Herb Reichert

Right now, I swear, Schiit Audio's Mike Moffat and Jason Stoddard are sitting there in California, smugly smirking at me and John Atkinson. While JA was struggling to properly measure Schiit's Ragnarok (Fate of the Gods) integrated amplifier for my review in the May 2016 issue, I sent Moffat an e-mail: "Are you smiling?"

"Yup," he replied. He'd known in advance that the Ragnarok wouldn't look good on standard tests. But he hadn't warned us: The Ragnarok's output-stage bias program responds to music sources, not signal generators.

Besides the TIA's thick copper top deck (and copper remote handset), the 280R features full point-to-point-wired, dual-mono construction with one GZ34 rectifier tube per channel…

I am an Anglophile…and a Brit-fi guy. I just am. Back in 1982 I really wanted a wood-cased A&R Cambridge A60 to drive my Rogers LS3/5a speakers. But I couldn't afford its modest price. Somewhere around then, this venerable UK company simplified their name to Arcam.

Technics spent all of 2016 re-emerging into the Euro-American audio market—and they did it with full-on high Japanese style and connoisseur-level sound. At last year's CES, Technics introduced their Grand, Premium, and Reference class audio products—including the 100 percent new SL-1200GAE/G/GR turntables! They made a big splash then, and now they're doing it again.

Today, in Vegas, DeVore's super-sensitive Orangutan O/96 loudspeakers ($12,000/pair) were powered by Sugden's Masterclass LA-4 line preamplifier ($3750) and Sapphire FBA800 40Wpc class-A amplifier ($7500). The system was playing Sharon Jones and the Dap-Kings (on Daptone Records) with super cool but hot-running LP joy.

Both sides of the Atlantic are making tube products that (again) sound at least a little like actual vacuum tubes and less like high-strung solid-state racing cars. Both cultures now want genuine tube sound but demand 21st century tube longevity and reliability—and, of course, a discrete headphone amplifier.

Emotiva looked so direct-sales, street-wise smart—and everybody was talkin’ about how musical Emotiva’s stuff sounds: “It sounds good—and they're givin’ it away!” I couldn’t wait to try one of their products.