"Close to two weeks before the show opens, we have already sold more advance tickets than we did at last year's show," very upbeat show promoter Suave Kajko told Stereophile. This should translate…
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Canada's biggest three-day consumer audio and lots more show, TAVES, is poised to break its former attendance record when it opens in Toronto, Ontario on October 30. Newly reframed as "Canada's Ultimate Consumer Electronics Show," it opens less than a month after Denver's Rocky Mountain Audio Fest, and a mere week before the start of the Westchester County version of the New York Audio Show.
Please don't tell her I said this, but lately, my wife has been getting twitchy about my records. Twitchy as in: She wants me to sell them. Or at least some of them.
I have only myself to blame. For years, I have shared with her my every joy that came of finding, at a lawn sale or garage sale or on eBay or at a record store whose proprietors "had no idea what this thing is worth," some rare and valuable treasure. And therein lay another facet of my problem: As often as I would rejoice at the music I was poised to enjoy, or the sheer pleasure of acquiring something rare and well made, I…
At the same time, let's not become too blasé about our more familiar tubular friends: the 12AX7, the KT88, and the EL34—especially the EL34. That classic pentode tube, introduced in 1954 by Mullard Ltd., has been at the heart of some of my favorite amplifiers, most of which commit the equally counterrevolutionary sin of being push-pull instead of single-ended. How I would hate to wind up in a world in which fondness for push-pull EL34 amplifiers is met with the same scorn as love for Elton John records, some of which are actually pretty good.
Today I'm enjoying a new EL34-based…
I first met electronics engineer John Dawson in 1979, at a British audio show. The company he'd co-founded, A&R Cambridge, had just launched the A60, a slim, elegant-looking, 40Wpc integrated amplifier costing only £99 (then equivalent to $217).
By the time I reviewed the Mk.2 version, in the October 1984 issue of Hi-Fi News & Record Review, the A60's price had risen to £199 ($248), the company was now called Arcam, and more than 22,000 A60s had been sold, making it one of the best-selling amplifiers in England. While preparing that review I had visited Arcam's factory, near the…
Reflection, the first album from British blues band Steamhammer (24/192 ALAC needle drop from LP, English CBS 63611), is a guilty pleasure of mine, considering the album's excessive use of compression and artificial reverb. In my favorite track, "Even the Clock," the threads in the mix—chiming lead guitar, picked rhythm-guitar riff, offstage flute, spring-reverb splashes on the sound of the clock at the beginning, and the suck-and-blow compression effects on the drums, cymbals, and ostinato bass line—were all laid bare by the Arcam P49, but without disturbing the holistic quality of the…
Sidebar 1: Specifications
Description: Solid-state, two-channel power amplifier. Inputs: 1 pair unbalanced (RCA), 1 pair balanced (XLR). Outputs: 2 pairs binding posts, 1 pair preamplifier outputs. Power output: 200Wpc into 8 ohms (23dBW), both channels driven; 400W into 4 ohms (23dBW), one channel driven. Frequency response: 20Hz–20kHz, ±0.05dB. Sensitivity for maximum output: 1.15V, single-ended input; 2.3V, balanced input. Input impedance: 10k ohms. Harmonic distortion: 0.001% (1kHz at 80% power into 8 ohms). Signal/noise: 110dBA ref. 50W into 8 ohms. Maximum power consumption: 1kW.…
Sidebar 2: Associated Equipment
Analog Sources: Linn Sondek LP12 turntable with Lingo power supply, Linn Ekos tonearm, Linn Arkiv B cartridge.
Digital Sources: Antipodes DX Reference music server; Ayre Acoustics C-5xeMP universal player; Apple 2.7GHz i7 Mac mini running OS10.7, Audirvana Plus 1.5.10, iTunes 11, Pure Music 2.0; PS Audio PerfectWave DirectStream D/A converter; dCS Vivaldi digital playback system; AudioQuest JitterBug USB filter; Ayre Acoustics QA-9 USB A/D converter.
Preamplification: Channel D Seta L phono preamplifier.
Power Amplifiers: Parasound Halo JC 1,…
Sidebar 3: Measurements
I performed a full set of measurements on one of the two FMJ P49 samples I was sent (serial no. FPA4901087_14_52), using my Audio Precision SYS2722 system (see the January 2008 "As We See It"). As the P49 is specified as having a maximum power output of 200Wpc into 8 ohms, I preconditioned it before the measurements by running both channels at one-third that power, 67W, with a 1kHz signal into 8 ohms, for one hour. Following that period, the top panel was warm, at 109.8°F (43.3°C), though the vents covering the internal heatsinks were hotter, at 134.1°F (56.8°C).…
One snag brought on by the LP boom is that vinyl pressing plants, of which there are too few, are backed up. While that’s good news for someone like RTI, it’s less thrilling to consumers who typically wait for months after the CD/MP3 release of a new album to hear the vinyl. So it was with great pleasure that I slapped on my recently arrived LP copy of Dave and Phil Alvin’s Lost Time, which was released on September 18. Not surprisingly, given the brothers’ roots rock leanings, the sound here also has a healthy respect for the past. Dave Alvin’s guitar is drenched in reverb throughout, the…
I first saw Benchmark's AHB2 stereo power amplifier at the 2013 Convention of the Audio Engineering Society, in New York City. On silent display in Benchmark's booth on the convention floor, its compact size and comprehensive features made the amp immediately attractive, and the design was described as a departure from traditional analog and digital amplifiers (footnote 1, more on that later). It was also explained to me that the AHB2 was based on designs by Benchmark's founder, Allen H. Burdick (whose initials it bears). By the time of Burdick's retirement, in 2006, Benchmark didn't yet…