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It's rare to find a truly new speaker technology, so I couldn't help but be intrigued by the Airfoil's Bending Wave Drivers. I asked designer Paul Paddock how they work.

"They fall into the class of devices called 'Traveling Wave' drivers. Basically, you're setting up a shock wave with a linear voice-coil along one edge of the diaphragm, that ripples through the membrane."

"So you're setting up a longitudinal wave in the membrane, and as it propagates along the membrane, transverse waves are given off and create…

Description: Five-piece, three-way, loudspeaker system with powered subwoofers. Drive-units and configurations, per channel: Main unit: 9 Airfoil Bending Wave Drivers stacked vertically in line-source array, two 6.5" polymer-cone Coupling Woofers in sealed enclosure at base of line-source tower. Subwoofer: two 12" doped paper-cone woofers in Balanced Force Compression Design (back to back) in freestanding cabinet. Passive crossover, coupling woofers to towers: 170Hz passive first-order, two-way series network. Active crossover, subwoofers to main units: 80Hz low…

Analog source: VPI TNT Mk.V-HR turntable, Grado Signature Reference cartridge.
Digital sources: Simaudio Moon Eclipse, Wadia 861 CD players.
Preamplifier: VAC CPA1 Mk.III.
Power amplifiers: VAC Renaissance 70/70, VTL Ichiban, Mark Levinson No.20.6, Classé CAM-350.
Cables: Interconnect: Nirvana S-X Ltd. Speaker: Nordost Valhalla. AC: Synergistic Research and Reference Master Couplers, AudioPrism.
Accessories: MIT Z-System, Z-Center and Nirvana AC systems, AudioPrism Noise Sniffer AC analyzer and Quietline filters; VPI 16.5 record-cleaner,…

Given the Airfoil 5.2 system's bulk, it made sense to take advantage of a road trip I was making through the Southwest last fall to measure the speaker in Brian Damkroger's Albuquerque listening room. The advantage of this was that I could actually get a handle on the speaker's in-room behavior, which its unusual design made imperative. The disadvantage was that I couldn't take all the measurements that I usually do in my Brooklyn test lab. (Because of my need to keep my traveling rig as portable as possible, I used the Mitey Mike II from Joe D'Appolito rather…

Bold in sound and sensibility, this live-wire recording matches two Romantic chamber works related in spirit in performances by two young soloists related by blood. In their early 20s, the frères Capuçon are a pair of highly touted string players; most notably, the Frenchmen are championed by Martha…

It was a flight attendant. "You're annoying the other passengers," she said, "Your stereo is way too loud."

I was embarrassed, of course. I was also…

The Denon CD player, on the other hand, has a surprisingly good headphone output, capable of driving Sennheiser '580s to moderately high levels without…

Description: Battery or AC-powered portable headphone amplifier available in three versions: Standard, Premium, Supreme. Number of inputs: one pair, on RCA jacks. Number of outputs: one ¼" stereo headphone jack. Controls: On/Off, Volume, Process On/Bypass, Filter On/Bypass (Supreme only). Input impedance: >50k ohms. Rated input: 0dBU (775mV) Standard; 4dBU (1.24V) Premium & Supreme. Rated output: 22mW into 100 ohms, Standard; 60mW into 100 ohms, Premium & Supreme. Maximum output (0.02% THD at 1kHz): 400mW into 100 ohms (equivalent to 6.32V RMS). THD:…

The HeadRoom amplifier was non-inverting for all control settings, and its input impedance was a little lower than specification at 21k ohms at 1kHz (footnote 1). Channel separation in Bypass mode was better than 70dB at low frequencies, worsening to 37.5dB at 20kHz due to capacitive coupling between the channels, probably between the parallel pcb tracks carrying the signals to the volume control. The HeadRoom's background noise was a little higher than I expected, its S/N ratio measuring about 62dB (unweighted, 22Hz-22kHz, ref. 1V). (An earlier sample of the…