To get these overgrown bookends to stand up, you slide little black boards into the slots in their bottoms. Each board is held in…
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When I saw the Unity Audio Signature 3 speakers ($1895/pair) arrive in one box, I was happy. Not just because it meant there would be that much more space left in my basement. No, because it means that Unity is saving money on packaging costs. That means they can spend more money on things like super-nice crossover components. That means...well, I think you know what that means. After all, any piece of audio gear is only as good as the parts it's made from.
The midrange was slightly low in level. It was on the first pair also, but on these it seemed to be slightly more so. This suckout is not serious; it just showed up because the speakers are so smooth in most other respects. Of the many wonderful tracks on Dorian's Sampler II, one taken from J.S. Bach's Cantata BWV63 (DOR-90113), is the real torture test for components in my system. The amazingly rich presentation of all the different instruments, as well as the enveloping feel of the different halls on all the tracks, led me to use this disc as a reference. But if there's anything I know…
Sidebar 1: Review System
The CD player used for my debut Stereophile review was a Kinergetics KCD-20B that I've modified somewhat. Recently, I've been using the best preamp in the world: no preamp at all. What? I don't listen to vinyl? I must not be a real audiophile. The power amplifiers currently in my system are Nelson Pass–designed 15W single-ended "Zen" monoblocks (footnote 1). They have just one large MOSFET in the signal path, and I have to tell you they sound wonderful because I built them.
Other power amps ready for active duty were an NAD 2100X, a Michael Yee Audio PA-…
Sidebar 2: Measurements
Other than impedance, all acoustic measurements were made with the DRA Labs MLSSA system and a calibrated B&K/DPA 4006 microphone. To minimize reflections from the test setup, the measuring microphone is flush-mounted inside the end of a long tube. Reflections of the speaker's sound from the mike-stand hardware will be sufficiently delayed not to affect the measurement.
The Unity Audio's sensitivity was about average at a calculated 86dB/2.83V/m. As stated by Kathy Grost, the Unity Signature 3 does have a flat impedance with frequency, as can be seen…
Sidebar 3: Specifications
Description: Two-way, three-driver, sealed-box, floorstanding loudspeaker. Drive-units: two 6.5" polypropylene-cone woofers, one front-firing, one rear; one 1" cermaic-coated silk-dome tweeter. Frequency response: 39Hz–20kHz, ±2dB. Sensitivity: 86dB/W/m. Nominal impedance: 5 ohms. Maximum power handling: 300W.
Dimensions: 9.25" W by 4" D by 38" H. Weight: 33 lbs.
Standard finishes: walnut, black oak. Special finishes, $250 extra: piano black, curly or birdseye maple, rosewood, two-tone mixes.
Serial numbers of units reviewed: CA002196/97, first pair;…
All photographs by Lily Szabo Photography and used with permission
Thursday February 13 was a day most of us in New York would have preferred to stay indoors. With 10” of snow falling since the night before, the Stereophile office closed, the roads in my neighborhood impassable, and public transport iffy at best, I really didn’t want to make the trek into Manhattan. But I did and was glad to have done so. English loudspeaker manufacturer KEF, represented by a team led by the company's brand ambassador Johan Coorg (above right), was promoting a unique event for the press at MSR Studios on…
Keith Jarrett: Concerts: Bregenz München
Keith Jarrett, piano
ECM 1227–29 (3 CDs; also available as 24/96 files from HDTracks). 1982/2013. Manfred Eicher, prod.; Martin Wieland, eng. ADD. TT: 2:30:19
Performance *****
Sonics ****½
Keith Jarrett, piano
ECM 1227–29 (3 CDs; also available as 24/96 files from HDTracks). 1982/2013. Manfred Eicher, prod.; Martin Wieland, eng. ADD. TT: 2:30:19
Performance *****
Sonics ****½
Keith Jarrett's gift for brilliant invention is apparently inexhaustible throughout both of these concerts, recorded five days apart in spring 1981. The combinations of lyricism, literally foot-stomping gospel, chordings and voicings alternately sumptuously lush and astringently lean, and unexpected musical destinations reached in surprising ways…
Way back when, I met this maenad woman at Caffe Reggio in Greenwich Village and told her I was an artist. She told me she was an art collector and invited me to her loft to see her collection. While she was showing me an impressive assortment of African and contemporary art, she was dropping names: William Burroughs, Bob Marley, John Cage, etc. Hmmm . . . really? I spoke up. "Oh, I love John Cage. What was he like?"
She told me that Cage picked her up one day to go to an art party in the Hamptons. When they arrived, he said he needed her help putting batteries in a box full of transistor…
I well remember my first "real" headphones: a pair of Koss Pro4AAs that I bought back in 1970. The Kosses were relatively expensive, but, like headphones today, they allowed an audiophile with limited cash to get a taste of high-end sound that was not possible with a speaker-based system. I bought the Pro4AAs because I had become fascinated with how the images of the instruments and singers were strung along a line between my ears inside my head. It seemed so much more intimate—a more direct connection with the music—than playback through loudspeakers.
And in those early days of recording…
A track I played during my 2013 presentations at audio shows and audiophile-society meetings was Eriks Esenvalds' O Salutaris Hostia, from the album A Drop in the Ocean, by the Portland State Chamber Choir conducted by Ethan Sperry (16-bit/44.1kHz master file for CD, PDK-C-01). I had mastered this CD for Stereophile's Erick Lichte, who had both edited the recording and produced some of the sessions. Massed voices are very difficult for audio systems to reproduce, because the spectrally rich content is sensitive to intermodulation distortion. This can be particularly problematic with…