Stereophile – January 2020 by Diogo Cirillo

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THERE ARE AS MANY OPINIONS AS THERE ARE EXPERTS

AS WE SEE IT

BY JIM AUSTIN THIS ISSUE :

Pro audio is coming around to what audiophiles have known for years.

Slow Listening

ubjectivist audiophiles have long maintained that long-term listening is necessary to assess the quality and character of an audio component. Scientific testing methodologies such as ABX, which require quick and conscious evaluation of a change in the sound, have long struck many of us as insufficient, seeming to miss much that affects our enjoyment of music. A pair of Genelec researchers—Thomas Lund, an audio professional with a medical background, and Aki Mäkivirta, a research and development manager and a Fellow of the Audio Engineering Society—have published two articles1 on the science of hearing and perception, and their findings appear to support such views. Among their observations:

k The “perceptual bandwidth” of humans—the maximum size of the datastream into our brains—is remarkably small. Experts put it in the range of 40–50 bits/s: compare that to the worst kind of MP3, which has a data rate of 10s of kilobytes/s, more than 1000 times larger.2 (No wonder we’re easily fooled by lossy encoding.) Perceptual bandwidth “should generally be considered a scarce resource,” the authors state. k We are not passive recipients of sensory information—how could we be with such a low perceptual bandwidth? Sensing is an activity; attention is a tool we deploy to select which information we take in. k Only a fraction of the perceptual information we take in is available to our conscious awareness; much of it goes unnoticed. Yet, it still affects us. We—or anyway our brains—even solve problems—unconsciously—using unconscious information. Together, these ideas imply a perceptual landscape far different from the one that people long assumed: Through long experience, we build an internal model of reality and then reach out to test it against scarce, select sensory input. Our ability to function well and make accurate judgments depends on the accuracy of our internal model and the precision with which we correct it with scarce, carefully selected external stimuli.3 Models of reality are contextual: An outﬁelder’s long experience allows him to get a fast start in the right direction when a ball leaves the bat. Our own long experience allows us to detect small changes in what we hear that stereophile.com

January 2020

others cannot.4 A major theme of the articles is that listening takes time. Indeed, the titles of both feature the phrase “Slow Listening”—surely an allusion to the slow food movement that started in the late 1990s.5 Time matters in subjective listening tests, the authors conclude, in various ways: k Music and language training over years affect our ability to detect short, transient sounds. k Becoming familiar with a reference audio system takes time. “Based on a limited perceptual bandwidth and 8 hours of dedicated listening per day, getting to know a room and equipment in any detail would take at least a week, but assuming years would be safer,” the authors write. “Subjective tests, even producing repeatable results, may have little relevance if confined in time”—a challenge for audio reviewers for sure. k Much that matters in perception goes on below the surface, without our explicit awareness. How do we know when our unconscious rumination has matured to the point that it’s time to render judgment? We can’t, so we need to factor in extra time. What, then, are we to make of ABX tests in which test subjects compare a version of a few seconds of music, jangling keys, or whatever against a reference? Such tests are good for many things—see the first article in this month’s Industry Update—but far from the last word on sonic and musical significance. When we rely on them too heavily, we miss things. Here’s one more idea from the article that many audiophiles can relate

to. The authors cite an article published in Nature Neuroscience in 20146 that establishes that noise well below the threshold for physical damage can cause auditory stress and impact our hearing. Nontraumatic sounds, including those with “excessive high frequency energy, lack of ‘quiet transients’” (which are removed in lossy encoding schemes) and “interaural strangeness or unnaturalness,” can cause undesirable changes in the “auditory brain,” even if they do not damage hair cells. Aural stress, listening fatigue, and the resulting impairment in our ability to discriminate small differences is familiar to audio reviewers. Scientists have now corroborated our subjective experience. Which raises another possible objective of audio systems. Accuracy— ﬁdelity—is, for most serious listeners, the benchmark we measure our systems against, whether we measure ﬁdelity by objective or subjective criteria. But other valid criteria exist. Maybe some listeners just want sound that minimizes, or even alleviates, stress, whether through second-harmonic distortion, suppressed response in the presence region (aka BBC dip), natural interaural relationships, or whatever. Maybe some people just want their sound system to sound good.

peaking of sounding good: This month’s issue contains the ﬁrst installment of a new Stereophile column. In Revinylization, Art Dudley reviews the most important of the latest reissues on vinyl. You’ll ﬁnd the new column on p.125. Q

1 The company’s managing director, Siamäk Naghian, is a coauthor of one of the articles. See aes. org/e-lib/browse.cfm?elib=20547 and aes.org/e-lib/ browse.cfm?elib=19621. 2 I ﬁnd this number implausibly small, but it’s what is claimed. 3 John Atkinson discussed this subject in his 2011 Richard C. Heyser Memorial Lecture to the AES: tinyurl.com/yxpyu4av. 4 It’s not only reviewers of course; anyone with good hearing and the right mindset can acquire such skill. 5 Later, there was also a brief “slow listening” movement, a response to MP3 and earbuds. 6 See ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24946762.

VON SCHWEIKERT AUDIO

T HE S OU ND O F RE ALI T Y

JANUARY

2020

Vol.43 No.1

p.55

FEATURES 115

Bill Frisell—the Stereophile Interview The guitar great talks about Telecasters, harmony, ﬁnding new ideas in old songs, and his thoughts on LPs vs CDs.

EQUIPMENT REPORTS 44

p.44

Gryphon Ethos CD player – D/A converter by Jason Victor Serinus

Wilson Sasha DAW loudspeaker by Sasha Matson

NAD M10 streaming integrated ampliﬁer by John Atkinson

Elac Carina BS243.4 loudspeaker by Herb Reichert

Benchmark LA4 preampliﬁer by Kalman Rubinson

Q Acoustics Concept 300 loudspeaker by John Atkinson

107 PS Audio Stellar Phono phono preampliﬁer

p.107

SEE OUR EXCLUSIVE EQUIPMENT REPORT ARCHIVE AT WWW.STEREOPHILE.COM Stereophile (USPS #734-970 ISSN: 0585-2544) Vol.43 No.1, January 2020, Issue Number 480. Copyright © 2019 by AVTech Media Americas Inc. All rights reserved. Published monthly by AVTech Media Americas Inc., 260 Madison Avenue, 8th Floor, New York, NY 10016. Periodicals Postage paid at New York, NY and additional mailing ofﬁces. Subscription rates for one year (12 issues) U.S., APO, FPO, and U.S. Possessions $19.94, Canada $31.94, Foreign orders add $24 (including surface mail postage). Payment in advance, U.S. funds only. POSTMASTER: Send all UAA to CFS. (See DMM 707.4.12.5); NON-POSTAL AND MILITARY Facilities: send address corrections to Stereophile, P.O. Box 420235, Palm Coast, FL 32142-0235. Mailing Lists: From time to time we make our subscriber list available to companies that sell goods and services by mail that we believe would be of interest to our readers. If you would rather not receive such mailings, please send your current mailing label, or an exact copy, to: Stereophile, Mail Preference Service, P.O. Box 420235, Palm Coast, FL 32142-0235. Subscription Service: Should you wish to change your address, or order new subscriptions, you can do so by writing to the same address. Printed in the USA.

by Michael Fremer stereophile.com

January 2020

JANUARY

2020

Vol.43 No.1

As We See It

Pro audio may be coming around to ideas of long standing in the audiophile world—now with scientiﬁc support.

p.23

Letters

Readers praise our Chick Corea interview, correct a misunderstanding about “Hotel California,” describe their experiences with Klipschorns, and commend our review, in Stereophile’s October issue, of the dCS Bartók.

G YOUR SET ON VISIT TH OAPBOX! AT WWWE FORUMS .STEREO PHILE.CO M

Industry Update

A lifetime achievement award for Bob Deutsch, a deﬁnitive test for high-rez, new “immersive audio” tech from the New York AES gathering, a software-only Audio Precision testand-measurment suite—and, as always, audiophile events across the country.

STAY INFORMED: GO TO STEREOPHILE.COM FOR UP-TO-THE-MINUTE INFO.

23 Analog Corner Mikey listens to VPI’s HW-40 40th Anniversary Edition direct-drive turntable—and likes what he hears.

Listening

Art Dudley revisits (ﬂat) Earth, puts new stands on his Quads, and listens to them with some lovingly reconditioned vintage Naim electronics.

39 Gramophone Dreams Herb wonders how the mind can convert marginally realistic sounds and images into a tangible “somewhere else”—and listens to the very cool looking (and excellent-sounding) RAAL-Requisite SR1a ribbon headphones.

125

Revinylization

In a new monthly column, Art Dudley rounds up the most interesting recent vinyl reissues.

p.39

127

Record Reviews

November’s Recording of the Month is Munich 2016, a new solo release by Keith Jarrett. Also: Reviews of newly released music from Jan Garbarek and the Hilliard Ensemble, Palestrina, Prokoﬁev, Gounod, Ted Nash, the Fred Hersch trio, Neil Young and Crazy Horse, and others.

134 Manufacturers’ Comments Feedback from Grado, Feliks Audio, Krell, Elac, and Benchmark Media.

138 My Back Pages Reader Carl Thomas Hriczak writes about years of listening to records, glass platters for phonographs, Glenn Gould, and passing on the tradition.

INFORMATION 136 136 132 137

Manufacturers’ Showcase Dealers’ Showcase Audio Mart Advertiser Index p.127

p.128

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January 2020

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Powering the Future of Audio™ JANUARY 2020 EDITOR JIM AUSTIN DEPUTY EDITOR ART DUDLEY TECHNICAL EDITOR JOHN ATKINSON SENIOR CONTRIBUTING EDITORS MICHAEL FREMER, HERB REICHERT, KALMAN RUBINSON WEB PRODUCER JON IVERSON COPY EDITOR LINDA FELACO

AVTECH MEDIA AMERICAS INC EDITORIAL DIRECTOR PAUL MILLER FINANCE DIRECTOR OWEN DAVIES GENERAL MANAGER KEITH PRAY

FOUNDER J. GORDON HOLT COVER PHOTO ERIC SWANSON ART DIRECTOR JEREMY MOYLER

CONTRIBUTING EDITORS (AUDIO)

BRIAN DAMKROGER, ROBERT DEUTSCH, LARRY GREENHILL, JON IVERSON, DAVID LANDER, ERICK LICHTE, SASHA MATSON, PAUL MESSENGER, KEN MICALLEF, THOMAS J. NORTON, JASON VICTOR SERINUS

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CONTRIBUTING EDITORS (MUSIC) DAVID ADLER, LARRY BIRNBAUM, THOMAS CONRAD, FRED KAPLAN, RICHARD LEHNERT, ROBERT LEVINE, SASHA MATSON, FRED MILLS, JASON VICTOR SERINUS, JOHN SWENSON

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LETTERS

FEEDBACK TO THE EDITOR

Chick and Miles Editor: I was overjoyed to read the interview with Chick Corea in the October issue. It was Chick and Miles that sent me on my journey of jazz which has wandered all over the improvisational musical map. I appreciate the insight into the mind and spirit of this truly innovative pianist. —Robert Greenbaum Houston, TX

No congas down the corridor Editor: Thanks, as always, for an informative and well-executed magazine for our great hobby. Just wanted to weigh in on an error in Mr. Greenhill’s review of the SVS SB3000 subwoofer (September 2019 issue). In discussing the excellent subterranean sound heard in the intro to “Hotel California,” from The Eagles’ Hell Freezes Over, Mr. Greenhill cites the “large conga drum” that creates this sound. Any drummer watching the DVD of this concert immediately knows two things: 1) A conga drum cannot make the deep bass “thud/boom” that is heard when the drummer, Scott Crago, enters the song. 2) Close inspection (easy to miss if you’re not a drummer, or not looking for it) reveals that Scott is standing and, yes, playing congas. But he is also playing a bass drum with his right foot. It is that drum that has been miked and mixed to offer that impressive subwoofertesting note. —Charlie Lein Forest, VA

Klipschorns and SETs: perfect together Editor: When I received my September 2019 issue of Stereophile, I was excited to see my beloved Klipschorns on the front cover and looked forward to reading the review by Art Dudley. I have a pair of circa 1987 K-horns which I bought slightly used in 1988 for the mere price of $2000! What I remember most from when I ﬁrst heard the Klipschorns was the lifelike sound and imaging emerging from these large, gorgeous speakers. I’ll never forget the sound of those horns being played on Fanfare For the Common Man. I knew right then: I “needed” these speakers. A few months later the opportunity stereophile.com

January 2020

came along, and I was able to purchase a year-old used pair in the walnut ﬁnish. As I started to read Art’s review, I knew right away his placement of the speakers and the amps he was using were going to be less than optimal. Over my 30+ years listening to these speakers, I came to fully understand the criticality of the placement, along with the equal importance of powering them with the right amps. For decades, as we moved multiple times in the United States Air Force, we always looked for a house with corners to place the speakers. Sometimes this drove my wife crazy! Most of the time, we succeeded. However, for decades, I did not have the right amp(s) powering the K-horns. My old Yamaha M85 and the Bob Carvers I bought right after I retired from the USAF in 2013 simply had too much power and were not a good match for the Klipschorns. A few years ago, I reconnected with my audio guru, who, besides having a pair of circa mid-1960s K-horns, has an incredible ear and knows how to achieve optimal sound quality. He eagerly agreed to make a trip to my house to hear and see my setup. Upon hearing the K-horns driven by the Carver amps, he strongly advised I move to single-ended triode (SET) monoblocks delivering single digits of Wpc in order to take full advantage of the 104dB efﬁciency of the Klipschorns. He then designed and built a SET pair of amps for me with vintage power supplies and correctly matching tubes. Once the new SETs were hooked up in our listening room, which has two great corners for placement, I could hear the difference immediately. That sound I heard back in 1987 was not only back, it was better. There is no question, these speakers, when powered with the correct matching amps and correctly placed as LETTERS TO THE EDITOR should be

sent as e-mails only. Email: stletters@ stereophile.com. Please note: We are unable to answer requests for information about speciﬁc products or systems. If you have problems with your subscription, call (800) 666-3746, or email stereophile@emailcustomerservice.com, or write to Stereophile, P.O. Box 420235, Palm Coast, FL 32142-0235.

