Jana Dagdagan

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Jason Visits VTL: A Video Report
Jana Dagdagan
Jana Dagdagan  |  Jul 07, 2017  |  8 comments
One day before the Los Angeles Audio Show, Jason Victor Serinus, his fresh haircut, and I visited VTL Amplifiers, Inc. in Chino, California. We were given a tour of the factory by Bea Lam and Luke Manley, who were featured in this 2007 interview by Jason.
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Jason's Binaural Video at AXPONA
AXPONA 2018
Jana Dagdagan  |  Apr 27, 2018  |  4 comments
Constellation’s Irv Gross (right) welcomes Jason to the Precision Audio room.

On Saturday April 14, I followed Jason Victor Serinus around AXPONA with my video camera while he played recordings from M•A and John Atkinson.

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KEF's Jack Oclee-Brown on Making Affordable Speakers
InterviewsJana Dagdagan
Jana Dagdagan  |  Feb 09, 2018  |  2 comments
Back in the early summer of 2017, Jack Oclee-Brown, KEF's Head of Acoustics, visited John Atkinson to set up the KEF Reference 5 loudspeakers in his listening room. JA's review of the Ref 5 was published in October 2017, and during Jack's visit JA talked to him about the design of that speaker. But they also discussed KEF's affordable "Q" line of speakers and the challenges a manufacturer faces in bringing an inexpensive loudspeaker to market, the subject of this interview.
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KEF's Jack Oclee-Brown Talks Loudspeakers
InterviewsJana Dagdagan
Jana Dagdagan  |  Sep 06, 2017  |  7 comments
Last May, Jack Oclee-Brown, KEF's Head of Acoustics, visited John Atkinson's listening room to drop off and set up the KEF Reference 5 loudspeakers ($19,000/pair). (JA's review appears in the October Stereophile, which will hit newsstands and mailboxes later this week.) In this video, they discuss Jack's origins and the challenges of speaker design, as well as the genesis of the Reference 5.
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Last Trip To Other Music
Jana Dagdagan
Jana Dagdagan  |  May 16, 2016  |  15 comments
Photos: Brian Li

It's half past seven on a drizzly Friday night in New York City. I'm a little bit of a mess; soggy from the sporadic downpour, weakened by a full day's work, and still regretting the sub-par pork and chive dumplings I wolfed down earlier. All day long I've been fighting off the urge to inject myself with cold beers (preferably Guinness) and binge watch Wong Kar Wai films. It's one of those days.

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Manufacturer Meets Audio Reviewer: Not your Average Love Story
Jana Dagdagan
Jana Dagdagan  |  May 23, 2016  |  54 comments
Boy meets girl.
Boy and girl fall in love.
Boy and girl live happily ever after.

This is the traditional fairytale romance we've all been spoon-fed from birth. You know, Disney, unicorns, white picket fences, medieval castles, Ryan Gosling, etc, etc. There are many variations, but each one essentially tells the same story.

Unfortunately, the fact of the matter is, reality often falls quite short of fairytale, and very rarely is one story identical to the next. Modern romance is often more like this...

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MBL's Juergen Reis talks Digital with John Atkinson
InterviewsJana Dagdagan
Jana Dagdagan  |  Jan 30, 2017  |  1 comments
Last week, we posted a video on AudioStream of a conversation between Juergen Reis (MBL's Chief Designer), Michael Lavorgna (AudioStream), and John Atkinson, which we filmed during CES 2017. During that same session, we also filmed a conversation between JA and Juergen that focuses more specifically on MBL's new N31 DAC, which JA will be reviewing in a future issue of Stereophile.

In this video, Juergen and JA discuss digital filters, aliasing, Nyquist ringing, USB inputs, inter-sample "overs," and many of the other arcane issues involved in DAC design.

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Michael Fremer at Definitive Audio's Music Matters 12
Jana Dagdagan
Jana Dagdagan  |  Mar 13, 2017  |  2 comments
Last week at Seattle retailer Definitive Audio's 12th Music Matters, I got to watch one of Michael Fremer's legendary vinyl presentations. (If you have not witnessed Magic Mikey in action—he will be reprising his dem at AXPONA in April—it is truly a must-see!) In this video, Mikey demonstrates the difference between record pressings by playing three different pressings of Nina Simone's debut album Little Girl Blue: the 1958 original; a Pure Pleasure reissue; and the Analogue Productions reissue.
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MQA: Yes or No? An AXPONA 2017 Poll
AXPONA 2017Jana DagdaganMQA
Jana Dagdagan  |  May 05, 2017  |  91 comments
With any large gathering of people who share a common passion, one is bound to encounter polarizing issues and the fiercely opinionated standing on either side. In the world, it's politics and religion. In our world, it's tubes vs solid-state, whether cables really matter or not, and, most recently . . . Master Quality Authenticated.
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My own. My love. My precious.
Jana Dagdagan
Jana Dagdagan  |  Jun 13, 2016  |  9 comments
Photo: Kelsey Ohira

May 12, 2014. The day it all began. Three major events happened in my life on May the 12th:

1. My violent hatred towards the USPS was born.
2. I spent the most I ever have, till this very day, on a yellow cab.
3. A divine pair of Technics SL1200 Mk.II turntables entered my life.

Well, they didn't exactly enter my life, per se. They were left on my (then) doorstep in West Harlem, which may give you some insight on #1. More on that later. I need to calm myself. (Sips Earl Grey vehemently in straightjacket.)

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