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Schiit Audio Yggdrasil D/A processor The Analog 2 upgrade

Herb Reichert, September 2018 (Vol.41 No.9):

My first CD player was a portable: a Sony Walkman. My second CD player was a sturdy black TEAC VRDS 7, which I quickly relegated to transport-only duties serving one or another DACs from Audio Note. From the start, I enjoyed playing CDs. But compared to LPs, digital sounded deficient in contrast and conspicuously artificial, in a plastic-bottles-in-the-ocean kind of way. It felt distant and mechanical. Nonetheless, my brain readily adapted to its shortcomings.

After the TEAC, I switched to a C.E.C. TL2 belt-drive CD transport, which I…

English Song in All its Richness

From John McCormack, Kathleen Ferrier, and Dame Janet Baker through today's Bryn Terfel, Alice Coote, and Roderick Williams, some of our greatest English and Irish singers have become indelibly associated with the art of English song. To that exalted list we must now add mezzo-soprano Dame Sarah Connolly, whose recent recording of 120 years of English song from the Royal College of Music, Come to Me in My Dreams (Chandos 10944), with the superb pianist Joseph Middleton, is so deeply felt and gorgeously voiced that it earns a 5-star recommendation.

The history of English song extends back…

Bonus Recordings of September 2018 Bruckner & Wagner: Orchestral Works

Bruckner & Wagner
Andris Nelsons, Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra
Bruckner: Symphony 4. Wagner: Lohengrin Prelude
Deutsche Grammophon 479 7577 (CD). TT: 79:24
Bruckner: Symphony 7. Wagner: Siegfried's Funeral March
Deutsche Grammophon 479 8494 (CD). TT: 76:48
Both: Everett Porter, prod., eng.; Lauran Jurrius, eng.; Polyhymnia International, mastering. DDD.
Performance ****½
Sonics ****½

In works as vast and challenging as the symphonies of Anton Bruckner, near perfection of interpretation and execution can come in different, even opposed forms. The slow…

Listening #189: Luxman MQ-88uSE

For this month's column, I did something I've occasionally set out to do but never quite managed: I lived with a new power amplifier for nearly two months, used it to enjoy a variety of records, made scads of listening notes, and wrote most of the subjective portion of my review—all without knowing what was inside it.

From the time the Luxman MQ-88uSE arrived at my house until I sat down to write these opening paragraphs, I knew only the following: It uses tubes for voltage and current gain—the latter accomplished with two KT88 pentodes per channel—but not for power-supply rectification…

Listening #189: Luxman MQ-88uSE Page 2

Take, for example, the opening measures of the 1961 recording of Strauss's Death and Transfiguration by Otto Klemperer and the Philharmonia Orchestra (LP, UK Columbia SAX 2437). When I play this exceptional record through my reference Shindo amp, the "heartbeat" gently played on the kettledrum (footnote 5) is taut, the contrabassoon ominous but not outsize, and the solo flute nothing less than amazing: big, meaty, and convincingly present, its sound coming from a space physically higher than the other woodwinds (the result of a spot mike, perhaps?). Later in the piece, the agitato section…

Remembering Record Producer James Mallinson

James Mallinson confers with Sir Georg Solti during playbacks for Mahler's Symphony No.3 in Chicago's Orchestra Hall in November 1982, from the CSO Archives

Legendary British record producer James Mallinson, whose close to five decades of work with Decca/London, Telarc, and the labels of the major orchestras in London, Chicago and St. Petersburg, died unexpectedly on Friday night, August 24. He leaves behind, in addition to his beloved wife and son, an estimable recorded legacy that earned him no less than 16 Grammy Awards and 49 Grammy nominations.

John Atkinson remembers…

Esoteric N-01 network audio player

Ever since the Tokyo Electro Acoustic Company (TEAC) founded its Esoteric division, in 1987, Esoteric's slogan has been "state of the art." Given Esoteric's impressive displays at audio shows, which reflect a consistency of ownership, staff, and philosophy of engineering, design, and manufacturing, I have longed to evaluate one of their hand-assembled models in my reference system. Any brand named Esoteric, and whose top line of products is named Grandioso, had better make superior products.

I've been especially curious about the color and tint of Esoteric's house sound, which to this…

Esoteric N-01 network audio player Page 2

The freezing issue seemed to involve miscommunication between the USB sticks and Sound Stream. (The playback of files stored on hard drives worked just fine.) Sometimes the app would show that a file was playing, and my USB stick's status light would blink to confirm that it was being played—but the N-01 produced no sound, and wouldn't respond to presses of its Power button. Only after I'd quit the app, unplugged and plugged in the power cord, let the N-01 reboot, breathed deeply, and started from scratch could I hear music again. My dogs learned to put their paws over their ears to avoid…

Esoteric N-01 network audio player Page 3

With the jazz track at 2Fs, I noticed that the initial patter of fingers on drums and the trumpet sounded drier than without upsampling. The leading edges of notes from the horn, and the most percussive piano notes, were softened and rounded. The Rachmaninoff sounded significantly drier, flatter, and less colorful, and the bass was less profound.

Oversampling at 4Fs added air around instruments and a heightened sense of acoustic space, but the sound was, if anything, more flat and flabby than before. The 8Fs rate surprised me: both tracks sounded "wetter" and airier, with more…

Esoteric N-01 network audio player Specifications

Sidebar 1: Specifications

Description: Network media server-player with integrated digital-to-analog converter. Formats supported: DSF, DSDIFF (DIFF), DoP, FLAC, Apple Lossless (ALAC), WAV, AIFF, MP3, AAC (M4A container). Roon-certified. No internal storage. Resolutions supported: PCM to 32-bit/768kHz, MQA, DSD to 22.5MHz (USB port only); otherwise, PCM to 24/192, MQA, DSD to 2.8MHz via DoP. Inputs: XLR, RCA, optical, USB Type A (front, rear), USB Type B, Ethernet, BNC clock (44.1kHz–24.576MHz). Analog outputs: balanced (XLR), single-ended (RCA), Input impedance: 50 ohms. Frequency…