TAKE HEED! Unless marked otherwise, all letters to the magazine and its writers are assumed to be for possible publication. Please include your name and physical address. We reserve the right to edit for length and content.

advised by Klipsch, produce true lifelike music and imaging. Many an evening, my wife and I make a cocktail and sit on our curved church pew (it makes an awesome place to listen to music) in the listening room. When I drop the needle on the vinyl on my VPI Prime Signature turntable with a Koetsu Rosewood cartridge, whether it is Al Stewart’s Year of the Cat, Steely Dan’s Aja, Neil Young’s Live at the Cellar Door, Diana Krall’s A Case of You, or Lyn Stanley’s London With a Twist: Live at Bernie’s, those Klipschorns ensure the music comes alive, and we both feel like we are at a live performance. And ELP’s Fanfare For the Common Man still rocks the house! One thing for certain: Our Klipschorns are a permanent ﬁxture in our home and will continue to bring many hours of listening enjoyment for years to come. Thank you, Art, for the review. —Ralph Jodice Hanover, PA

A pure delight Editor: Kudos and thanks for your article reviewing the dCS Bartók DAC in the October 2019 issue! Apart from providing a clear and useful description of how that unit sounds, you provided an excellent and most welcome review and investigation of the contexts in which DACs live. As with several of your previous articles, you thoroughly and without advocacy address the issue of accuracy of signal handling versus pleasing or beautiful sound. You also, to the unfortunate dismay of dCS in their comment, use several meaningful and fairly presented approaches to both evaluating the unit under review and comparing that unit with other DACs. You also show by your careful and thorough work that digital handling of analog signals by accurate ADCs and DACs does not intrinsically degrade or even signiﬁcantly change analog signals, at least not from your analog source. Your factual and non-advocating approach is a pure delight to this longterm audiophile and, I hope, a source of useful information or food for thought for others. —Leonard Laub Westerlo, NY 11

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GoldenEar Technology is pleased to announce the introduction of the new Triton One.R. This extraordinary new reference quality loudspeaker is a smaller, less expensive follow up to the Triton Reference. The T Ref has been compared with speakers selling for over ten times its surprisingly affordable cost. It has had a remarkable response from both music and hifi enthusiasts as well as press and reviewers from around the world, who have bestowed upon it innumerable Speaker-of-the-Year and Product-of-the-Year awards. Now the T One.R is here for your ultimate delight. Al Griffin raved, “ The panoramic soundscape that the One.Rs rendered was a revelation...drums and percussion spread incredibly wide...with incredibly transparent rendering of vocals”.

“...a pair of Triton One.Rs really kick the width of the soundstage into overdrive, spreading the wall of voices far beyond their physical placement in the room, with undeniably enhanced clarity and articulation.” –Dennis Burger, HomeTheaterReview.com We developed new drivers for the T Ref, which incorporate advanced technologies for better sound, and brought these advancements into the Triton One.R. The new Reference Folded Ribbon Tweeter, with 50% more neodymium, is silky smooth and ultra high resolution. The new Focused-Field magnet structures deliver better control and higher efficiency. The new internal wiring, with a special critically perfect twist, provides better coupling and more coherent blending of the drivers. The new wiring topology further improves clarity and definition. And the very special film caps in the crossover make faster transient response a reality. The list goes on and on: long fiber lambs wool, accelerometer optimized bracing, special internal damping pads….. Everything contributes to T One.R’s remarkable ability to recreate a huge soundstage and deep three-dimensional image. And the voicing, which our engineers labored so long and hard over, makes the T One.R a proud follow up to the Triton Reference.

The 1600 watt built-in powered subwoofers can be musically delicate or simply rock your world! There are three newly designed racetrack shaped active subwoofer drivers on the front of the cabinet, which have special polymer impregnated nomex cones, in order to minimize cone breakup when strongly driven. Huge magnet structures are utilized in order to better control cone movement and improve transient response. There are four quadratic planar infrasonic radiators. They extend the low frequency response and are inertially balanced (two on each side) in order to minimize cabinet movement, resulting in clearer, more detailed sound. Combined with the 1600 watt sub amp and advanced 56 bit DSP, the built in powered bass section is superior to most stand-alone subwoofers, and of course, you will have two subs, one in each speaker. Al Griffin raved about,”...intense and gut-punching slam...I didn’t once feel a need for additional subwoofers.”

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INDUSTRY UPDATE

AUDIO NEWS & VIEWS

CANADA: TORONTO Stereophile Staff

On a Friday night in mid-October, during cocktail hour at the Toronto Audiofest, the organizers presented their Lifetime Achievement Award to longtime Stereophile contributor Robert Deutsch. Audiofest organizer Michel Plante invited Jim Austin, Stereophile’s new editor, onto the stage to introduce Bob. “Tonight I have an honor that I haven’t earned,” Jim said. “I’ve been Stereophile’s editor for just eight months, and I get to present a lifetime achievement award.” Jim then told the audience that he had asked John Atkinson, a longtime colleague of Robert Deutsch, to prepare some remarks, which he—Jim— read at the event: Robert Deutsch ﬁrst appeared in the pages of Stereophile three decades ago as the author of a letter that complained about the English usages that had been introduced by the magazine’s then-new editor, the very English John Atkinson. Husband to the ever-patient Beverley; a dog lover; a PhD; once a university professor, teaching

Those promoting audio-related seminars, shows, and meetings should email the when, where, and who to stletters@ stereophile.com at least eight weeks before the month of the event. The deadline for the March 2019 issue is December 20, 2019.

SUBMISSIONS:

experimental psychology; a student of singing; possessed of a fine tenor voice; a regular performer in amateur opera; a regular attendee at professional opera; and most important from our viewpoint, a keen audiophile, Bob joined Stereophile’s team of writers in 1988 as a music reviewer. His first two articles published in the magazine— ”The Non-Tweaker’s Guide to Tweaks” and “How to on the Stereophile website, Write Manufacturer’s Bob Deutsch, Jim Austin, and you find Bob comprehenComments”—combined Rob Schryer. sively describing his experikeen-eyed observations ences with box loudspeakers; enjoying with a sharp-edged sense of humor. An horn speakers; enthusing over tubed article he wrote 20 years later, drawing amplifiers; carefully coming to grips on his experience in psychology—“Are with solid-state amplifiers; playing You a Sharpener or a Leveler?”—is one with powerline accessories; and of the most insightful explorations of occasionally returning to his beloved what it is like to be a reviewer to be Quad electrostatics, all the while published in the magazine. bringing into sharp focus what makes Bob earned his bones as a Steeach product relevant to music-loving reophile reviewer in 1991 and 1992, audiophiles. writing about preamplifiers—many Along the way, he became Canada’s preamplifiers, from Conrad-Johnson, voice in Stereophile. Coda, Mark Levinson, Threshold, and And never once did he complain others. Look through the 680 reviews, to his editor that every one of those show reports, articles, and interviews

CALENDAR OFINDUSTRY EVENTS Attention all audio societies—we have a page on the Stereophile website devoted to you: stereophile.com/audiophilesocieties. If you’d like to have your audio-society information posted on the site, email Chris Vogel at vgl@cﬂ.rr.com. (Please note the new email address.) Please note that it is inappropriate for a retailer to promote a new product line in “Calendar” unless it is associated with a seminar or similar event.

LIONEL GOODFIELD

california

] Sunday, December 8, 11am until close: The Los Angeles & Orange County Audio Society will host its 26th Annual Society Gala and Awards Banquet in the Grand Ballroom of the Holiday Inn, Buena Park. Andrew Jones, chief engineer and speaker designer at Elac,

stereophile.com

January 2020

will receive the Founder’s Award, the society’s highest honor. The award will be presented by Michael Fremer of Stereophile Magazine. The second annual Audiophile Recordings of the Year Awards (two this year) and the Premier of the Innovation Award will be announced. Bob Levi, president and CEO of the society, will be master of ceremonies. Enjoy renowned magniﬁcent Gala Rafﬂe with prizes worth $50,000. A nonpareil luncheon will be served. Buy your tickets at the society’s website (laocas.com). Guests, visitors, and new members are invited. Parking is free. For more info, visit our website or call Bob Levi at (714) 2815850. ] Thursday, January 16, 2020, 6–9pm: San Diego, CA, Stereo Unlimited is

featuring the new KÓnto Carbon speaker with designer Richard Vandersteen and Global Sales Manager Brad O’Toole on hand to discuss the design and answer questions. A presentation will occur at 7pm in the big theater, with Q&A following. Music will be playing all night on a couple of Vandersteen-based systems. ] Saturday, January 18, 2020: Covina, CA, specialty audio retailer Sunny Components will host Vandersteen Audio. Sessions will start at 1pm and 3pm. Featured special guest Richard Vandersteen, Vandersteen’s founder and head engineer, and Global Sales Manager Brad O’Toole will demonstrate the new KĒnto Carbon loudspeakers with the Vandersteen M5-HPA high pass amps. Every model of Vandersteen

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METICULOUS, ABSOLUTE FOCUS Never miss a beat A record’s spiral groove is around 420m per side and over this distance, the needle will dance savagely, vibrating at up to 20,000x a second, capturing millions of transients at a micron level. Remaining rock-solid where it matters is Huei, an advanced phono preamp that never loses focus. Microprocessor-controlled and distilled from 30 years of UK ampliﬁer manufacturing, Huei brings the legendary Chord Electronics’ precision to vinyl playback.

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INDUSTRY UPDATE

products had to be carried up to his second ﬂoor listening room in suburban Toronto. Sometimes a sharpener, sometimes a leveler, always an audiophile in love with music, Bob has spent a lifetime getting better sound from his beloved vocal recordings, with many more improvements lying ahead.

In an emotional acceptance speech, Bob thanked the crowd and the organizers and spoke of how much it had meant to him over the decades to be part of the audiophile community. It was the second such award for a Stereophile writer this year: Earlier this year at the Montreal Audiofest, the same organization (which also puts on the Montreal show) presented its Lifetime Achievement Award to John Atkinson.

JAPAN: HIROSHIMA US: NEW YORK CITY Jim Austin

With a few exceptions, audiophiles have long advocated high-rez music formats, believing that music should be recorded and presented in the highest ﬁdelity possible, for our pleasure and posterity. And yet a few people in our community, and many more outside it, have long maintained that CD is good enough—that, indeed, as a general principle, music at CD resolution is indistinguishable from high-rez music. And until recently, scientiﬁc evidence for the audibility of high-rez music, while not negligible, was thin. It was not for lack of trying. Quite a few articles published in the relevant journals sought evidence of the audibility of higher bit depths speaker will be available for audition. ] Sunday, January 26, 2–5 pm: The Los Angeles & Orange County Audio Society will hold its monthly meeting at Audeze (3412 S Susan St., Santa Ana, CA 92704, audeze.com), known for their award-winning headphones. Factory tour at Audeze! Dragoslav Colich (CTO) and Sankar Thiagasamudram (CEO) will take you on a behind-the-scenes tour of Audeze, demonstrating how Audeze products are designed and manufactured. Audeze will have a slew of new products that they plan to introduce at CES and NAMM. All the new products for 2020 will be available for demo. The presenters will follow up

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January 2020

and sampling rates. The results were mixed. In 2016, Joshua Reiss of the Queen Mary University of London published a meta-analysis combining results from 18 such studies, involving more than 400 participants and 12,500 trials,1 concluding that the experiments “showed a small but statistically significant ability of test subjects to discriminate high resolution content, and this effect increased dramatically when test subjects received extensive training.” Some, though, thought the studies they chose were cherry-picked and so found the evidence weak. At this year’s New York meeting of the Audio Engineering Society—just concluded as I write—Yuki Fukuda and Shunsuke Ishimitsu, both of Hiroshima City University, presented results that show quite clearly that listeners can distinguish sounds encoded and reproduced at different sampling frequencies.2 Their trials differed from the previous ones in one important way: Instead of exposing test subjects to music at different resolutions, they used test tones. Specifically, they used two forms of spectrally “flat” signals: white noise and (Gaussian) impulse signals. White noise and impulse signals both have broadband content; they differ from each other in that in an impulse, all the frequency components are correlated in time, whereas for white noise the phase of the various frequency components is random. The Japan Electronics and Information Technology Industries Association defines the “CD format” as having sampling frequencies up to 48kHz and a bit depth of 16. Anything higher, in bit depth or sampling frequency, is considered high resolution. For these the tour with a Q&A. A raffle will include an LCD-24! You can look forward to an exceptional raffle and a life-altering lunch. Eastwind Import will be on hand to offer hand-selected vinyl and CDs for sale. Free parking is nearby. Guests, visitors, and new members are invited. For more information, visit laocas.com or call Bob Levi at (714) 281-5850. ] Sunday, February 23rd, 2-5 pm: The Los Angeles & Orange County Audio Society will hold its monthly meeting at Scott Walker Audio. Scott Walker and his team will have demonstration rooms showcasing the latest offerings from Magnepan (LRS), Magico (A3), Sonus Faber (Olympica Nova),

experiments, the two researchers used a bit depth of 16 in all trials so that their lowest sampling rate data would be classiﬁed as CD-rez, the others as high-rez. Fukuda and Ishimitsu employed Gaussian impulse and white noise test signals at 48kHz, 96kHz, and 192kHz. The test had seven subjects, all young: The average age was right at 22. ABX comparisons were made between 48kHz and 96kHz signals, 48kHz and 192kHz signals, and 96kHz and 192kHz signals. In a different round of testing, they applied a different methodology: MUSHRA, for Multiple Stimuli with Hidden Reference and Anchor. This test, too, involved seven subjects. Two women participated in the ABX round and one woman in the MUSHRA round. For each methodology, both headphones and loudspeakers were employed. The setups were modest. Loudspeakers were Eclipse TD-M by Japanese manufacturer Fujitsu Ten, a single-driver—hence intrinsically timealigned—powered desktop loudspeaker. The Eclipse, which is out of production but last sold in the US for $1300/pair, accepts digital data via USB and Wi-Fi, but in these experiments appeared to be used via the analog input: a 3.5mm stereo jack. The researchers employed a Fostex HP-A4BL D/A converter, which retails for $600 and is widely available at a street price under $500. A fast–roll-off linear-phase ﬁlter was employed to minimize aliasing distortion. Headphones were the Sennheiser HD 650. Tests were carried out in an anechoic chamber. 1 See aes.org/e-lib/browse.cfm?elib=18296. 2 See aes.org/e-lib/online/browse.cfm?elib=20690.

