Original!
Original was getting great sound with its $3000 Leonardo CD-A9II CD player and AF 2008 preamp and AF-2008 monoblock power amps ($4500 for all three), played through Dynaudio Contour S 1.4s. But off to one side was a smaller CD player that caught my attention, the $800 CD-A6T. That's "T" as in tubes—you can see the little suckers up in the upper right hand corner of the PCB.
Original's Assembly Line
"Essentially, we build everything by hand. Some Chinese companies think almost think this approach is primitive, but it gives us a lot of quality control."
Packed My Bags
That concludes the audio portion of my tour. I'm packed, and after toodling around Shanghai a little, I peddle off to Beijing for some culture, and then home.
Ping Gong
This is Ping Gong, one of my hosts and my fellow traveler. At breakfast this morning, he explained to me how he became an audiophile. "It was the Cultural Revolution," he said. "We weren't allowed to study, so we played music and talked. I had a big Russian turntable—mono! And one speaker, of course.
Quality Control
First you build, then you measure.
Ready For Its Close Up
Here's a better look at the tubes from the Original CD-A6T—they're miniature 6C7B, a military tube.
Road Song
Somehow the gods of travel, who usually enjoy watching me suffer, had one of their rare bouts of whimsey and decided to ruin future journeys by upgrading me to first class.
Routing a Side Panel
This CNC machine is fluting a side panel.
Sheng Ya Means Good Listening
Actually, I have no idea what Sheng Ya means, but at the Sheng Ya showroom, I felt right at home. There were audiophiles hanging out, listening, and, of course, yakking when we walked in. The sales guy was really into what he was doing and immediately began playing these interesting looking speakers made by Consonance.
Shop Floor
This is one of ETKG's shops. David Zhou has grown so large over the last 13 years that he has rented just about every available space in his area. Some garages have a single CNC station in them.