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Polk Legend L100 loudspeaker

Summer!

COVID-19 notwithstanding, summer—warmth, flowers, leaves on trees—has descended on Greenwich Village, my New York City home for the past 30 years. What hasn't descended are tourists, belching motorcycles, behemoth sports cars, beer drinkers, and the usual summer hell-raisers, the sort that would've sent legendary Village bohemians Kerouac, Ginsberg, and Burroughs running back to their cold-water flats.

With these absences comes something unique to my downtown experience: peace and quiet. As I write this, in early June, the streets are mostly empty, birdsong seems…

Polk Legend L100 loudspeaker Page 2

The specifications indicate that the L100 need power to sing. In this, the specifications are correct—but I found that the connection between amplifier power and musical satisfaction wasn't linear. My workhorse Heed Audio Elixir integrated amplifier ($1195, 50W into 8 ohms, 65W into 4 ohms) proved insufficient; with the Heed, the L100s sounded soft and lacked dynamics. The bass was better with the Schiit Audio Ragnarok II (60Wpc into 8 ohms, 100Wpc into 4 ohms, $1799), but the L100s still seemed underdriven.

Polk and Mytek
Paydirt came in the form of the Mytek Brooklyn AMP+ (250Wpc…

Polk Legend L100 loudspeaker Specifications

Sidebar 1: Specifications

Description: Two-way, ported, standmount loudspeaker. Drive units: 1" (25.4mm) "Pinnacle Ring Radiator" tweeter, 5.25" (133cm) polypropylene-cone mid/woofer. Crossover frequency: 2.9kHz. Frequency range: 43Hz– 50kHz. Nominal impedance: 3–4 ohms. Minimum impedance: Not specified. Sensitivity: 85.5dB/W/m. Recommended amplifier power: 70Wpc. Minimum recommended power: 30W. Peak power: 160Wpc.
Dimensions: 13.64" (346.5mm) H × 7.78" (197.6mm) W × 11.29" (286.8mm) D. Weight: 16.9lb (7.67kg).
Finish: Piano black, brown walnut, medium oak.
Serial numbers of…

Polk Legend L100 loudspeaker Associated Equipment

Sidebar 2: Associated Equipment

Analog sources: Kuzma Stabi R turntable & Kuzma 4Point 11" tonearm; Hana ML MC phono cartridge.
Preamplification: Mytek Brooklyn DAC+, Tavish Audio Design Adagio. Power amplifier: Mytek Brooklyn AMP+.
Integrated amplifiers: Cary SLI-80HS, Schiit Audio Ragnarok II, Heed Audio Elixir.
Loudspeakers: Quad S2, Spendor BC1.
Cables: Interconnect: Shindo Laboratory, Triode Wire Labs Spirit II. Speaker: Auditorium 23. AC: Triode Wire Labs Obsession NCF power cord, manufacturers' own.
Accessories: Kuzma PLATIS 65 isolation platform, IsoTek…

Polk Legend L100 loudspeaker Measurements

Sidebar 3: Measurements

I used DRA Labs' MLSSA system and a calibrated DPA 4006 microphone to measure the Polk Legend L100's frequency response in the farfield, and an Earthworks QTC-40 mike for the nearfield responses.

Polk specifies the L100's sensitivity as 85.5dB/2.83V/m; my estimate was actually a little higher, at 87dB(B)/2.83V/m. The L100's impedance is specified in the manual as 4 ohms, with a minimum magnitude of 3 ohms, though on Polk's website it is specified as 3–4 ohms. The solid trace in fig.1 shows that the impedance magnitude remains above 4 ohms from the bass…

Analog Corner #294: TechDAS Air Force One Premium turntable & Graham Engineering Elite tonearm

In 2013, when I first wrote about it (footnote 1), the TechDAS Air Force One ($105,000) was that company's best and most expensive turntable; it joined the handful of products that have earned an A+ in our semiannual Recommended Components feature—a rating that remained in place for six years. But too much time has passed since the Air Force One was auditioned by a Stereophile writer, so it has now fallen from that list.

The Air Force One is still available, but it's now a special-order product that, according to distributor Graham Engineering, can take up to six months to deliver. So…

Analog Corner #294: TechDAS Air Force One Premium turntable & Graham Engineering Elite tonearm Page 2

I found that one end of the acceptable belt tension range produced greater absolute speed variation measurements but impressively flat and stable high-pass–filtered results (smooth green line), while at the other end, there were smaller absolute speed variations but greater filtered speed undulations.

Crisply executed commands
For this kind of money, you should expect your playback wishes to be obeyed. The Air Force One Premium does not disappoint. Once set up, it remains set up. It's physically quiet (including the pumps), responsive, and neither finicky nor tweaky. The…

Analog Corner #294: TechDAS Air Force One Premium turntable & Graham Engineering Elite tonearm In Heavy Rotation

Sidebar: In Heavy Rotation

Ali Akbar Khan: Music of India: Morning and Evening Ragas (Connoisseur CS 1766)

Band of Horses: Acoustic at the Ryman (Brown Records BRWN003)

Clark Terry and His Orchestra: With Paul Gonsalves (SAM/French Decca 153924)

California Audio Labs Tercet Mk.III CD player

At $1295, the Tercet Mk.III represents a step up from CAL's $750 Icon, which I enthusiastically recommended back in April 1990 (Vol.13 No 4, footnote 1). Externally, with the exception of a wider and slightly thicker front panel, it appears to be a carbon copy of that unit. Like the other products in California Audio Lab's stable, the Tercet Mk.III is designed from the ground up in-house. It is totally solid-state, and, like the Icon, uses the same linear-drive, glass-optics, single-laser transport and noisy loading drawer (equally loud but lower in pitch than the Luxman D-105u CD player…

California Audio Labs Tercet Mk.III CD player Page 2

Blandine Verlet's Hans Ruckers II harpsichord (track 7) never sounded better. The tonal balance was excellent, with no register calling attention to itself. The resonating capacity of the instrument is fully explored in this fiery performance, and the sound did not disappoint. Listening closely, I sensed the entire instrument vibrating from the floor up. Inner harmonics, hanging on their own cushions of air and well-separated from the fundamentals, were captured exquisitely, lending an often-missed depth to the music. The strings "buzzed" as they should (which, in this music, is most of the…