and Rockport (Atria II and Avior II). Several models from Rockport and VPI will be on display, demonstrated with electronics from Constellation (Revelation series), Gryphon, McIntosh, VAC, and Soulution. Digital from Roon Labs and MQA will be showcased on gear from Berkeley Audio Design (Alpha Reference series 3), Aurender, MSB Technology, and Mytek. Turntables from Acoustic Signature (Invictus Jr) and VPI (Avenger Reference and Prime Signature in rosewood) will be demoed using cartridges from Air Tight, SoundSmith, and Ortofon. All rooms will be outﬁtted with the latest room acoustics, cabling, power conditioning,

INDUSTRY UPDATE

Applying the binomial test—the common p<0.05 assessment—all but one of the ABX tests yielded decisive positive results, with p values well below 0.05. The most successful tests were those with loudspeakers and the Gaussian impulse; in those experiments, p was less than 0.0001 in all comparisons. The results of the MUSHRA study, evaluated using a two-way ANOVA analysis, were more tenuous but still supported a conclusion that “there is a possibility of a discrimination between Hi-Res and non-Hi-Res audio data.” In a brief email, Fukuda, the corresponding author on the paper, told me that next they intend to study

whether people can distinguish among bit depths of 16, 24, and 32 bits at a 48kHz sampling frequency. Beyond that, it would be good to see the test repeated with older listeners—with, presumably, less acute high-frequency hearing—and with a variety of loudspeakers, to determine which loudspeaker characteristics are most important for hearing such differences; the implications could be very important for loudspeaker design. Next, experiments could be carried out in a regular room, to determine whether such differences are audible in a domestic environment or whether the anechoic chamber is essential. I’d love to see the results

of interviews with the test subjects, to hear their subjective listening impressions: What, precisely, did they hear from the high-rez? What are the subjective characteristics of high-rez test signals, relative to their lower-rez counterparts? Finally, subjects trained using these test signals could then be exposed to carefully chosen music samples—maybe music with wood block or other percussion, resembling those Gaussian impulse signals but with more going on— and then gradually moving on to other kinds of music. Only then will we be in a position to identify the subjective characteristics of high-resolution music in a way that should satisfy objectivists.

US: NEW YORK CITY

in space, not deﬁned in channels, and the codec ﬁrmware distributes them wherever they need to go in the playback system. Because of this mapping approach, the format is platform

Next, I attended a session on “Recording and Realizing Immersive Classical Music for, and with, Dolby Atmos,” where record producer Jack Vad explained and demonstrated the San Francisco Symphony Orchestra’s recording of Henry Brant’s spatial composition Ice Field. A stereo recording—or even a 5.1 or 7.1 recording—of the orchestra, organ, and several instrumental groups positioned in locations around Davies Hall would fail to convey the effect Brant demanded. Using Atmos’s facility to place the microphone feeds from each element in space, Vad was able to present the whole soundﬁeld and convey the “liveness” of all the instruments. Like Sony’s 360RA, an Atmos recording is source-mapped and so can be enjoyed on any suitable end-point player. Although the binaural experience is

Kal Rubinson

The buzz at this year’s New York meeting of the Audio Engineering Society (AES) was immersive audio, as it has been for the last several years. I witnessed developments that may have a big impact on the future of multichannel audio. First, I listened to Sony’s new immersive codec, developed with the cooperation of the research society Fraunhofer IIS: 360 Reality Audio allows the producer to place any individual sound source anywhere in the surround ﬁeld. While I listened to binaural playback over regular headphones equipped with special decoding software, I was able to watch the placement (and movement) of sources mapped on a screen. With 360 Reality Audio, sources of sound are mapped and accessories from Synergistic Research. Audio racks from Artesania and Solid Tech will be on display in all rooms. Headphones from HIFI Man, Focal, Sony, and Audeze will be available for audition. Representatives from Sonus Faber, McIntosh, Aurender, MSB, and Constellation will be on hand. Eastwind Import will offer personally selected vinyl and CDs. A rafﬂe is planned, and a magically delicious lunch will be served. Parking is ample and free. Guests, visitors, and members alike are invited. For more information, visit laocas.com or call LAOCAS President Bob Levi at (714) 281-5850.

agnostic, so only one format needs to be distributed. (New Yorkers can visit a 360RA display located in the lobby of the Sony Building at 25 Madison Avenue.)

minnesota

] Tuesday, January 21, 7–9pm: The Audio Society of Minnesota will hold its monthly meeting at the Pavek Museum of Broadcasting in St. Louis Park, Minnesota. The January meeting will be our annual “bring and brag” social event. Members and guests are encouraged to bring in their favorite vinyl or CDs for playback on our high-performance audio system. Refreshments will be served; guests, visitors, and new members are welcome to attend. For the most current information regarding our meetings, please visit our website at sites.google.

com/site/audiosocietyofminnesota. ] Tuesday, February 18, 7–9pm: The Audio Society of Minnesota will hold its monthly meeting at the Pavek Museum of Broadcasting in St. Louis Park, Minnesota. The meeting will feature Atma-Sphere Music Systems. Ralph Karsten will be on hand to show the company’s award-winning vacuum tube ampliﬁers and preampliﬁers. Refreshments will be served. Guests, visitors, and new members are welcome to attend. For the most current information regarding our meetings, please visit our website: sites.google. com/site/audiosocietyofminnesota.

January 2020

stereophile.com

INDUSTRY UPDATE

effective (sfsymphony.org/brant), it pales beside immersive playback via more than a dozen ATC monitors. What’s most important is that, with both systems, a single-format release

can be played on any suitably equipped system via device-speciﬁc software or ﬁrmware. Moreover, both formats can be streamed, allowing anyone to experience surround sound, whether via

headphones, a conventional two-channel system, or a multispeaker setup. Amazon Music HD has announced it will start streaming both formats later this year.

US: NEW YORK CITY

its hardware. The AP folks thought this might be of interest to at least a few of Stereophile’s readers. The APx500 Flex software suite, as it is known, runs on a Windows 8 or 10 computer (or a Mac running Windows via Bootcamp), interfacing with the audio device under test via an audio interface. At about $3000 for the two-channel base conﬁguration, it should appeal to small shops that can’t afford full-featured AP hardware like the APx555 and perhaps also to well-heeled, serious loudspeaker and electronics designer hobbyists. (To the base conﬁguration, one can add extensions for measuring more channels and doing additional measurements; you can also purchase software for particular measurements à la carte.) The AP reps told me that APx500 Flex should work with any audio interface that uses ASIO drivers, including the $159 Focusrite Scarlett 2i2 I some-

times use to measure loudspeakers, but the software has been rigorously tested with only three: the Lynx Studio E22 (a PCIE card), the RME Fireface UC, and the Lynx Studio Aurora; the Fireface and the Aurora are external boxes you connect to your computer by USB. “Prospective purchasers are encouraged to try out the software with their preferred audio interface before buying.” Naturally, the quality of your measurements will depend not just on the software but on the quality of the audio interface: A cheap interface like my Focusrite is ﬁne for measuring loudspeakers in a room, but the noise level would likely be too high for measuring precision digital electronics or a very quiet preampliﬁer, for example. AP’s hardware-based analyzers “remain the best choice for developers, design engineers and test technicians,” according to company literature. Q

Jim Austin

Not long before the New York AES meeting, I got a note from the people at Audio Precision (AP), the company that makes the industry-standard system for measuring audio equipment. John Atkinson has used their equipment for decades to make most of the measurements Stereophile publishes. The AP folks requested a meeting. I showed up at the appointed time, in the AES room at the Jacob Javits Convention Center, and sat down with Nick Dimes, a PR and marketing consultant working with Audio Precision; Daniel Knighten, the company’s vice-president in charge of product development; and Paige Morford, an AP marketing specialist. The meeting, I soon learned, was to inform me about a new approach that AP was taking: For the ﬁrst time, AP would sell its audio-analysis software separate from

stereophile.com

January 2020

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BY MICHAEL FREMER THIS ISSUE : Mikey listens to VPI’s HW-40 40th Anniversary Edition turntable—and concludes that it’s much better than its twice-as-expensive predecessor.

VPI Industries turns 40

udging by VPI’s new HW-40 direct-drive turntable, middle age well suits the company that Harry and Sheila Weisfeld started 40 years ago in their Howard Beach, Long Island, basement. Harry Weisfeld began his career as an audio manufacturer with the HW-9, an isolation base for Denon’s DP-80 direct-drive turntable. (You could say the introduction of a VPI direct-drive ‘table completes a circle.) Next came the DB-5 “Magic Brick,” a wood-encased block of laminated ferrous metal said to act as a “sink” for stray electromagnetic radiation. Audiophiles around the world bought these and plopped them atop their ampliﬁers, swearing they heard an improvement. They still do both!

The HW-16 record cleaning masince the cassette was well on its way to doing that, the introduction of the chine followed, an improved version of which is still manufactured and sold. CD was more a final nail in the coffin than a fatal stab). VPI, along with a For you youngsters out there who few others, chose to ignore digital and don’t remember, the original HW-16 had its velvet-lipped suction channel built into the lid, and there was no water collection tank inside: You gently closed the lid and hoped the distance between the record and the lips produced the correct pressure. Not exactly ideal. The sucked-up fluid just drained into the chipboard box. If you were lucky, it evaporated before it saturated the chipboard and turned it into a soggy mess. No one was that lucky. But VPI made improvements, and older 16s were upgradeable to the HW-16.5—Art Dudley made the first one and wrote about it VPI, along with a few others, in The Absolute Sound, chose to ignore digital and and VPI put it into continue making turntables. production—which have the now-familiar continue making turntables, just as spring-loaded, velvet-lipped nozzle as some of us continued—in magazines well as an internal catch basin for the such as this one, on street corners, and vacuumed-up liquid. VPI introduced its first turntable, the in hysterical letters to the editor—adHW-19, in 1981, a year before Sony vocating for the LP. My vinyl advocacy introduced the CDP-101, the world’s was mocked at CES more times than I first commercially available CD player: can remember. The music business and the highForty years later, the basement performance audio industry began its workshop in Howard Beach is just a mad scramble to kill the LP (although, memory—VPI is now based in New stereophile.com

January 2020

Jersey—and Sheila Weisfeld sadly passed in 2011. CD sales continue plunging, and this year revenue from new vinyl record sales will surpass that of CDs. Add the value of used LP sales and it’s a physical media wipeout! No great surprise to me or to Harry Weisfeld. Why? We listened and preferred what we heard from records! Who’s laughing now? The new HW-40 direct-drive turntable is not VPI’s most costly, but in terms of design, execution, and value, it’s the best VPI turntable yet. Bundled with a JMW-12 “Fatboy”

gimbal-bearing 12" tonearm, the HW-40 costs $15,000 in its introductory, limited-edition version. (I’ll come back to that below.) That’s half of what VPI’s ﬁrst direct-drive turntable, the Classic Direct of 2013, cost in its day—yet the new ’table uses the same cogless, BLDC (Brushless Direct ThinGap motor,1 manufactured by ThinGap LLC of Ventura, California), adapted for VPI under the direction of the company’s director of electrical engineering, Mike Bettinger. 1 thingap.com/ironless-composite-stator

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The motor-drive electronics, designed by Bettinger and made by VPI, have also been improved, starting with the company’s changeover from a switching power supply to a linear one. Also in contrast to the Classic Direct, the HW-40’s power supply is built into the chassis. They can do that because the HW-40’s linear supply doesn’t produce difficult-to-suppress electronic noise. Bettinger visited my home when the ‘table was delivered, bringing with him a display sample of the HW-40’s newly designed and highly simplified machined-aluminum motor housing with integrated subplatter/rotor. This assembly, which also marks a change from the Classic, allows for the platter to be removed for shipping. The entire motor housing is flanged and incorporates a five-bolt pattern so it can be securely bolted to the plinth’s aluminum top plate. Removing the subplatter/rotor reveals the circular ThinGap stator core, made of 100% nonmagnetic material, with its coils of almost invisibly tiny, solid-copper, square-cross-section wire

Top: Subplatter bottom showing brass bushing surrounded by rotor ring. Bottom: ThinGap stator in the center of which is the inverted ball-topped spindle bearing.

arranged in an overlapping “V” and embedded in a composite structure. Bettinger pointed out that this design is far more rigid than having the coils mounted on printed circuit boards, as done on direct-drive designs from

other makers (read: Technics). The design is said by ThinGap to “signiﬁcantly reduce” torqueripple effects: a periodic increase or decrease in output torque as the output shaft rotates. (The same motor is used, albeit in a belt-drive implementation, in my reference Continuum Caliburn turntable.) The HW-40’s subplatter/rotor spins on an inverted bearing, central to which is a hardened steel ball atop a steel spindle shaft (similar to what VPI uses in its more conventionally driven Avenger or Titan turntable), the latter rigidly secured to the motor housing—as is the encoder that monitors the rotor rotation. (The Hall Effect commutation devices, which tell the computer the locations of the motor poles, are mounted deep at the stator’s bottom.) A brass bushing at the center of the subplatter/rotor ﬁts over the spindle, and the steel ball makes contact with a PEEK (polyether ether

