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Michael Fremer may be Stereophile's Mr. Analog but he was mightily impressed with the Moon 780D digital processor from Simaudio, which never meets a source of data it can't turn into music. Herb Reichert gets excited by an affordable tube preamp from Rogue, as does Fred Kaplan over an expensive VTL tube preamp; and Art Dudley and John Atkinson get much musical enjoyment from Sony and PSB speakers, respectively. And as well as our regular "Analog Corner," "Listening," "Gramophone Dreams," "Aural Robert," and "Industry Update" columns, Sasha Matson interviews Ayre's Charley Hansen—the "Wizard…
It was 89°outside at 11am on the opening day of Capital Audiofest in Rockville, MD, a day when the high temperatures were predicted to reach the mid-90s—the show continues today and tomorrow. One could be forgiven for asking: why not spend the day at an audio show in a nice, newly renovated, air-conditioned hotel?
Why not, indeed. There are 58 individual exhibits here, representing God-only-knows-how-many different brands: Munich High End it ain't, but then Munich isn't a 25-minute Metro ride from our nation's endearingly dysfunctional capital.
And look! Here it was, a full hour…
I assumed they called this delightful, human-scaled, audio exposition Capital Audiofest because it is held near our Nation's capital in Rockville, MD—but alas, I think I was mistaken. It appears it is because every sleeping, exhibition, or conference room at the Rockville Hilton had a big digitized photo of some Roman Corinthian capitals—every one! Or perhaps that is just some sly, tongue in cheek, ironic illusion to "All roads lead to . . ." But I was not mistaken about the delightful and human-scaled part. Founder and organizer Gary Gill has open arms and a big smile that always makes…
I like the out-of-the-ordinary, possibly because I have been disappointed by the ordinary often enough that I'm not uncomfortable looking elsewhere. So I'll admit up-front that I was predisposed toward enjoying Larsen loudspeakers, from Sweden, which are designed to perform their best, not in an anechoic chamber but in a real room, when positioned up against a real wall. Even that bit of psychological preconditioning didn't prepare me for how impressed I was by the Larsen 8 ($7000/pair), driven by a GamuT Di150 integrated amplifier ($13,990), itself fed by a Pear Audio Blue Kid Howard…
Think hip, young, handsome, and smart—with (maybe) some grease under his fingernails. Besides being one of my favorite loudspeaker manufacturers, Zu Audio's Sean Casey and his daughters restore vintage motorcycles. Sean is also a dancing party guy with a pile of records that follows him around like dust follows Pig Pen. And . . . he's a Left Coast guy that gets to hang with mellow smart dudes like Nelson Pass (Pass Labs).
At CAF Sean was knee deep in vinyl demonstrating his Definition Mk.IV loudspeakers ($12,500/pair in Hickory wood), He was using a beyond-super-cool vintage Luxman PD444…
To hear the system demonstrated by The Voice That Is—Tidal Audio Piano Diacera G2 loudspeakers ($39,990 in midnight black), Tidal Preos-D preamp ($31,190), Tidal Impulse stereo amplifier ($32,290), Bricasti M1se DAC ($10,000), Aurender N10 server ($7999), and Brinkmann Spyder turntable ($12,000) with that company's 10.5 tonearm ($5490) and EMT-ti cartridge ($3990)—was to conclude, on the basis of that experience and previous experiences with systems put together by proprietor Doug White, that the man is utterly incapable of making bad sound. Although I assume it took alot of after-hours,…
At 5pm on a Thursday, some Thursdays ago, Robert Baird and I embarked on a post-work record hunt in Brooklyn. More specifically, we explored Williamsburg, otherwise referred to as "Hipster Land" (footnote 1). Aside from being an all-round neat neighborhood, Williamsburg is also home to quite a few record shops. This trip, we decided to keep our stops to a minimum and focus on two of our favorites: Rough Trade (64 N 9th Street, Brooklyn, NY 11249) and Earwax Records (167 N 9th Street, Brooklyn, NY 11211).
First stop: Rough Trade
Rough Trade is an all-in-one, two-floor kingdom of…
Every good show has a vibe, and the vibe at Capital Audiofest owes a lot to the region's very spirited DIY community. Put it this way: If Capital Audiofest were a music club, open-mic night would draw some of its biggest crowds.
So it was at CAF2016, where the DC-DIY room (visit www.DCAudioDIY.com) was perpetually crowded—and perpetually energized by some of the most remarkable gear I've seen and heard. During one visit, a pair of GM70-powered, 20W single-ended monoblocks designed and built by David McGown drove speakers built by Stuart Polanski using GR Research mid-woofers and Fountek…
Stax Kogyo, a small audio company by Japanese standards, has been for the past 15 years steadfastly refining and redefining the electrostatic headphone. The SR-Lambda Pro is their current flagship model, and at a 1984 US list price of $780 it also represents a very substantial investment in headphone technology.
The SRM-1/MK2 drive unit supplies the necessary polarizing voltage for the phones and is also a low-powered class-A transistor amplifier that can simultaneously drive two sets of Pros or other Stax headphones. The SR-Lambda is available in two versions, the more costly being the…
Sidebar 1: Headphone Frequency Response
There is a fundamental difference between headphone listening and any other listening experience. With headphones, whether of the on-the-ear or around-the-ear type (that's what the "circumaural" in the specs means), the auditory canal is more or less on the axis of the headphone's diaphragm. In all other listening, much of the sound enters the ear only after reflecting off the pinna (ear lobe) and head. This factor alone drastically affects the frequency response perceived by the ear/brain.
John R. Sank, in a paper in the April 1980 Journal…