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If the devil is in the details, then Beelzebub has taken up residence in the collections of cables we use to connect our components. Reviewing the stuff is tough enough, but things are even more difficult for the average audiophile: Inevitably, the wire that sounds fabulous in the store or in your friend's system doesn't work worth a hoot in your own system, and you're left where you began. Equally inevitably, the wire that does work best carries a price more often seen in Tiffany's or Harry Winston. It's enough to drive a hi-fi nut to drink. So relax, pour yourself a nice glass of wine, and…
Cable sounds
The result of all this effort was well worth it. The SRII's sound was a near-ideal balance of superb low-level resolution, harmonic richness, speed, and dynamics. Bass was firm, deep, and defined, the midrange open, silky, and richly detailed. The top end was an especial strength, providing exceptional extension, scads of detail, and absolutely no etch or grain. Dynamics were subtle or explosive—whatever the music demanded was readily available.
The result of all this effort was well worth it. The SRII's sound was a near-ideal balance of superb low-level resolution, harmonic richness, speed, and dynamics. Bass was firm, deep, and defined, the midrange open, silky, and richly detailed. The top end was an especial strength, providing exceptional extension, scads of detail, and absolutely no etch or grain. Dynamics were subtle or explosive—whatever the music demanded was readily available.
Lee's pursuit of quiet has reaped rich rewards—the SRII gave me profound silence between instrumental spaces, worked equally…
Sidebar 1: Specifications
Silver Reference II interconnect: 7N Zero Crystal Silver, 1.0m: $948 (RCA), $998 (XLR); $500/m for longer cables, 15% off for 0.5m.
Satori Shotgun loudspeaker cable: 7 AWG total, 6N Zero Crystal Copper, $1188/8' pair; $100/ft extra for longer length, less $50/ft for shorter lengths.
Gargantua II AC cord: AWG, 6N Zero Crystal Copper + Silver, 6.0', $1488; $160/ft for longer cord, less $80/ft for shorter cord.
Approximate number of dealers: 51.
Manufacturer: Acoustic Zen Technologies, 800 Los Vallecitos Blvd., Suite P, San Marcos, CA 92069. Tel: (760)…
Sidebar2: Associated Equipment
Analog sources: SOTA Cosmos turntable, Graham 2.2 tonearm, Dynavector XV-1 cartridge; Clearaudio Champion II turntable, Unify tonearm, Benz L2 cartridge.
Digital sources: Classé Omega SACD/CD player, Ayre D-1x CD/DVD-V player.
Preamplification: Manley Labs Steelhead and Boulder 2008 phono stages; Jeff Rowland Design Group Synergy IIi line stage; Ayre K-1x, Atma-Sphere MP-3 full-function preamplifiers.
Power amplifiers: Halcro dm58, Lamm M2.1, Manley Labs 250 Neo-Classic monoblocks.
Loudspeakers: EgglestonWorks Andra II, Calix Phoenix Grand…
Editor's Note: In 1954, a New York writer and teacher reinvented the world of audio with the modest-looking Acoustic Research AR-1 loudspeaker. A small fraction of the size of the behemoths that were then de rigeur for the reproduction of bass frequencies, Edgar Villchur's loudspeaker went as low with less distortion. Perhaps more importantly, the AR-1 pioneered both the science of speaker design and the idea that a low-frequency drive-unit could not be successfully engineered without the properties of the enclosure being taken into account.
To celebrate the fiftieth anniversary of…
Lander: Some years after the acoustic-suspension woofer, you designed the first dome tweeter. You've said it was initially intended for the AR-1, because the driver made for you wasn't up to the quality of the woofer, and because you were relying on a competing company for it. How long did that project take, and why did you decide on a dome configuration?
Villchur: Building the woofer prototype was a matter of a couple of weeks, but this took a year and a half. Of course, I had other things to do. As for the dome, it wasn't so much the shape of the diaphragm as the fact that the diaphragm…
Roy Allison: Bending Boundary Effects
Before other people paid attention to the phenomenon, Roy Allison noticed that loudspeaker measurements taken in conventional home living rooms typically revealed a dip in power response in the 100–300Hz range. That was in the late 1960s, when Allison was VP for engineering and manufacturing at Acoustic Research. In 1972, after designing or supervising the design of nine models at AR, he left to begin an investigation of real-room speaker behavior. Next he teamed up with former AR president Abe Hoffman and two other colleagues from that company,…
Lander: The legendary AR turntable remained in the line, of course.
Allison: The turntable provided a big profit. I don't know how many hundreds of thousands sold. That was Eddie's concept. What I did was help in production engineering.
Lander: In 1966, Stereo Review's annual market survey indicated that AR had just under a third of the speaker market locked up. What happened between 1967 and 1972, when you left?
Allison: In those five years we doubled sales and doubled profits, but our market share was dropping because the market was expanding. It was sort of like a…
BILL LLOYD: Standing on the Shoulders of Giants
Koch LOC-CD-8035 (CD). 1999. Bill Lloyd, Scott Baggett, prods., engs.; Brad Jones, prod.; Robin Eaton, Marshall Crenshaw, engs. AAD? TT: 56:46
Performance ****?
Sonics ****
Koch LOC-CD-8035 (CD). 1999. Bill Lloyd, Scott Baggett, prods., engs.; Brad Jones, prod.; Robin Eaton, Marshall Crenshaw, engs. AAD? TT: 56:46
Performance ****?
Sonics ****
Bill Lloyd's hooked on hooks. In three albums—the second of which, 1994's Set to Pop (ESD 80892), is still my album of the millennium—he's become a master of power pop. Power pop is distinguished from its stickier, sweeter cousins—play-it-to-death Top 40 and the really nauseating, Flintstones chewable variety pandered by N'Synch, Spice Girls, and Britney…
When I reviewed Infinity's Primus 150 loudspeaker in the April 2004 Stereophile, I was very impressed with its overall performance. To this day, I continue to be amazed at the level of realism this $198/pair loudspeaker can reproduce, and I've kept the review pair to serve as a benchmark for an entry-level audiophile speaker. When I'd completed that review, my first thought was: Now—what can Infinity do within the affordable Primus series for more money? So I requested a review sample of the Primus series' flagship, the three-way Primus 360 floorstanding speaker. After all, how could I…