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ketone) thrust pad. Bettinger told me that to drive the motor, the system produces a 10kHz pulse stream that hits each of the coils: “Basically you are ringing a bell every time you do that.” If the structure is not simple, he said, it can produce all sorts of harmonics and stored energy that get reflected back into the platter. It’s sort of like a voice coil, he said, with a platter sitting on top of it. Like that of the original Classic Direct Drive, the HW-40’s well-damped platter is precision-machined from an aluminum alloy billet and weighs 18lb. For its part, the entire integrated drivesystem assembly with subplatter/rotor and flanged housing weighs 25lb. VPI’s drive system uses a ring encoder that provides 2460 pulses per revolution to precisely monitor velocity as well as the platter/motor position. The HW-40 direct drive system is claimed to achieve 93% efficiency and

a torque of 2.68 Nm/sec—that’s high— so that, despite the platter’s high mass, it both accelerates to full speed and decelerates to a stop in 1 second. The software allows for ﬁne-tuning the application of speed corrections to the servo in order to minimize the effects of vibrations and system-generated noise. According to VPI, this ﬁnetuning was accomplished by monitoring the table’s output while playing unmodulated-groove test records, all while making adjustments via the software. The goal was to minimize or eliminate “any perceptible evidence of the motor drive signal.” Observational methodology—listening to music—was also used in the

tuning process with a large selection of well-known highquality recordings of strings, pianos, and vocals, as well as those known for producing vivid spatiality and well-deﬁned room-sound decay. You may be asking yourself, if VPI uses an even better version of the motor used in its $30,000 turntable in its $15,000 turntable, what’s been cheapened to account for the price differential? The answer is nothing, actually. In fact, this “halfprice” turntable is better in every way, in my opinion, than the Classic Direct. VPI says that back in 2014 it paid $4000 each for those ThinGap motors—and that doesn’t include the costs of R&D implementation. Using the usual audio-industry metric of retail being ﬁve times the parts cost, that’s $20,000 retail for the motor alone! No wonder the Classic Direct sold for $30,000! This time around, perhaps partly due to the vinyl resurgence and VPI’s

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growing worldwide presence, Mat Weisfeld ordered a lot of Thin Gap motors, at a considerably reduced price. While the HW-40 Anniversary model reviewed here, which sports glossy rosewood side panels, is a 400-unit limited edition (that’s already close to being sold out), the standard HW-40 will not be a limited-production model. Speaking of which, this limitededition version includes a really nice dustcover that in the future will be an extra-cost accessory—this in addition to the above-mentioned Fatboy arm, which is not intended to be swapped out for tonearms from other makers. Subsequent HW-40s will have a removable armboard as standard; the Fatboy will be available as an option, or the buyer can use the tonearm of his or her choice. Solid construction Yes, the improved motor/platter system is the main attraction, but VPI has done a great deal more here to produce what I believe is its best-ever ‘table. Plinth construction on this large-footprint (21.75" × 17" × 10"), 70lb assemblage is impressive (though its appearance is no better than that of the Classic Direct) and features a solid machined top plate of 0.75" 6061 aluminum finished in a textured black paint finish, internally damped with an MDF sheet. What’s considerably different and better here is a new, Bettinger-devised footer system. Each foot terminates in a large aluminum block that bolts firmly to the plinth’s innards and isolates the player both vertically and horizontally. Each foot’s thick bottom pad is of a metal-particle-flecked material Bettinger wouldn’t identify—but he said it absolutely would not compress over time despite the turntable’s high mass. An integral elastomer cylinder connects the aluminum block to the foot itself. (While the feet are heightadjustable to a small degree, VPI recommends leveling the platform you put the turntable on. That’s good advice with any turntable.) This is the first VPI turntable I’ve reviewed that provides a high degree of isolation from the surface upon which it rests. Despite the cones, feet, inserts, bladders, and what have you that VPI has used over the years, this is the first one where, if you tap (or bang!) on the platform, nothing gets through to the stylus. According to VPI, two years of work went into producing this level 26

the HW-40 is better damped, letting through only a subdued, quick-to-settle “pop” when the top plate is struck. Bettinger told me that the outer frame is well-isolated, too. I was able to corroborate that: Tapping on it produces nothing through the speakers. Measurements The HW-40’s speed accuracy and consistency numbers bettered those of the already fine Classic Direct, though the differences aren’t significant. (The HW-40’s frequency chart is more symmetrical and aesthetically attractive.2) Compared to the excellent measurements of my reference belt drive Continuum Caliburn turntable, these are three times better—for one-tenth the price! That said, as with flat on-axis speaker response, these measurements do not tell the sonic story. The HW-40’s improved footer assembly.

of performance using a combination of mass loading, mechanical stiffening, selective damping, and a combination of elastomers. In and of itself, the top plate is still somewhat lively, but compared to my memory of the Classic Direct,

The new Fatboy 3D-printed gimbal-bearing 12" tonearm The latest iteration of VPI’s 3D-printed resin tonearm features ultrahighprecision gimbal bearings (which, as I recall the story, Harry Weisfeld obtained from his neighbor Bell Labs/ Lucent Technology when it was sold and downsized), a new, large-diameter, supersmooth-rotating VTA/SRA tower, and a new azimuth adjustment feature: Loosen two Allen-head screws located where the tube enters the aluminum sleeve adjacent to the bearing yoke, and the tube easily rotates. One other major and unique change: Instead of the exposed tonearm wire with LIMO connector termination used exclusively for decades on VPI arms, whether unipivot or gimbaled, the wire on this Fatboy exits more traditionally at the base of the arm, routes into the plinth, and terminates with RCA jacks. The arm retains the previously used smooth-dialing–counterweight VTF-adjustment system. And yes, there’s an antiskating mechanism that you are free to use (as I do) or ignore (as HW does). One more thing: This arm is the ﬁrst in my experience with VPI where the armrest lock actually locks and stays locked in place. That is major. In other words, this Fatboy is VPI’s most normal arm ever. In every parameter, this new tonearm is a highprecision piece that’s a pleasure to set up and especially to use. 2 You can see the Classic Direct’s chart at stereophile. com/content/vpi-classic-direct-drive-signatureturntable.

January 2020

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Setup and use Placed atop an oversized HRS isolation base fitted with six isolation footers appropriate for the 70lb turntable’s weight, the HW-40 was up and running within minutes of its arrival. This is a large, heavy ’table that demands a great deal of real estate and an appropriately sturdy stand. Setting up a cartridge proved more difficult. What’s the effective length of the arm? What’s the cartridge weight range the arm can accommodate? What’s the arm’s effective mass? The instructions don’t provide any of this basic information. This has been a 40-year VPI problem! I had the same complaint about the Classic Direct’s instructions and specifications. The company makes various length arms, but none are identified on the arm, nor are their supplied singlepoint alignment gauges identified, and each is different. VPI provides a single point alignment gauge. Is the alignment Löfgren? Baerwald? Stevenson? Something else? The instructions don’t say. Without knowing the arm’s effective length, using another gauge is driving blind. I have quick and easy access to Mat and Harry, so it was easy for me to ascertain that the effective length is 292mm. Still, after 40 years, this should have been addressed long ago! VPI is not the only tonearm manufacturer that supplies simplified and less-than-ideal setup instructions, such as “set the arm height so it looks parallel with the record surface,” etc., so I’m not going to criticize that. But really, at least tell the customer the instructions are for easy, not precise, setup (and let them know about the azimuth feature, because the instructions don’t!). Armed with the correct effective length, I set up the Lyra Atlas SL using the Acoustical Systems Smartractor to set Löfgren A overhang and zenith angle, then a USB microscope to set 92 degree SRA, and finally a digital oscilloscope to set azimuth. I wanted to get the most from this arm and turntable. Later, I tried setting up the Ortofon 28

Anna D but found it was too heavy for the supplied counterweight, so I returned to the Ortofon A90. (Later, eager to try the Anna D, I added some Blu-tack to the end of the counterweight and got it to balance perfectly.) I also used a Stein Music The Perfect Interface ʋ Carbon Signature mat. It’s paper thin but produces noticeably better results. Using the HW-40 was easy and a complete pleasure. Even using the outer platter ring this time was easy and stress-free compared to VPI turntables past. Has it been further reﬁned, or am I just more coordinated? Not sure. Though the spindle is threaded, VPI supplied a heavy “drop on” weight that I also used, along with a heavy one from E.A.T. I used both Analysis Plus Silver Oval and Stealth Audio Helios MM interconnects. Rock-solid sonic performance Here’s what I wrote about the VPI Classic Direct: “The VPI combo of Classic Direct Drive turntable and 12" tonearm consistently produced mesmerizing sound that combined the rock-solid musical drive craved by fans of idler-wheel drive with the

quiet and nonmechanical tonal richness demanded by devotees of belt drive. Add to that exceptional transparency and retrieval of low-level detail; taut, deep, powerful bass; and a total lack of obvious colorations, and you have $30,000 worth of sound. And then some.” The jazz subscription label Newvelle released in its 2018 series More Than Enough (NV021), a gorgeous duet album featuring saxophonist Greg Tardy and guitarist Bill Frisell. It’s a very quiet, contemplative set, intimately miked, and opens with a cover of Duke Ellington’s “The Single Petal of a Rose.” Newvelle’s 2018 records were pressed at QRP, and all feature black backgrounds— and, fortunately, all are pressed as concentrically as possible. There are long sustains and decays into black that the HW40 delivered unerringly, which wasn’t surprising because when I did the speed test the 3150 tone was almost unwavering. (Test records aren’t perfectly concentric either.) Mobile Fidelity’s double 45rpm One Step edition of the Thelonious Monk Quartet’s Monk’s Dream (UD1S2-011) arrived during the review period. It was Monk’s Columbia debut, recorded during a week in early November 1962, and while the quartet of Monk, Charlie Rouse, Frankie Dunlop, and John Ore rocked and are always fun to listen to, this wasn’t what I’d call “prime Monk.” The 30th Street Studios recording is tightly miked with Dunlop hard right, Rouse and Ore center, and Monk hard left. The HW-40s produced the drive and precise transient performance that’s needed to effectively deliver the title-tune opener. Ore’s bass, lurking behind Rouse’s aggressive sax blasts, never got lost, with each pluck well expressed, though moving over to my reference turntable produced greater transient deﬁnition and pushed Rouse further forward in space—but to the tune of 10 times the cost? That’s a value judgment I won’t address. Monk’s ﬁrst solo on the album, in “Body and Soul,” demonstrated the January 2020

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’table and arm capable of handling ferocious attacks without hardening the transients and neglecting the instrument’s woody follow-through. While the recording is close-miked and relatively dry, especially compared to early 30th Street stereo recordings, there’s subtle fast reverb, too, trailing quickly behind all of the instruments. The HW-40 captured that well, as a pleasing cushion, whether I was running the Lyra Atlas, the Ortofon Anna D, or the Ortofon A90. More importantly, each cartridge expressed its recognizable sonic character, though, as I already mentioned, the Fatboy couldn’t carve the spaces or deliver the bottom that the $50,000 SAT arm manages. No great surprise! One day I’d like to hear the SAT on the HW-40. (I found a guy on Facebook who put one on the Classic Direct!) You know what? Considering the HW-40’s $15,000 price, its very good arm is almost a freebie. The ’table’s torque can drive the stylus through the most complex and dynamic passages, and its delivery of rhythm’n’pacing was rock-solid—yet there was no price to pay on the most subtle musical passages. The Electric

Recording Company just reissued the revered 1960 recording, by Leonid Kogan and the Paris Conservatory Orchestra, conducted by Constantin Silvestri, of the Mozart Violin Concerto No.3 in G major and the Mendelssohn Violin Concerto in E minor (UK Columbia SAX 2594/ ERC 049). I couldn’t ﬁnd a used original stereo copy anywhere on the internet, so I assume this record is rare and a keeper. This is a relatively distant though spectrally gorgeous and spatially solid recording, especially Kogan’s violin, which the HW-40 put in front of me, three dimensionally, in ways I’m still waiting for the digits to deliver. The ppp passages were drop-dead quiet and the fff ones—well, this recording was more about the p’s than the f’s. But on f-rich recordings, such as the Star Wars/ Close Encounters pairing that I have as a King Records Japan reissue test pressing (KIJC 9199), pressed at RTI, the HW-40 pushed the fffs in the grooves to the max without adding edge or even a hint of brittleness. All in all, this arm/’table combo for half the price of the Classic Direct struck me as quieter, smoother, more

musically engaging, and more relaxing. The quiet was the most obvious improvement: The HW-40 is as quiet a turntable I’ve heard here at any price, except perhaps the unobtainable and 10-times-more-costly Onedof. When I compared the HW-40 to a reference that includes the $50,000plus SAT CF1-09 tonearm: Yes, there was quite a difference, especially in terms of bottom-end slam, control, and detail resolution—and, most important, in carving out instruments in three-dimensional space, where the Fatboy tended to homogenize things. a little bit. How good is the ’table by itself? In time I’ll get to know that. But for now, since I wrote in 2014 that the $30,000 Classic Direct was a “game changer,” the even better $15,000 HW-40 is what? You tell me. Q

CONTACTS VPI Industries, Inc. 77 Cliffwood Avenue, #5D Cliffwood, NJ 07721 Tel: (732) 583-6895 Web: vpiindustries.com

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IN SEARCH OF THE EXCEPTIONAL

BY ART DUDLEY THIS ISSUE :

Maybe the earth really was ﬂat in the 1980s.

