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The Monitor Audio Gold 100 6G was measured in a large conference room—11'11" H × 25'3" L × 15'8" W—on a PT&D MDT turntable. I used the Listen SoundCheck 24 audio-test software; a GRAS 40BD ¼" microphone and a 26CB preamp, with a Listen SCM-2 ¼" measurement microphone and a seven-microphone array at 5° vertical increments; a Listen AmpConnect 621 audio interface and amplifier; and a B&K Type 5434-B-001 accelerometer. The system was calibrated with a B&K 4231 acoustic calibrator at an…

Audio Video Show 2026, the 28th edition of the hi-fi show in Warsaw, will open in just a few hours, on Friday, October 23, at noon local time. Said to be the second largest audio show in the world (trailing only High End Vienna), the three-day event is expected to attract a huge number of visitors from all over Europe and beyond.

The lobby and conference areas of the Radisson Blu Sobieski—which, on the day before the show begins, are virtually empty—will soon be packed with queued-up visitors and exhibitors. Featuring “devices and systems from 100 PLN to 2 million PLN!” (PLN…

Analog sources: Rega P10 turntable with RB3000 tonearm and Apheta 3 moving coil cartridge. Rega AOS phono stage.
Digital sources: Grimm MU2. Eversolo A10. Aurender A20. 15" MacBook Air M4 running Roon 2.0.
Preamplifier: PS Audio PMG Signature.
Power amplifier: McIntosh MC462.
Integrated amplifiers: T+A Symphonia streaming. PrimaLuna EVO 400 Integrated tube.
Loudspeakers: Estelon X Diamond Mk II. Focal Scala Utopia Evo.
Cables: Digital: AudioQuest Vodka Ethernet. Interconnect: AudioQuest Black Beauty RCA and XLR. Speaker: AudioQuest…

Other than for archiving and iPod use, is there any good reason to digitize vinyl playback? Pure Vinyl's Rob Robinson thinks so. His software offers RIAA and dozens of digital-domain equalization curves that he claims are inherently superior to any analog-domain filtering. Once recorded "flat," the high-resolution files can be conveniently played back using any curve (even, sometimes, the correct one!).

Yes, there are almost daily program updates, and viruses, corruption, program crashes, and hard-drive failures can wipe out your entire music collection…

As if that wasn't enough stability, consider that the company's first commercial product, the Sondek LP12 turntable, has continued through many iterations to the present day. It is so well known in hi-fi that people simply call it…

Digital playback is simpler than vinyl if your goal is to play music from a single source, like a streaming service. However, most audiophiles have local sources, too, often more than one (local files, NAS, ...) and often more…

In 1938, American composer Roy Harris wrote a composition he called American Symphony, for trombonist Tommy Dorsey and his band. Jim Pugh, also a trombonist, made it his business to locate the work. He found it, or part of it, at the Library of Congress, and recorded two movements at a 1995 session engineered by longtime friend Jim Anderson. An all-star group of New…

To say that these two musicians are at the top of the current jazz world is an understatement. In the important jazz critics' polls, Ambrose Akinmusire is consistently No.1 trumpet and Mary Halvorson is No.1 guitar. Their first album together is a singular, challenging listening experience. The first track, "Prelude in the Ash," is…

Earlier this year, I wrote two articles on record cleaning, in particular the ultrasonic kind (footnote 1). Some of the ideas I expressed were good and correct, like the choice of surfactant (Tergitol 15-S-9). Others, like the amount of Tergitol to use, were less well-considered. I put too…