search

I measured the Heed Audio Quasar phono preamplifier using my Audio Precision SYS2722 system (see the January 2008 "As We See It"). As always with phono stages, I experimented with the grounding between the preamp and the Audio Precision system to get the lowest level of noise. I ended up floating the Audio Precision's outputs from ground and connecting the Quasar's grounding post to the analyzer ground.

The Quasar preserved absolute polarity with both moving-coil and moving-magnet settings and inputs, and from both its High and Low outputs. There are…

Here’s our second (of three) video show reports from the New York Audio Show that took place earlier this month at Manhattan’s Park Lane Hotel.

After monitoring the feedback on our first video report, I realized that I should have been clearer about the footage in the room. For those of you who were concerned about the placement of the microphones from the different types of footage of Herb listening, please understand that it’s difficult for us to…

John Atkinson, too, is a hard man, at least when it comes to audio gear. When, in January 2014, he reviewed the Pass Laboratories XA60.5…

Description: Class-A, solid-state, monoblock power amplifier. Inputs: 1 unbalanced (RCA), 1 balanced (XLR). Outputs: 2 pairs, can accommodate spades or bananas. Power output: 60W into 8 ohms (17.8dBW), 120W into 4 ohms (17.8dBW). Frequency range: 1.5Hz–100kHz. Voltage gain: 26dB. Input sensitivity: 2.83V RMS output for 150mV input. Input impedance: 100k ohms balanced, 50k ohms unbalanced. Output impedance: not specified. Signal/noise: >85dB, ref. level 2.83V RMS. Power consumption: 375W. Trigger input, 12V DC (RCA).
Dimensions: 19" (480mm) W by 7.5" (…

Analog Sources: Thorens TD 124 turntable (reconditioned by Schopper AG); Ortofon RMG-212 (rebuilt), Thomas Schick 12" tonearms; Ortofon 90th Anniversary SPU cartridge.
Digital Sources: MacBook Pro computer (early 2015); Roon Optimized Core Kit running on Intel NUC computer with SSD drive; Benchmark DAC 1, Meridian Explorer2 USB, Mytek HiFi Brooklyn, PS Audio DirectStream DACs.
Preamplification: Auditorium 23 Standard step-up transformer, EAR 834P phono stage.
Power Amplifiers: Benchmark AHB-2 bridged for use as monoblocks), PS Audio BHK…

Before performing any measurements, I ran one Pass Labs XA60.8 (serial no. 28984) for an hour at one-third its specified maximum power of 60W into 8 ohms—thermally, the worst case for an amplifier with a class-B or -AB output stage. By the end of the hour, the top panel was warm, at 96.4°F (35.8°C), and the side-mounted heatsinks were a little hotter, at 109.1°F (42.8°C). (Temperatures were measured with a Mastercool infrared thermometer.) The XA60.8 ran a little cooler than the XA60.5 I reviewed in January 2014, probably due to its larger heatsinks.

I…

In the first room hosted by Adirondack Audio & Video: a D-08u SACD Player ($14,995), PD-171A belt-drive turntable ($6,995), Ortofon Cadenza Blue cartridge ($2039), EQ-500 vacuum-tube phono EQ ($6495), C-900u control preamplifier ($14,…

I've been following Schneider closely since the mid-1990s, when she and the band played every Monday night at Visiones, a small, now-defunct club in Greenwich Village. The door fees gave her enough to pay each band member $25 and herself $15, the cost of cab fare to and from her apartment on the Upper West Side. Several years passed before bookers and producers came in for a listen…

Come back, baby. You'll find a million poems deep in your destitute soul.—Richard Hugo, "Second Chances"

The poet Richard Hugo (1923–1982) was known by his students for suggesting that every poem has two subjects: the thing that triggered the writing of the poem in the first place—the writer's Grecian Urn, if you will—and, beyond that, whatever eventually becomes the finished poem's actual subject. Hugo observed that the latter often isn't known to the writer when he or she begins work, but reveals itself over…