John Fahey and the Spiders from Kansas City

uring my first attempt at college, I lived in a dormitory where my nextdoor neighbors had an informal trade in pharmaceuticals; their most ardent customers were my neighbors across the hall. One of the latter was a fellow named Pete, a good-natured guy (if a bit sanctimonious in his disdain for music he considered insufficiently bluesy) whose heavy rotation list was, at the time, topped by John Fahey’s The Voice of the Turtle. I merely disliked the record the first time I heard it, but in the days ahead I came to loathe it. I found it repetitive, masturbatory, technically inept, and dead boring. Pete hated my music, too. But at 18, I was an insecure listener. I projected my own pretensions onto every musical artist I encountered—and so it never occurred to me that some of Dylan’s best songs were intended as humor, or that at least half of Robbie Robertson’s songs didn’t mean jack shit, or that listening to Led Zeppelin was okay because it was fun. That was almost a half-century ago; in the ensuing years, I learned to love a lot of music that was lost on the teenaged me. I have also learned to forgive myself—for that shortcoming, at least—although lingering embarrassment prevents me from disclosing all of the great composers and writers and performers whose stuff I didn’t get the first or sometimes even the second or third time around. The fact is that, at 18, I simply hadn’t listened enough, read enough, or lived enough to grasp all of what I was hearing. I hadn’t snuggled enough babies or mourned enough elders or done enough heavy lifting in the times between. John Fahey didn’t cross my radar again until 5 or 6 years ago, when a record store opened in the rural village I then called home: an unlikely occurrence that served only to strengthen my belief in a loving God. During that merchant’s brief time in Cherry Valley, NY, I bought some wonderful records—ones that remain among my very favorite, snatch-from-a-burninghouse LPs. Chief among them: a copy of a reissue1 of John Fahey’s first album, Blind Joe Death (Takoma C 1002), a collection of original and traditional instrumentals performed stereophile.com

January 2020

solo on a steel-string guitar, recorded in 1959 and, remarkably, rerecorded in 1964. When I saw it in the bins, I remembered how much I enjoyed the Fahey-curated-and-produced Harry Smith’s Anthology of American Folk Music, Volume Four (2 CDs, Revenant 211), so it seemed I should give his own compositions and performances another try. I’m awfully glad I did. This time around, I wasn’t hung up on the

surface details—the consistently outof-tune guitar, the lack of polish in the playing, the near-absence of any real development or improvisation in these repetitive and at times downright drone-y pieces—and was now able to focus on the intensity of the performances, and the apparently unique way Fahey melded blues and folk purism with his own slyly trippy take on simple ballads, laments, and hymns. (Or maybe the latter quality had been there all along, and Fahey just knew how to bring it out?) Yes, I still wonder about the out-oftune guitar. Was it a deliberate attempt to mimic the recordings left behind by itinerant musicians whose poor-quality fretted instruments couldn’t stay in tune or intonate properly? Was his indifference toward playing in tune part of some semi-unconscious ritual he used in preparation for his performances? Or did he consciously invent punk folk decades before the emergence of punk rock? I don’t know. Wondering is fun, but answers to those questions aren’t crucial to getting John Fahey’s music. For me. Anymore. It probably wasn’t my status as an audiophile that led me to ﬁnally appreciate John Fahey, but it surely had something to do with my status as a record collector—and in my mind those two lives are linked. And that leads me to wonder: Which performers or composers or entire styles of music did you have to keep coming back to before you got it? Which records did you hate as a kid that you now love as an adult? Please let me know (adudley@stereophile.com), and if you don’t mind, I may wind up putting your answer in this space a couple of months from now. CRYO ME A RIVER My life as an audiophile can be divided into six distinct eras: ERA I (1966–1969): My family’s (mono1 Only 100 copies were pressed of the original 1959 release; virtually all were given away, some to reviewers and folk-music archivists, others by sneaking them into record-store bins.

Sometimes, absolutely superb isn’t good enough. The successor to the Class A rated Spendor D7 is here. The D7.2. We were honored when Stereophile gave the Spendor D7 a Class A rating – that’s a remarkable accomplishment for a $6,500 loudspeaker. The new Spendor D7.2 features significant improvements to the proprietary Dynamic Damping system and a more rigid cabinet structure. The result is the sort of timing and transparency normally only found in far more expensive loudspeakers. But we didn’t stop there. The 7.2 boasts Spendor’s own advanced polymer 7 inch driver and proprietary LPZ soft dome tweeter. They’re beautifully integrated by a meticulously re-engineered crossover— creating an extraordinarily smooth, revealing sound. When it comes to the pursuit of a truly satisfying listening experience, we’re never satisfied. Audition the result at your local Spendor dealer. To find a dealer near you and to learn more about the Spendor D7.2, visit bluebirdmusic.com/D7.2

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The worst part of my job is the steady stream of disruptions to that system (although the results are often happy-making, as with the Ortofon SPU Century, Air Tight ATM-300R, etc.). The best part of my job is that I sometimes get to travel back in time and revisit individual products or whole technologies I used to live with. So it was in late summer 2019, when I received not only a generous loan of a mid-1980s all-Naim amplification system but a damn good excuse to take my Quad ESL speakers out of mothballs.2 The Naim components in question were their NAC 32-5 preamplifier and NAP 250 power amplifier, supplemented with their Hi-Cap outboard power supply; that last item was devised as an upgrade to a more basic system in which DC from the Naim amp’s own power supply is

phonic) Webcor record player, which I annexed: the rare sin for which this Catholic feels zero guilt. ERA II (1970–1981): Various humble component systems purchased with funds from my ﬁrst precollege parttime jobs. ERA III (1982–1985): The high-end era begins with my purchase of a Rega Planar 2 and winds down with ConradJohnson electronics and Magnepan speakers—all very good in their way. But halfway through this era was a dip in pleasure when I somehow wound up with a Sota Sapphire turntable (with a record clamp so badly designed that the user had to distend the suspension springs every time it was applied), Spectral DMC-5 preamp, and BEL amp: a combo that sounded Godawful through a pair of Thiel speakers. ERA IV (1986–1995): Flat Earth Artie: Linn LP12 and Roksan Xerxes turntables, Naim electronics, early Epos and ProAc speakers. A good time musically and sonically, if just a wee bit cultish. ERA V (1996–2007): Lowpower tubes and Lowthers— about the latter, the less said the better—and then, beginning in 2000, moderatepower tube amps and Quad electrostatics.

PHOTOS BY ART DUDLEY

ERA VI (2008–PRESENT):

Low-power tube amps and speakers that aren’t Lowthers—first Audio Note AN-Es, which I still admire, then various horns. I love where I am. The hi-fi I have now, which I’m listening to as I write this— Garrard 301 and Thorens TD 124 turntables (I still mean to dedicate one to stereo and the other to mono, and I still can’t decide which should be which), EMT, Ortofon, and Denon pickup heads and cartridges, an Auditorium 23 Hommage T2 step-up transformer, Shindo Monbrison preamp and Cortese power amp, and 1966 Altec Flamenco speakers, with Shindo, Auditorium 23, and Luna cables—does everything I want and need: color, texture, touch, force, flow, momentum, and scale, plus a pretty wide frequency range, convincing spatial performance on stereo records, and enough clarity and stereophile.com

January 2020

freedom from gross colorations that I can review gear with it. Looking back, the only things I miss from time to time are my Linn-Naim-ProAc system and that original Roksan Xerxes (all of said products having been sold a while back) and my Quads (which I still have but don’t get to use very often: There isn’t room in this house to maintain two full-size systems). I miss the Webcor a little, if only for its simplicity and portability, but it didn’t sound nearly as good as the portable KLH stereo owned by my best friend’s family.

used to power the preamp. In 1988, the 32-5/250/Hi-Cap combination was Naim’s second-best ampliﬁcation system, bettered only by the use of two NAP 135 monoblocks in place of the stereo amp. (In 1988, my own Naim setup was humbler: I started out with the less expensive NAC 62 preamp and NAP 140 amp, later upgrading to a Naim-reconditioned secondhand NAP 250.) As with the Nait 2 integrated amp I 2 I actually keep them in vacuum-pack mattress bags: Dust and Quads really hate each other.

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wrote about in the May 2016 Stereophile,3 the Naim components in question had been serviced by AV Options, a US company whose star technician is UK-born Chris West, who worked for Naim for a goodly number of years. (AV Options is also an authorized Naim Audio service center and has expanded into retailing, via internet, a few products that fit their Naimfriendly view of the hi-fi world.) The NAC 32-5 was given the basic AVO rebuild service for that model, including upgraded locking DIN sockets from PrehKeyTec of Germany ($995) and WBT Nexgen RCA jacks, treated with AVO’s “Deep-Cryo” cryogenic treatment ($180), in place of the original BNC Phono-1 sockets. The preamp’s MM phono-input boards were rebuilt ($195) and fitted with Vishay Z Foil loading resistors that had also been given the Deep Cryo chill ($125). The NAP 250 amp had been treated to AVO’s standard rebuild ($1695), which includes all-new tantalum and electrolytic capacitors, all-new trim potentiometers, and more. The amp also got some Deep Cryoed Z Foil resistors of its own ($150) and a Deep Cryo treatment for its mains transformer and wiring loom ($500). The Hi-Cap power supply had the full AVO rebuild appropriate to that product ($995), plus PrehKeyTec locking DINs ($295) and its own transformer cryogenic treatment ($500). The amplifier and power supply were also supplied with AVO’s TibiaPlus 12 Deep-Cryo AC cords ($219/6’). No less important for the purposes of this review was an adjustment to the amp’s B+ rail, applied by Chris West to make the NAP 250 more suited to the Quad ESLs. As West explained in an email, “Normally each amp channel runs off +39.3/–39.9 DC voltage rails supplied by two regulated power supply circuits. For safe use with Quad [ESLs], the rail voltages are dialed down to +36.3V/–36.9V.” For those readers who are unfamiliar with the brand, Naim Audio has, since their founding in 1972, specialized in solid-state amplifiers of generally modest to moderate output power. (The NAP 250 of 1988 output 70Wpc into 8 ohms—scarcely less than their then-flagship amp, the 75W NAP 135 monoblock.) Other Naim characteristics include their use of quasi-complementary class-AB output stages—NPN transistors are used for both halves of the waveform, rather than the far 34

more common approach of using NPN devices for one phase and PNP for the other—and Naim’s amps make extensive use of star grounding. The latter has consequences beyond each product’s chassis: In a Naim-centric system equipped with a Hi-Cap, that external power supply becomes the central ground point to which all other electronics (and in some settings even the turntable and tonearm) are referenced. Older Naim products also possess the endearing combination of sensible size and different-drummer styling. As for the latter quality, my review samples all sported the company’s original “chrome-bumper” casework, named for the polished edges of the otherwise black-painted aluminum extrusions in which they were housed. Speaking only for myself, I miss that look and would go as far as to suggest that Naim Audio Ltd., now owned by Focal, is missing the boat by not offering a period-correct “vintage-reissue” Naim Nait 2. And then there are my Quads, the rehabilitation of which I began to recount in the June 2006 Stereophile.4 They remain as they were at the completion of that project, with one exception: After seeing and hearing, on more than one occasion, the ESLs owned by Robin Wyatt of Robyatt Audio, which are ﬁtted with Spider Leg stands designed and build by Electrostatic Solutions ($795 for a stereo set), I bought and installed a set of my own. These supports, which are machined from solid maple, take the place of the Quads’ slim beechwood side panels; integral to the new panels, which measure 1.125" thick, are gracefully curved feet that elevate the ESLs in a way that I ﬁnd perfect for close-range listening in a smallish room. (For Quad owners with larger rooms, taller Spider Legs are available at a higher cost.)

BY THE TIME WE GOT TO SALISBURY And so we come back to John Fahey’s Blind Joe Death. I couldn’t imagine a more suitable recording with which to relive the joys of 1980s-era Naim amplification, which is known for performing in a manner indifferent to the technical qualities of the recording at hand, for honing in on the meaning of the music itself, and for finding and communicating all nuances of musical momentum, flow, and pacing. So I directed the output of my usual LPplaying front end (Garrard 301 turntable, EMT 997 tonearm, EMT TSD 15 pickup head, Hommage T2 step-up transformer) into the Naim preamp’s phono input, connected the Naim amp to my Quads with the same 21' pair of AV Options Twisted 56 speaker cable I used with the vintage Nait 2 ($674 plus $195 for the Deep Cryo treatment), and sat down to listen. “Poor Boy, Long Ways From Home,” an antecedent of the Rolling Stones’ “Prodigal Son,” sounded enjoyably relentless. “In Christ There Is No East or West” was equal parts reverent and joyful, the latter especially when Fahey switches from strumming out a chordal melody to fingerpicking the tune with a double-time alternating bass line. But it was on the very weird “Sun Gonna Shine in My Back Door Some Day” that the Naim-Quad combination did what I believe it was supposed to do: It presented the music in a direct, forceful, momentous fashion, one in which every note had a life of its own. Indeed, every note was like a word in a strange, disjointed sentence, as one might hear in a dream. Which is to say, it sounded great. I didn’t stop there. Since the Naim gear arrived in August, I couldn’t restrain myself from celebrating the 50th 3 See stereophile.com/content/listening-161. 4 See stereophile.com/ artdudleylistening/606listening/index.html.

