoding, then to real 18-bit decoders, and now several companies claim to be providing 20-bit…
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Everything makes a difference. Everything. File that away.
Everything makes a difference. Everything. File that away.
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There are two kinds of good sound: good sound sound and good music sound. While I could describe the distinction in few words or many, it's easier to point to two recordings of Elgar's oratorio The Dream of Gerontius: by Sir Adrian Boult and the New Philharmonia Orchestra, with tenor Nicolai Gedda singing the title role (2 LPs, EMI SLS 987); and by Malcolm Sargent and the Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra, with Heddle Nash in the lead (2 LPs, EMI RLS 709).
I imagine the Boult version, recorded in stereo in…
Finally, in order to keep the Garrard's power cord from fouling against the plinth—possibly transmitting vibrations or, at worst, restricting the movement of the 301's spring-suspended motor—Woodsong supplies a relatively light-gauge, three-conductor wiring harness to go from the turntable's AC terminal block to an IEC socket on the rear edge of the plinth. The installation procedure: Attach harness to turntable; insert turntable in plinth while carefully feeding wires toward an opening on the plinth's rear edge; fish wires through opening and fasten wire lugs to socket contacts; fasten…
The SOtM sMS-1000SQ Windows Edition with AudiophileOptimizer and Roon: Not only does that very long name require finger-twisting shifts between upper and lower case, it really doesn't tell you what the sMS-1000SQ WE is.
Korean manufacturer SOtM, Inc. describes it on their website as a "music server based on Windows Server OS besides the original Linux [Vortexbox] OS based sMS-1000SQ." I'd describe it as a Windows-based PC that's designed and optimized to manage a database of music files and stream the music to local or networked DACs, and that supports multiple options for file…
Sidebar 2: Recordings in the Round
It's been five years since I've had the time and space for this feature. I can't hope to catch up with all that's happened since, but in reviewing surround gear for "Music in the Round" I've used and mentioned the most notable surround recordings as references, and reviewed the recordings themselves in "Records to Die For." When the last installment of "Recordings in the Round" was published, we were still dealing mostly with SACDs and the very first Blu-ray Audio discs. I now prefer to download files, but most surround downloads are also available as…
Sidebar 2: Contact Info
SOtM, 202 (Ssangyong-Dong), 84-9, Wolbong 4-ro, Seobuk-gu, Cheonan-si, Chungcheongnam-do, 31171 Korea. Tel: (82) 41-576-7663. Fax: (82) 41-576-7664. Web: www.sotm-audio.com. US distributor: Simple Design LLC (Sonore). Web: www.sotm.sonore.us.
Highend-AudioPC, Switzerland. Web: www.highend-audiopc.com