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VPI Industries Classic Direct turntable with JMW 3D 12" tonearm ($30,000; reviewed by Michael Fremer, May & June 2014, Vol.37 Nos. 5 & 6 Review and Review)

The analog source remains nearly as vital as ever: a product category that continues to attract both new design talent and the efforts of industry veterans. Our 2014 choice for Analog Source Component of the Year—the Classic Direct Turntable with JMW Memorial 3D-printed 12" tonearm—comes from the latter group: manufacturer VPI Industries has toiled in the vinyl vineyards for 36 years. (We…

MSB Technology Analog DAC D/A processor ($6995; reviewed by Jon Iverson, April 2014, Vol.37 No.4 Review)

PS Audio PerfectWave DirectStream D/A processor ($5995; reviewed by Art Dudley, September 2014, Vol.37 No.9 Review)

Sony HAP-Z1ES media player ($1999.99; reviewed by Kalman Rubinson, May 2014, Vol.37 No.5 Review)

No hanging chads for us: The voting for this year's Digital Component of the Year was sufficiently close that we declared a three-way tie. Our winners are two D/A processors and a media player. In what may or may…

Audeze LCD-X headphones ($1699; reviewed by John Atkinson, March 2014, Vol.37 No.3 Review)

Once we've dispensed with source components, amplification components, and loudspeakers, virtually anything else that gets put into—or under, or onto—our music systems can qualify as an accessory. Thus, one supposes that a few readers will be let down that the voting for our 2014 Accessory of the Year reflected a conservative turn of mind, with nary a quantum-field generator, plastic demagnetizer, or capacitor ointment in sight. Indeed, fully three of our seven…

NAD D 3020 integrated amplifier ($499; reviewed by Stephen Mejias, November & December 2013, Vol.36 Nos.11 & 12 Review)

Here's the least surprising surprise of this year's balloting: NAD's D 3020 integrated amplifier coasted to an easy win for Budget Component of 2014. Hell, even I saw that coming.

The D 3020, designed to commemorate NAD's 40th anniversary, was named in honor of the company's classic 3020 integrated amp of the 1970s and onward. Both products were designed by the estimable Bjørn Erik Edvardsen, but this time he…

Vivid Audio Giya G3 loudspeaker

Some years, we see a number of products that take first place in more than one category. This year, there's only one, and it's also our joint Loudspeaker of the Year: the Vivid Audio Giya G3. The G3 did more than merely earn JA's respect: it gave him immense enjoyment, and effectively doubled the field of contenders for the coveted title of John Atkinson's Retirement Loudspeaker (the other being the jointly anointed Wilson Alexia).

Notes on the vote: The results of this contest are especially interesting…

ATC Loudspeaker Technology SCM19 loudspeaker ($4299/pair)
"In addition to the musical and technical virtues of a competently executed sealed-box design, ATC's SCM19 two-way monitor (reviewed in June 2014, Vol.37 No.6) is big enough to make a major sonic impact in most listening rooms of reasonable size, and small enough not to trip over its own feet. Low distortion, zero fatigue, great looks, fair price. WNTL?"—John Marks

Audeze LCD-X headphones ($1699), VPI Industries Classic Direct turntable ($30,000), DeVore Fidelity Orangutan O/93…

Steve Guttenberg kicks off the issue by explaining why he prefers recorded music to live concerts, while A-list mastering engineer Bob Katz explains why Steve 's analysis of the sound of modern recordings in his November 2014 "As We See It" was misguided, if not…

Smoke Sessions released nine CDs and one…

Shuggie, born Johnny Veliotes, is of course, the guitar virtuoso son of the great R&B bandleader Johnny Otis,…

In almost 40 years of attending audio press events, only rarely have I come away feeling that I was present at the birth of a new world. In March 1979, I visited the Philips Research Center in Eindhoven, Holland and heard a prototype of what was to be later called the Compact Disc. In the summer of 1982, I visited Ron Genereux and Bob Berkovitz at Acoustic Research's lab near Boston and heard a very early example of the application of DSP to the…