January 2020

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anniversary of Woodstock by listening to the first two albums’ worth of music to be released from the festival, compiled in the 2009 box set Woodstock (5 LPs, Cotillion/Rhino R1 519622). The most notable qualities brought to Crosby, Stills & Nash’s “Suite: Judy Blue Eyes” by the Naim-Quad system, compared to my usual electronics and speakers, were the clarity, presence, and downright spooky realism of the voices between the speakers. Yet the Naim electronics did nothing to dispel my idea of the Quads as most suited to nearfield listening, as opposed to filling a whole room with music: If anything, the Naims made me pull my seat even closer to the electrostatic panels. Rest assured I was rewarded. An even greater reward came with the album’s next selections: Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young’s “Sea of Madness,” a great performance of a pleasantly quirky Neil Young song (which, it turns out, was not actually recorded at Woodstock: Apparently the title’s appropriateness to the event overruled the forthrightness of artists and record producers alike). A standout was Greg Reeves’s electric bass line, which was deep and resonant yet tight enough to

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sound like music and not just a pleasant low-frequency sound. Through the Naims and Quads, I missed not one note of Reeves’s superb playing: His occasional ultrafast triplets were a treat. And Joe Cocker’s “With a Little Help from My Friends” sounded magniﬁcent, owing especially to the insight the system offered into the nuances of the lead vocal and of the falsetto backing vocals gamely supplied by members of the Grease Band. 1969 beckoned again, this time in the person of the recently released (as I write this) three-LP Anniversary Edition of the Beatles’ Abbey Road (3 LPs, Apple/Universal 0602508007466). John’s rhythm guitar on “Come Together”—especially during each chorus, when he dialed up the intensity of his playing—sounded convincingly present. And Paul’s bass—which is the driving force behind this very arrangementdependent song, and which gives it its redeemingly sinister quality—was well done, if a little boomy on a couple of notes. As for detail retrieval—well, the Quad ESL wrote the book on presenting detail without brightness and without sounding ﬁddly, didn’t it? Ringo’s off-mike shout following

the instrumental measures was clearly audible, as was the hard-to-describe wink in Paul’s voice during some portions of “Maxwell’s Silver Hammer,” a song I can do without. (I never said a more detailed presentation was always a good thing.) The downside of the Naim-Quad combo’s performance with this album? A lousy sense of scale—actually no scale at all. John’s voice in “I Want You (She’s So Heavy)” sounded like it was the size of a G.I. Joe doll. Similarly, on the recording of Mozart’s Requiem by Roland Bader, the Böblingen Bach Choir, and the Stuttgart Philharmonic (LP, Vox STPL 512 740), the sounds of all those instruments and voices were miniaturized and those massed voices often sounded strained. But never mind. The sound of Johnny Griffin’s tenor sax, not to mention Max Roach’s explosive drumming, throughout Griffin’s “Chicago Calling,” from Introducing Johnny Griffin (LP, Blue Note 1533), was what the Naim-Quad combo was all about. This performance pressed every one of my buttons, music lover and audiophile alike, at the same time. In fact, this gear obliterated that distinction. There was

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audible space around all the instruments, which came across exactly as one hears it in a live setting. Cymbals sizzled, neither too little nor too much. Curly Russell’s bass propelled the music with crazy temporal realism. There was clarity, touch, and—through this rebuilt preamp and amp—more timbral color than I’ve ever before heard from Naim gear. Then I came back to small-scale acoustic music: On a copy of the folk-lullaby collection Golden Slumbers (LP, Caedmon TC 1399), given to me by Herb Reichert, the combination of Naim ampliﬁcation and Quad electrostatic panels presented an unusually rich-voiced Pete Seeger with a scarypresent banjo. Yet that level of realistic presence was nothing compared to the voice and nylon-string guitar of Oscar Brand singing “Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star.” As Herb might put it: Folks, this is one of the most musically charming records you’ll ever hear. The sense of being in the room with the performers was so real, I could almost smell the wax of the candles that surely lit the recording space during these sessions. Golden Slumbers is already one of my favorite records, and I think

ored by nostalgia, or by my rekindled love for small-scale acoustic folk music—or is it just the chrome-bumper thing? Possibly: I’m only human. But at the end of the day, it seems to me those crazy ﬂat-earthers of yesterday had at least one thing right: There may be other amps that sound better in one regard or another, but there aren’t a great many that simply play music better than a Naim. Q

CONTACTS I’d rather listen to it on this gear than anything else. Whenever I introduce a product to my system, the last question I ask myself is: Could I live with this? This time out, especially with music that didn’t need to sound big to succeed, the answer was an unambiguous Yes. Hey, I already own and love the Quad ESLs, even if they don’t spend as much time in front of me as they used to. And of all the ways I know to successfully feed and drive them—I certainly haven’t heard them all—my all-around favorite approach is the one provided by classic Naim electronics. Is my opinion col-

AV Options Tel: (847)329-9549 Web: avoptions.com Naim Audio Ltd. Southampton Road Salisbury Wiltshire SP1 2LN UK Tel: (44) 1722 426 600 Web: naimaudio.com Electrostatic Solutions 2929 Cherry Street Kansas City, MO 64108 Tel: (913)208-7657 Web: estatsolution.com

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GRAMOPHONE DREAMS

THIS ISSUE : Herb reviews what may be the ﬁrst-ever full-range true ribbon headphones. And feeds the Little Mermaid.

BY HERB REICHERT

RAAL-Requisite SR1a headphones

ell me now: When you’re there in the scene, watching Lord Voldemort chase Han Solo through the Cave of the Klan Bear, how often do you notice that the sounds you’re experiencing are being pumped at you from ﬁve black-painted room boundaries, while the ﬂickering-light images approach from only one? Moreover, in a parallel, more quotidian reality, you’re sitting upright in your seat, noisily chomping popcorn while absorbing—and processing—massive amounts of sensory data: Did you ever consider the sensual, mechanical, and psychological complexity of a moment like this, and how fundamentally unnatural it is?

What I love most about cinema is how easily and effectively my brain lets me experience being there in the bed with Brigitte Bardot in Les Femmes (1969), or there on the platform of the train depot during the opening sequence of Once Upon a Time in the West (1968). My memories of both places remain vivid. I confess, I do not understand how my mind can convert marginally realistic sounds and two-dimensional flickering-light images into me being somewhere else. But I do have this memory of my 3-year-old daughter putting a cookie in the door of our VHS player. When I asked her why she did that, she looked at me and said, with absolute matter-of-factness, “I’m feeding the Little Mermaid.” It was then I realized: We are wired from an early age to assemble extremely abstract data into powerful conscious realities. This reality-forming process appears to function pretty well no matter how unnatural or abstracted the data it’s working with. Whether I’m reading a book, watching a movie, or listening to music files, the success of my brain’s reality-construction depends not on the quantity or quality of data, but instead on my ability to focus my attention on the data as it is presented. The more complete my focus, the more complete my experience of a constructed reality. I remember my college anthropology teacher explaining how, almost a century ago, explorers filmed a tribe of indigenous Melanesians. When they projected the moving images on a screen, no one in the tribe recognized the chief or his wife or anything that resembled their world. Why? Because stereophile.com

January 2020

they had not yet learned to decode the pictographic language of cinema. Because they had never fed the Little Mermaid. And of course being an audiophile means I’ve spent my life staring at an equipment rack between a pair of wood boxes—watching whole operas, Horowitz at Carnegie Hall, or a sweaty

I’ve spent a lifetime learning to “see” musicians both inside and outside the speaker boxes. Tina Turner singing “Proud Mary.” I saw all this because I’ve spent a lifetime learning to “see” musicians both inside and outside the speaker boxes. All this cranial-nerve anthropology brings me to the chief question of this column: Is listening to music with headphones really more difficult or “unnatural” than reading a book? Watching a movie on a flat screen? Or staring at the space between wood boxes? Or rather: Is the art of headphone listening something many audiophiles of a certain age have never learned to do—like Gen Z never learned to sit in a sweet spot staring between giant speakers? Well folks, it’s never too late for old dogs, because I’m pretty sure I’ve found a unique nonheadphone headphone—one that will instantly satisfy both headphone connoisseurs and stubborn contrarians: the RAAL-Requisite SR1a’s ($3499). These radical hightech contraptions sit lightly on your head and neither cover your ears nor put pressure on your pinna. Plus! They image outside and away from your skull—similar to floorspeakers! Are you ready? RAAL-Requisite SR1a headphones I must start by introducing Aleksandar Radisavljeviü. He’s the founder and chief engineer of Serbian manufacturing company RAAL Advanced Loudspeakers, established in 1995, which 39

GRAMOPHONE DREAMS

manufactures a range of dipole ribbon tweeters. Aleksandar is also co-founder and director of R&D and manufacturing for Requisite Audio Engineering of Ventura, California, which is responsible for the creation of the RAALRequisite SR1a ribbon headphones, which the company describes with the trademarked descriptor “Earfield Monitors.” To the best of my knowledge, the RAAL SR1a’s contain the world’s first and only full-range pure ribbon driveunits. To qualify as a pure ribbon, the diaphragm must be a thin, rectangular strip of metal foil, attached only at its narrow ends and energized by rows of permanent magnets at its sides. The diaphragm of a pure ribbon is not attached to a film substrate, as with Magnepan’s quasi-ribbons or various manufacturers’ air-motion transformer tweeters. The SR1a’s design aesthetic relies heavily on laser-cut stainless steel rectangles and thick buffalo leather. To situate the RAALs properly on my head, I needed to adjust the length of the broad leather top band and the narrower leather back-of-head band. These two bands combine to center

the twin 3.77" × 0.75" (95mm × 19mm) open-baffle ribbon-drivers on the entrance to my ear canals. Along the front edge of each SR1a baffle is a 0.65" × 4" roll of red-orange memory foam wrapped in Italian lambskin suede. That foam-and-suede roll keeps the SR1a off the head and away from the ears. The back part of each earpiece features a gusseted pentagonal wing made of what appears to be lenticular gray-black carbon fiber. That “wing” serves as a waveguide while increasing the area of the ribbon’s baffle, allowing for deeper bass. The SR1a’s weigh 15oz (425gm) and come packed in a Pelican case. The RAAL ribbon’s natural impedance is a near-dead-short 0.018 ohm. Therefore, they need to be driven by a 50-150Wpc loudspeaker power amplifier (not included) via an impedancematching interface box (included). This 2" × 5" × 7" ventilated black box contains banks of power resistors that bring the SR1a’s apparent load up to approximately 6 ohms. The output of this interface box must be connected to the SR1a headset via a 7' Y-cable with a female XLR connector (use of which prevents the owner from accidentally

connecting the RAAL headphones directly to the output of a headphone amp, with guaranteed bad results). Also included are two 2' pairs of banana-to-banana cables for connecting the output of your power amplifier to the input of the interface box. The RAAL-Requisite SR1a’s, which come with a 5-year warranty, are not only the world’s first full-range pure ribbon transducer; as far as I know they are also the world’s first headphones that are repairable by the user. The SR1a ribbon drivers are encased in a unique “cartridge” that simply slides in and out of the headphone shell. No tools are required, it takes just a few minutes, and electrical contact is made automatically. These field-replaceable ribbon cartridges cost $199 each or $350/pair. Cupping and chambering Beyond their unprecedented full-range ribbon-ness, the RAAL-Requisite SR1a headphones are distinguished by their off-the-ear-ness. This is important: It means their sound character is not manufactured or controlled by a circular padded acoustical chamber surrounding the listener’s pinna—like

GRAMOPHONE DREAMS

virtually all other over-ear headsets. This is important because all circumaural over-ear headphones have one unsubtle, unnatural, and unavoidable listening component: They mechanically cup our ears, and we can feel them doing this cupping the whole time they’re on our heads. (If you cup your hands right now and place them snugly over your ears, you’ll experience the resonant seashell-like sounds that result from this cupping.) This air-tight pressurizing is also called “chambering,” which is how over-ear headphones make bass. The problem is, this audible circumaural cupping and chambering mask detail and compress lower frequencies. Cupping is what tells my brain that sound is being pressured into my ear canals. Even when I close my eyes, my awareness of cupping shuts me in and encourages me to imagine the band is playing inside my head. (Headphonehaters hate when that happens.) Off-the-ear headphones like the RAAL-Requisite SR1a’s and the JPS Labs Abyss AB-1266 Phi’s do not cup or chamber: Instead, they hover near the listener’s ear, which means they deliver free and open reproduction that requires very little brainwork to

reconstruct. Amp requirements Aleksandar Radisavljeviü explains why the SR1a headphones need a 100Wpc amp: “Since there is already a 10:1 (or higher) ratio of cable to ribbon resistance, this means that the ribbon will not be controlled by ampliﬁer damping. (It was clear from the beginning that ribbon excursion and damping control must be accomplished by passive means: using small amounts of acoustical resistance.) “Since the ampliﬁer damping factor plays no role and the cables need to be terminated with more than 2 Ohms, then we can use a resistor of any convenient value connected in series to the headphones and their cable. As far as the ribbon is concerned, this is a current-source operation mode. “The RAAL specs say: IMPEDANCE: 0.018 ohms SENSITIVITY: 85dB/1 mW POWER HANDLING WITH BASSHEAVY TRACKS: 450 mW RMS MAX SPL AT 450 MW RMS (LIMITED BY RIBBON EXCURSION AT LF):

111dB

“To develop 450 mW of power at 0.018 ohms load, we need 5 Amps RMS.” Listening with the Schiit Aegir Schiit’s new $799 Aegir amplifier generates 10Wpc in class-A and 20Wpc in Schiit’s proprietary Continuity bias. It is lower-powered than the RAALRequisite headphones require, but it is my current reference for high-quality solid-state power at a low price. It is also my current favorite headphone amp. Not surprisingly then, it is the first amp I used with the SR1a’s. With moderate musical program at moderate volume levels, I did not notice any power limitations—only clear, liquid, elegant sound. The sound of Vladimir Horowitz’s piano on Horowitz the Poet (44.1/16 FLAC, Deutsche Grammophon/Qobuz) flowed naturally and emitted all the coded data my brain needed to forget hi-fi, headphones, and audio journalism. Vlad’s piano sounded true of tone—like it should always sound. Enjoyability level was high. Listening to this record was the first time I felt I had the SR1a’s positioned perfectly relative to my pinna. Because

