Media Server Reviews

Sort By: Post DateTitle Publish Date
Digital Processor ReviewsFloor Loudspeaker ReviewsIntegrated Amp ReviewsMedia Server Reviews
A FollowUp RoundUp
John Atkinson  |  Jan 10, 2024  |  13 comments
Three products were recently subjected to second opinions: I reviewed the revised RS250A version of HiFi Rose's RS250 streaming D/A preamplifier and the optional DC1 DAC module for Audio Research's I/50 integrated amplifier; Ken Micallef wrote about his time with the Volti Razz loudspeaker.
Continue Reading »
Media Server Reviews
Acoustic Research AR-M2 hi-rez portable player
John Atkinson  |  Mar 24, 2016  |  16 comments
In the early 1970s, I lived in a village 40 miles north of London, England, and regularly drove through an only slightly larger village called Houghton Regis. And every time I did so, this budding audiophile was thrilled to see a factory in the High Street with a nameplate proudly announcing that it was the site of Teledyne Acoustic Research's European operations. I was aware of the American brand because of a chance encounter with a pair of Acoustic Research LST speakers, and the geographical connection led to an increased interest in their speakers (footnote 1). A sort of local-boy-, er, local-multinational conglomerate-makes-good story. Sort of.
Continue Reading »
Media Server Reviews
Antipodes Audio K50 music server
Jason Victor Serinus  |  Sep 29, 2021  |  22 comments
On the face of it, playing and streaming digital music files is a straightforward process. You direct data from various sources—some local, some "in the cloud"—perhaps via a reclocker/signal conditioner to a digital-to-analog converter (DAC). "And the music comes out here."

Not so simple. Bits, it seems, aren't bits, or not only. A digital datastream is also an analog signal. Noise and other signal errors endemic to multi-function computers not designed primarily for music playback can affect how music sounds. And then there are the practical issues of setting up and connecting everything optimally, and then organizing music files correctly, which can be especially difficult when ripping files from multidisc sets.

Continue Reading »
Media Server Reviews
Antipodes DX Reference music server
John Atkinson  |  Sep 29, 2015  |  4 comments
Perhaps because I grew up in post-WWII England, with austerity and food rationing the norm, I learned at an early age the value of frugality. It was a financial stretch for me to buy, in the late 1960s, my first real audio system: Garrard SP25 turntable with Audio-Technica cartridge, Kenwood integrated amplifier, Wharfedale Super Linton speakers. Even when I could afford to upgrade the system, other than replacing the Garrard with a Thorens TD 150 and the Audio-Technica with a Shure, I went the DIY route. Back then, in the early '70s, I assumed that the advent of op-amp chips like the Fairchild Semiconductor µA741 would make it possible for me to design and make, for example, a good-sounding preamplifier for a lot less than it cost to buy one from an established manufacturer. That assumption turned out to be wrong, of course, but frugality was, by then, a habit: too ingrained for me to shake entirely.
Continue Reading »
Audacious AudioMedia Server Reviews
Antipodes Oladra server/streamer/reclocker
Jason Victor Serinus  |  Jun 21, 2023  |  0 comments
Servers, servers, servers. How we who embrace digital hi-fi love them for their potential to make files and streams sound better (more alive, vital, streams sound better (more alive, vital, musical, moving, transparent) than music served from a computer. How we curse them when we experience the limitations of their software. How we despair when, shortly after ascending to Peak Digital Mastery, we download a software update that hurls us back into the Valley of Digital Unknowns.

I've climbed then slid down multiple hi-fi peaks as I've moved from computer to a Roon-equipped NUC, Roon Nucleus+, and Innuos Statement Next-Gen music servers. Along the way I've reviewed the original Innuos Statement from Portugal and the Antipodes Audio K50 from New Zealand. Now I'm exploring Antipodes's top-of-the-line server/streamer/reclocker, the Oladra ($25,000), which is designed for precise clocking, low noise, and high bandwidth.

Continue Reading »
Media Server ReviewsStand Loudspeaker Reviews
Apple HomePod smart speaker
Jim Austin  |  Jul 17, 2018  |  73 comments
It's after 5pm on Wednesday, and I'm finishing up the listening part of my review of Apple's wireless speaker, the HomePod ($349). On a whim, I've just asked Siri to play me some drinking songs.

I mention this because the HomePod's "smart" features—its integration with Siri and the Apple Music streaming service—is a big part of its appeal. In its natural element, the HomePod provides a way of accessing music that, although as old as our century, to me is still new and unfamiliar: Forget your hoary music collection, your Rolling Stones and Beethoven. Decide what kind of music you want to hear—a genre or a mood—then leave the choice to Siri and her algorithmic minions.

Continue Reading »
Budget Component ReviewsMedia Server Reviews
Apple iPod portable music player
Wes Phillips  |  Oct 05, 2003  |  0 comments
It was John Atkinson, that legendary ornithologist, who first pointed it out: "Have you noticed how frequently you see women using the iPod?"
Continue Reading »
Media Server Reviews
Astell&Kern A&ultima SP1000 portable audio player
Michael Fremer  |  Oct 19, 2017  |  27 comments
People often ask me how I listen to music when I travel. I play MP3s on my iPhone.