GRAMOPHONE DREAMS

the RAALs sit away from my skull, and because the carbon fiber “baffles” are adjustable, it took me a couple of days to get the bass vs space ratio dialed in. As always, when Horowitz sounds right, I know my system is right. With the Schiit Aegir, the RAAL-Requisite headphones’ greatest virtue became obvious: They did not sound like any circumaural headphone or in-ear monitor I know of. With their extreme purity and resolution, the SR1a’s deposited Vladimir Horowitz, his piano, and the room he was playing in right there, in the space in front of me. Not inside my skull. Everyone knows I’m a devotee of small, monitor-type speakers listened to in the extreme nearfield—wherein they play big. Stereophile Raal Hedphones Impedance (ohms) & Phase (deg) vs And the RAALs are just that: Frequency (Hz) They are, unquestionably, small monitorlike speakers that play big when listened to from about 0.75" from my ear. What more could I want? The words “whole” and “resolved” acquired new meaning as I listened to my favorite test track: “Buddy & Maria Elena Talking in Apartment” from Buddy Holly’s Down the Line: Rarities (CD, Decca B001 167502). More than ever before, I felt like I was in a real apartment beauty in your recordings than the (not in my head) hearing two people RAAL-Requisite SR1a’s connected to sound like themselves, saying real-life this extraordinary design. I experienced things. Think high resolution and natuno current shortages, and Vladimir ral at the same time—not hi-fi. Horowitz’s piano sounded richer and That being said, when I turned the more solid than ever. volume up on “Love Is Strange,” the The Nelson Pass–designed amp Aegir made a few crunchy clipping made the Aleksandar Radisavljeviü– sounds. The RAALs were demanding more current than the Schiit could designed ribbons sound absolutely deliver. pure and relaxed with not even a hint of glare on sopranos or massed strings. Listening with the Pass Labs XA25 On viola da gamba virtuoso Hille If you want to hear what your amp rePerl’s Loves Alchymie (44.1/16 FLAC, Deutsche Harmonia Mundi/Tidal), ally sounds like, or everything your exwhen soprano Dorothee Mields speaks pensive phono cartridge is recovering, these words from John Donne’s poem or how different all your DAC’s filters The Bait—“Come live with me and sound, you need a head-mounted be my love / And we will some new transducer that resolves at the level of pleasures prove”—I could hear each the RAAL SR1a, coupled to the classword bounce off the church walls. Her A Pass Labs XA25 stereo amplifier, which is definitely more powerful than voice was framed in seductive pulsing reverberation. The experience made its modest 25Wpc into 8 ohms and me grateful to be an audiophile and to 50Wpc into 4 ohms ratings suggest. have discovered this beautiful, enchantNo matter what hi-fi you have, it’s unlikely to dig deeper and find more ing album. 42

Best of all, on this recording, the RAALs showcased their most engaging virtue: material presence. Hille Perl’s viola da gamba appeared in full, tangible materiality. Her instrument had bite and weight and emitted the sounds of ancient wood. Perl’s bow strings felt more like horsehair than they had with any other headphones in my possession. Listening with the Benchmark AHB2 The Schiit Aegir demonstrated that the RAAL ribbons were highly resolving. The Pass Labs amp took said resolution and transparency to the next higher level, and added more physical weight to the presentation. But both amplifiers are under 100Wpc. So I decided to try a more powerful amplifier, one that many people recommend for the SR1a headphones: Benchmark’s AHB2 stereo amp. The AHB2 is famous for its low measured distortion, low output impedance, and high damping factor. According to the Benchmark manual, the AHB2 combines a class-H power supply and classAB amplifier technologies with feed-forward error correction. Most important, the Benchmark amp is specified to deliver greater than 29A into 1 ohm (!) and 80V peak-to-peak into any load. The manual says it can put 130Wpc into 6 ohm loads such as the RAAL SR1a. The AHB2 drove the RAAL ribbons with authoritative clarity. Playing “Cet Enfant-là” from Alexandre Tharaud’s Barbara (44.1/24 FLAC, Erato Warner Classic/Qobuz), I experienced an avalanche of previously unheard inner detail. The AHB2 made the SR1a’s feel like an aural microscope. The sound was unabashedly clear and well-sorted, but it was also brittle and bright on the Horowitz and Hille Perl recordings. During parts of Jean-Louis Aubert’s vocals (on Barbara), this brightness would sporadically flash my ears with a distracting glare (between 1kHz– 3kHz). This reoccurring glare compelled me to turn the volume down. Tharaud’s piano appeared enjoyably percussive, but its normally saturated tone was now lightly and evenly January 2020

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GRAMOPHONE DREAMS

bleached. The spit and wet throat were missing from Aubert’s vocals. The sensual pleasures of “Poème Vivant” were abridged. Nevertheless, I understood why so many engineering types would choose the AHB2 with the SR1a’s: It played superclear, dug deep, and recovered much. Listening with the Rogue Audio Stereo 100 I tried the RAAL SR1a’s with only one tube amp: Rogue Audio’s 100Wpc Stereo 100. It sounded okay, but the amp clipped easily and often. That discouraged me from trying any other tube ampliﬁers. Important comparisons Q: Are the $3500 SR1a’s better than the $4999 Abyss AB-1266 Phi’s? A: No. But they are not inferior. The Abyss AB-1266 Phi’s remain my reference headphones. When powered by the Pass Labs XA25 ampliﬁer, the Abyss ’phones deliver the most natural, lifelike audio reproduction I have experienced. The Abyss headphones are also quieter and more transparent than the SR1a’s. Like the SR1a’s, the AB-1266 Phi’s sit off the ear, but only far enough to not cup or chamber. The SR1a’s sit farther off the ear and, consequently, let in more room sound. This added openness is a pleasure to experience— especially the imaging. But said openness automatically reduces quietude and transparency. The sonic landscape of the Abyss AB-1266 Phi’s is liquid and silent, like its namesake. Like the ocean’s depths, the Abyss ‘phones showcase a shadowy transparency. In stark contrast, the SR1a’s exhibit a hazy, bright-sun transparency. The RAAL-Requisites are more conspicuously open and dynamic than the Abyss ‘phones. But . . . Please understand . . . the Abyss and RAAL headphones sound more alike than they sound like any other headphones out there. Both headphones exist on the leading edge of transducer science. Their only competition (in my limited experience) is the HiFiMan Susvara headphones. Q: Are the RAAL SR1a ribbons better than the HiFiMan Susvaras? A: Maybe a little. As I switch from the completely open SR1a’s to the merely open AB1266 Phi’s to the not-very-open (cirstereophile.com

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cumaural) HiFiMan Susvaras, the sonic landscape becomes more closed in. With the Susvaras, I can definitely hear that cupping-induced seashell reverb I described at the beginning. Conclusions Three types of audiophiles will appreciate the RAAL-Requisite SR1a’s: The first are seasoned headphone connoisseurs who have been in the game a while and already own a collection of venerable exotics like Sony’s MDR-R10 and Qualia 010, AKG’s K1000, and Grado’s original RS1. These listeners are confirmed aficionados seeking to experience recordings with the greatest amount of verity . . . and (!) that extra special lightning-in-abottle something that raises a headphone above the herd of its time. For these audiophiles, the RAAL-Requisite SR1a’s will be a must-have addition to their collection. The second are crotchety audiophiles who detest headphone listening, declaring it “unnatural!” These headphone holdouts will love and embrace the RAAL-Requisite SR1a. They will be astonished (and feel validated) by how much the SR1a’s sound like regular sit-on-the-floor loudspeakers. The third are mastering engineers. My friend Frank Schröder, the renowned German tonearm designer, was the person who turned me on to the RAAL-Requisite ribbons. He loaned me his pair while he visited NYC. Frank said he used the SR1a’s to master recordings, and sure enough, I discovered that Aleksandar Radisavljeviü designed them with that use in mind. No question, they are revealing enough for the job. In my view: The RAAL-Requisite SR1a’s are both revelatory and revolutionary. Class A+. Q

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VOCE TRIPLE SUB

With App Controlled Built-In DSP & 800 Watts RMS of Digital Power!

CONTACTS Requisite Audio Engineering 2175 Goodyear Ave, Suite 110 Ventura, CA 93003-7761 Tel: (818)437-0779 Web: requisiteaudio.com Manufacturer RAAL Advanced Loudspeakers d.o.o. Djordja Simeonovica 4 19000 Zajecar Serbia Tel: 381 64 144 1111 Web: raalrequisite.com, raalribbon.com

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EQUIPMENT RE PO RT

JASON VICTOR SERINUS

Gryphon Ethos CD PLAYER–D/A PROCESSOR

hat kind of creature is this? Gryphon Audio Designs’ new Ethos ($39,000)—pronounced EE-toss by its Danish manufacturers—is marketed as a CD player and digital-to-analog converter. It’s decidedly au courant in that it includes two 32bit/768kHz ES9038PRO Sabre DAC chips—one for each channel—with each holding eight individual DAC chips; offers optional upsampling to either 24/384 PCM or DSD128; and decodes up to 32/384 PCM and quadruple DSD (DSD512) via its USB input, or up to 24/192 (and no DSD) via AES/EBU or S/PDIF. It does not decode MQA or the high-resolution layer of an SACD disc, and it has no Ethernet port. Aspects of its styling are eye-catching and resolutely retro: Its strikingly lit, top-loading disc mechanism resembles an LP platter, access to which is gained by lifting a tonearm-like handle. The gold-plated puck that holds the CD in place (as on most or all toploaders) evokes nothing so much as a CD record weight. Especially when its CD transport lights up from within during disc loading, the Gryphon Ethos is the most beautiful audio component I’ve ever had the opportunity to handle. Once I had made peace with its wide choice of reconstruction ﬁlters—seven PCM and three DSD—and decided whether I preferred its optional upsampling feature, or not, I found the Ethos among the easiest of components to control, whether by its front panel or (sturdy) remote. I frequently found myself gazing at what Gryphon refers to as the player’s “vacuum ﬂuorescent” front panel display. Like the gryphon of Greek mythology—its eagle head and wings and lion body are thought, by company founder Flemming E. Rasmussen, to represent “the perfect union” of grace and power—the Ethos is a singular creature that plays by its own rules.

From there to here Gryphon’s heritage extends back to 1985, when Rasmussen founded the company and began designing the exteriors of all Gryphon components. Gryphon’s first product, a pure– class-A dual-mono head amp, was intended at first to enable Rasmussen to discern differences between phono cartridges more effectively. The revelation of detail and subtle differences were priorities from day one. “It was the first pure dual-mono, pure class-A amplifier in the world, and it set our path forward,” Gryphon’s sales director, Rune Skov, explained at the start of a Skype conversation that also included Gryphon’s chief engineer/ head of R&D, Tom Møller, and CEO Jakob Odgaard. For 35 years, the company has stuck to a philosophy that stresses a synergy between aesthetics and performance. Gryphon remains dedicated to pure class-A, dual-mono, and fully symmetrical balanced circuitry, and strives for a neutral sound that eschews an identifiable house signature—that and, in Odgaard’s words, “no fooling around with surround and multi-channel. We stick to what we were created for.” Take that, Kal Rubinson. “We use the same pathways as in 1985 but have added a lot due to the creativity of Tom and the rest of the guys in the R&D team,” Skov said. Gryphon released the world’s first asynchronous upsampling CD player, the Gryphon CDP-1, in 1998. Speakers followed in 1999 with the Cantata, a large bookshelf loudspeaker that included outboard Linkwitz circuitry to correct woofer output to the room. “Our philosophy is one of controlled madness,” said Skov with a laugh. “It’s controlled madness because it makes no sense building 200W pure class-A amplifiers. We don’t hold back on performance and would rather wait six months or one year to launch a product so that the performance level

Description Single-box CD player and D/A processor with user-selectable ﬁlters and upsampling. Digital inputs: 1 USB B, 1 AES/EBU (XLR), 1 S/PDIF (BNC). Analog outputs: 1 pair singleended (RCA), 1 pair balanced (XLR). Digital output: 1 AES/ EBU (XLR). Formats/sample rates supported: PCM to 32bit/44.1, 48, 88.2, 96, 176.4, 192, 352.8, and 384 kHz. DSD via USB: DSD64, 128,

256, and 512. BNC and XLR inputs limited to 24/192). Frequency range: CD mode: 10Hz–20kHz; DAC mode: 10–96kHz, depending upon sample rate. Output voltage: 1V or 2V single-ended, 2V or 4V balanced. Output impedance: 7.5 ohms single-ended, 15 ohms balanced. THD+N (20Hz–20kHz B-weighted): <0.003% at –6dBFS, <0.01% at 0dBFS. Dimensions 18.9" (480mm)

W × 6.93" (176mm) H × 17.8" (453mm) D. Weight: 30.13lb (13.7kg). Finishes Brushed anodized aluminum and black polished acrylic. Serial numbers of units reviewed 0110046 (listening), 0110009 (measuring). Price $39,000. Approximate number of dealers: 15. Warranty: 3 years workmanship and materials, 2 years on laser and movable parts.

Nontransferable. Manufacturer Gryphon Audio Designs ApS, Industrivej 10B, DK 8600 Ry, Denmark. Tel: (+45) 86891200. Web: gryphon-audio.com. US distributor: On a Higher Note, PO Box 698, San Juan Capistrano, CA 92693. Tel: (949) 544 1990. Web: onahighernote.com.