That answer always surprises, and sometimes disappoints: "You listen to MP3s?"

The response is moderately tempered when I add that I use good in-ear monitors (IEMs)—either Westone ES50s (ca $995) or Jerry Harvey Audio Laylas (ca $2725), both with eartips made from molds of my ear canals.

Continue Reading »
Budget Component ReviewsMedia Server Reviews
Astell&Kern AK100 portable media player
John Atkinson  |  Jul 25, 2013  |  First Published: Aug 01, 2013  |  18 comments
Apple's iPod came of age in the fall of 2003, when, with the release of iTunes 4.5, the player was no longer restricted to lossy compressed MP3 or AAC files. Instead, it could play uncompressed or losslessly compressed files with true "CD quality"; users no longer had to compromise sound quality to benefit from the iPod's convenience.

Enter Astell&Kern. At the beginning of 2013, this brand from iRiver, a Korean portable media company, introduced its AK100, a portable player costing a dollar short of $700 and capable of handling 24-bit files with sample rates of up to 192kHz.

Continue Reading »
Audacious AudioMedia Server Reviews
Astell&Kern AK240 portable media player
Michael Lavorgna  |  Jan 29, 2015  |  0 comments
Do you travel? Commute, perhaps? Just like to listen to music privately around the house? No matter—the Astell&Kern AK240 is the luxury choice in high-resolution portable music players (footnote 1). It even comes with a lovely leather case that beautifully cradles its angular beauty. The AK240 can play all of your PCM files, up to a resolution of 24-bit/192kHz, as well as DXD and single- and double-rate DSD, natively, and can do so from its internal storage, from a microSD card, or from your computer via WiFi or a wired connection. It can also function as a DAC or USB-to-TosLink converter. I'm not so sure there's much left wanting.
Continue Reading »
Audio StreamsMedia Server Reviews
Audio Streams #1
Michael Lavorgna  |  Jul 01, 2014  |  7 comments
I'm the editor of AudioStream.com, Stereophile's sister website devoted to computer audio. We review all manner of hardware, software, and music related to file-based playback, and offer helpful (we hope) "How To" articles as well as interviews with industry people—all designed to ease your journey to and through the world of computer audio. I envision my new Stereophile column, "Audio Streams," as an extension of this mission—and the addition of that trailing, plural s gives me some leeway to explore a wider range of hi-fi topics.
Continue Reading »
Digital Processor ReviewsMedia Server Reviews
Aurender A10 network music player/server
Jason Victor Serinus  |  Dec 21, 2017  |  55 comments
A huge fuss was made over Aurender's first music server, the S10, when it premiered in 2011 at the California Audio Show. While I didn't feel that the room acoustics and setup were good enough at CAS to permit an honest appraisal, the looks and features of the S10 (now discontinued) thrust Aurender into the spotlight. So when John Atkinson, who had very favorably reviewed Aurender's N10 server in April 2016, asked if I would evaluate Aurender's new A10, the opportunity to serve so many audiophiles with a single review elicited from me an unequivocal "Yes!"
Continue Reading »
Audacious AudioMedia Server Reviews
Aurender N10 music server
John Atkinson  |  Mar 29, 2016  |  17 comments
When I reviewed the Antipodes DX Reference in October 2015, that $7500 media server made musical mincemeat of my regular computer audio setup: a headless 2.7GHz i7 Mac mini fitted with 8GB of RAM and Pure Music and Audirvana apps. Coincident with the publication of that review, Aurender launched its N10 music server ($7999) at the 2015 Rocky Mountain Audio Fest. I had been impressed with Aurender's Flow USB headphone amplifier when I reviewed it in June 2015, so I asked for an N10.
Continue Reading »
Media Server Reviews
Autonomic Controls Mirage MMS-5A media server
John Atkinson  |  Apr 09, 2013  |  2 comments
I bought a Slim Devices Squeezebox network player in the spring of 2006 and my life changed. Having audio files on a server and being able to play them through my high-end rig via the Squeezebox's S/PDIF output liberated my music from the tyranny of a physical medium. As I wrote in my review, "physical discs seem so 20th century!" After Wes Phillips reviewed the Squeezebox's big brother, the Transporter, in February 2007, I bought the review sample and lived happily ever after in the world of bits rather than atoms—at least until the summer of 2010, when Slim Devices' new owner, Logitech, brought out the Squeezebox Touch. The Touch did everything the Transporter did, with a full-color display, at one-eighth the price!
Continue Reading »
Budget Component ReviewsIntegrated Amp ReviewsMedia Server Reviews
Bluesound PowerNode streaming integrated amplifier
Ken Micallef  |  May 27, 2022  |  0 comments
Old-school audiophiles like me cling to our vinyl records and CDs. We spin them on turntables and slide them into transports, which send electric signals through wires to solid state or tubed amplifiers—a string of hardware devices. But, despite our object-attached ways, we're quite aware that we are living in a software-enabled, Bluetooth-connected, Wi-Fi–facilitated world. Even our Milky Way galaxy is wireless; as that pontificator of everything galactic, scientist Neil DeGrasse Tyson, has proclaimed, "We're all connected."
Continue Reading »

Pages

X