January 2020

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ERIC SWANSON

SPECIFICATIONS

The Gryphon Ethos is the most beautiful audio component I’ve ever had the opportunity to handle. we seek is there. That’s why the lifespan for a Gryphon product can be 10-15 years.” Gryphon’s top-loading Mikado CD player with asynchronous 24/96 upsampling came out in 2001, and the upgraded Mikado Signature with asynchronous 32/192 upsampling remained available until 2013, when the company could no longer obtain Philips’ toploading CD-Pro2 drive mechanism. The design of the Ethos is intended to evoke Gryphon’s digital and vinyl heritage. The design called for a top-loading mechanism that could be aesthetically enhanced to resemble an LP player, and ﬁnding a high-quality CD/SACD toploading mechanism was virtually impossible. So Gryphon went with StreamUnlimited of Austria’s CD-Pro 8 drive, which only handles CD. The Ethos is supported by Gryphon’s Atlas spikes, whose height is adjusted using the small tool and old-fashioned level that are supplied with the unit. “Many of our competitors take the current from the output and transform that into an analog voltage,” Møller explained. “Instead, we take the voltage directly from the DAC circuitry and have a voltage-to-voltage, fully classstereophile.com

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A amplifier that is a central aspect of the Ethos’s sound. Around the analog stage, the other components surrounding the transistors are discreet. We don’t use ICs or op-amps in the signal path—it is fully discreet. The only op-amps we use are incorporated as a DC servo to ensure that no DC leaks into the analog output. We use . . . Melf resistors, which have very low current and voltage noise. We also use polypropylene film capacitors and very good electrolytic capacitors as well. Because the power supply is indirectly part of the signal path, we paid a lot of attention to it. As for the player’s ports, we tried an Ethernet with another product, and we preferred the sound from USB when fed by a very good high-end USB cable.” Other defining aspects of the Ethos’s design include a fully balanced class-A analog output stage that employs zero negative feedback. Outputs are balanced Neutrik XLR and single-ended gold-plated RCA. There are two separate analog toroidal transformers and two digital power supplies. (The Gryphon website has a long list of additional features that this Polly needn’t parrot.) 45

Does your system need an MRII? (Music Reproduction Imaging Instrument)

“Alta Audio has indeed pulled a rabbit out of a hat with the Alec” —Karl Sigman, Audiophilia New from Alta Audio, the Alec proves that a compact footprint doesn’t necessarily equal limited performance. Featuring sonics that immerse the listener in a natural soundstage, the Alec is Alta Audio’s ultimate statement of how meticulous a ention to crossover design is essential to creating a diminutive, carefully cra ed speaker that conveys the detail, dimensionality, and feel of a live performance. Available in Piano Black and Rosewood, the Alec stands in a league of its own. For further information, visit www.alta-audio.com or call 631.424.5958.

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GRYPHON ETHOS

Getting it on While it was a snap to connect the Ethos to my reference Audio Research Reference 6 preampliﬁer—I used balanced interconnects all the way to my D’Agostino Progression monoblocks—I encountered several challenges during setup and operation. Once, while playing hi-rez PCM and switching between PCM and DSD upsampling, the unit sent a few seconds of white noise through my speakers. It passed quickly, and no damage was done. It never happened again, even though I switched between DSD and PCM upsampling many times during playback. Second, due to a production error in this early unit, its rear AES/EBU input lacked the requisite release lever. Once I had inserted my cable, I couldn’t remove it. Rather than risk damaging the unit by forcing it or inserting some

sharp tool, I returned the Ethos at review’s end with the cable still attached and invited Gryphon to remove it and send it back. I customarily send signals from my Roon Nucleus+ music server via Ethernet, but the Ethos is not a streaming DAC: I had to choose from its USB, AES/EBU, or S/PDIF inputs. Due to the structure of my multicomponent internet noiseisolation setup—a two-room equipment chain that Editor Jim Austin calls unduly complicated but which nonetheless contributes to my system’s high level of transparency and detail—I lacked the ability to move the Nucleus+ close to the Ethos and connect it via USB. (I’ve ﬁgured out a solution for next time.) That left me with two choices: I could connect the Nucleus+ to my extremely transparent dCS Network Bridge and send that component’s output signal

MEASUREMENTS

or logistical reasons, I tested a different sample of the Gryphon Ethos (serial number 0110009) from the one that JVS auditioned but was assured that the two samples came from the same production batch. I performed the testing with my Audio Precision SYS2722 system (see the January 2008 “As We See It”1) using its AES/EBU and S/PDIF digital outputs, test tones on CD, and USB data sourced from my MacBook Pro running on battery power, with Pure Music 3.0 playing WAV and AIFF test-

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Fig.1 Gryphon Ethos, Filter 2, impulse response (one sample at 0dBFS, 4ms time window).

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tone ﬁles. All the testing was performed with the player’s upsampling turned off. Before I played test CDs, I leveled the Gryphon’s chassis with its three feet; a bubble level is provided for this purpose. The player’s error correction was good—no glitches were audible in the player’s output until the single gaps in the data spiral on the Pierre Verany Digital Test CD reached 1.5mm in length. (The “Red Book” Compact Disc standard requires only that a player cope with gaps of up to 0.2mm.) The AES/EBU and S/PDIF inputs locked to

January 2020

datastreams with sample rates up to 192kHz, the USB input would handle 32-bit data sampled up to 384kHz. Apple’s USB Prober utility identiﬁed the player as “Ethos USB” from “Gryphon Audio Designs ApS,” with the serial number “413-001.” The Gryphon’s USB port operated in the optimal isochronous asynchronous mode. The maximum output level from the unbalanced output was 2.16V, slightly higher than the CD standard’s 2V. As 1 See tinyurl.com/4ffpve4.

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Fig.2 Gryphon Ethos, Filter 3, impulse response (one sample at 0dBFS, 4ms time window).

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Fig.3 Gryphon Ethos, Filter 4, impulse response (one sample at 0dBFS, 4ms time window).

GRYPHON ETHOS

to the Ethos via AES/EBU, which, however, limited playback to 24/192 PCM files (and no DSD). Or I could load files onto my Macbook Pro, play them with Roon or other software, and send the output to the Ethos via USB, which can handle resolutions up to DXD and DSD512. At the start of my many happy listening sessions, I attached my 2017 Macbook Pro to the Ethos via a 2m Nordost Valhalla 2 USB cable that Nordost graciously supplied for the review. While the folks at Gryphon primarily use their own cabling for music playback, they recommend Nordost Valhalla 2 for USB. Many audiophiles use computers for file playback and streaming, but I have yet to encounter a nondedicated computer with a noise floor as low as a good quality music server/streamer. This was certainly the case with my Macbook Pro, which I also use for show coverage, email, etc. While I easily affirmed that, using Roon, I could play DXD and DSD128 files via USB—Roon’s playback limit is DSD128—the same pervasive grayness I experience when I run signal via USB from my computer to my reference dCS Rossini setup impacted my enjoyment. Because I wanted to hear the Ethos at its best, I opted for Roon Nucleus+ into the dCS Network Bridge via Ethernet

into the Ethos via AES/EBU for the remainder of my listening. As I write this, Gryphon is not yet an official Roon partner endpoint, but the Ethos recognizes Roon software and impressed me as taking full advantage of Roon’s sound and metadata.1 (Among the many documents available for download on the Ethos webpage is one that addresses USB Roon Core Setup.) Once connected, I can’t imagine that anyone would have difficulty using the Ethos. The letters on the display that indicate when unsampling is engaged are small but visible from 12' away, and choices between filters and PCM or DSD upsampling are indicated in big print at the time of engagement. You will have a harder time seeing track numbers and other information from afar. Downloadable USB drivers are required for Windows users, but that’s the case with virtually all DACs I’ve reviewed. Being wowed I started out with my CD of Patricia Barber’s Jim Anderson–engineered Higher (CD, ArtistShare AS0171), our Sep1 Perhaps by the time you read this, Roon will have issued a major software update that adequately addresses the software’s difficulty recognizing classical files that include diacritics and other indicators that, in Roon, render the files invisible.

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usual, the maximum balanced output level was exactly twice the unbalanced, at 4.32V. Both outputs preserved absolute polarity (ie, were noninverting) with the remote control’s Invert button set to Off. Though higher than speciﬁed, the unbalanced output impedance was still a very low 30 ohms across the audioband; the balanced impedance was a low 59 ohms, again at all audio frequencies. The Gryphon’s impulse response varied considerably according to which of the seven reconstruction ﬁlters had been selected. With Filter 1, described in the manual as “slow roll-off, min-

imum-phase,” the impulse response was a short minimum-phase type (not shown). Filter 2, described as “slow roll-off, linear-phase,” had an extremely short linear-phase response (fig.1). Filters 3, 5, and 7 all had similar long, linear-phase impulse responses (fig.2), with ringing present either side of the peak. Jason’s preferred filter, the hybrid Filter 4, has a small amount of ringing before the peak, with more ringing following it (fig.3). This response is very similar to that of the Hybrid filter offered by the Pro-Ject Pre-Box-S2.2 Filter 6 was a long minimum-phase type (not shown).

Reconstruction filters with different impulse responses can behave similarly in the frequency domain. Tested with white noise sampled at 44.1kHz, the Gryphon’s output with the minimum-phase Filter 1 (fig.4, red and magenta traces) was almost identical to that of the linear-phase Filter 2. Both began to roll off in the top audio octaves and exhibited a slow decline in output at ultrasonic frequencies, the aliased image at 25kHz of a full-scale 19.1kHz tone (blue and cyan traces) suppressed by around 25dB. With 2 See fig.6 at tinyurl.com/y57ph9rb.

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Fig.4 Gryphon Ethos, Filter 1, wideband spectrum of white noise at –4dBFS (left channel red, right magenta) and 19.1kHz tone at 0dBFS (left blue, right cyan), with CD data (20dB/vertical div.).

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Fig.5 Gryphon Ethos, Filter 5, wideband spectrum of white noise at –4dBFS (left channel red, right magenta) and 19.1kHz tone at 0dBFS (left blue, right cyan), with CD data (20dB/vertical div.).

Fig.6 Gryphon Ethos, Filter 4, wideband spectrum of white noise at –4dBFS (left channel red, right magenta) and 19.1kHz tone at 0dBFS (left blue, right cyan), with CD data (20dB/vertical div.).

GRYPHON ETHOS

tember 2019 Record of the Month,2 and compared its sound to Red Book FLAC files of the recording. Both ways, the sound was drop-dead gorgeous. With the REF 6 adding just a wee bit of extra warmth, glow, and air, I loved the natural fullness of the midrange and the guitar’s spoton tonality. Sticking with CD, I turned to an old reference standby, “Insensatez” from Entre Amigos, by bossa nova singer Rosa Passos and double bassist Ron Carter (CD, Chesky JD247). The sound’s ivory-tinged core was beautiful, and bass depth and control were excellent. Listening to Murray Perahia’s performance, on piano, of Handel’s Harpsichord Suite in E, HWV 430, from Murray Perahia Plays Handel and Scarlatti (CD, Sony Classical 62785), was a total joy. Going back and forth among 10 filters (7 PCM AND 3 DSD) can be a recipe for madness, so I spent only a short amount of time comparing them. For PCM, each of the seven choices had strengths in one area or the other, but for my tastes, default Filter 4 offered the best overall combination of extended highs, full midrange, well-defined lows, and soundstage width and depth. As for DSD, I failed to discern a difference between the three filters, which differ only in their choice of ultrahigh pass band frequency. Midway through my time with the Ethos, I was delighted that Gryphon’s US distributor, Philip O’Hanlon of On a Higher Note, paid a visit to Port Townsend. In his bag

was a huge stash of reference discs, many of them hybrid SACDs. Although, per Stereophile’s review policy, I didn’t share my listening impressions with O’Hanlon, I could not hide the smile in my eyes when he played the CD layer of his Tony Faulkner–recorded hybrid SACD of the Florestan Trio performing the second movement of Debussy’s Piano Trio, on their recording of Debussy, Fauré and Ravel Piano Trios (Hyperion SACDA67114). Depth was exemplary, and the piano’s glow all one could ask for. Or was it? This seemed the perfect time to experiment with the Ethos’s upsampling feature. Once upsampled to DSD128, I felt that all barriers between me and the music fell away. While DSD upsampling certainly seemed most appropriate for the Red Book layer of a hybrid SACD—at least inasmuch as I would inevitably compare the experience to the sound of the disc’s DSD layer—upsampling to either DSD or 24/384 PCM enhanced listening with additional air and depth. There was a far greater sense of believable acoustic space around the musicians, as well as additional texture and overtones. I liked the upsampling feature a lot. Next, O’Hanlon chose the Red Book layer of a hybrid SACD of Vladimir Ashkenazy leading the Sydney Symphony Orchestra in Prokoﬁev’s Lt. Kije Suite (Exton EXCL2 https://www.stereophile.com/content/recording-september-2019-higher

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Filter 5, described as an “apodizing” filter, the output rolled off very quickly above 20kHz (fig.5, red and magenta traces), reaching the noise floor at the Nyquist frequency of 22.05kHz, this indicated by the vertical green line. Filter 3, a “brickwall” type, behaves identically. Filter 4 also reaches full stop-band suppression by the Nyquist frequency (fig.6) but starts rolling off earlier than Filters 3 and 5. Filters 6 and 7 have identical ultrasonic rolloffs but

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Fig.7 Gryphon Ethos, Filter 4, frequency response at –12dBFS into 100k ohms with data sampled at: 44.1kHz (left channel green, right gray), 96kHz (left cyan, right magenta), 192kHz (left blue, right red) (0.5dB/vertical div.).

has more passband ripple than Filter 4. Filters 6 and 7 are textbook fast-rolloff above 20kHz (ﬁg.8). The Gryphon player doesn’t apply deemphasis to preemphasized CDs, which results in a boost in the treble reaching 8.5dB at the top of the audioband. Fortunately, preemphasized CDs are very rare these days. Channel separation (not shown) was superb, at >120dB in both directions below 1kHz, decreasing to a still-

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reach the stop-band noise floor around 24kHz (not shown). With 44.1kHz data (fig.7), Filter 4 starts to roll off a little above 10kHz but then drops like a stone around 17kHz. It also has some passband ripple, which is generally felt not to be a good thing, as do the frequency responses at 96kHz and 192kHz in this graph. Filters 1–3 have similar audioband responses to Filter 4. Although Filter 5 is flat to 20kHz with CD data, it

Fig.8 Gryphon Ethos, Filter 7, frequency response at –12dBFS into 100k ohms with data sampled at: 44.1kHz (left channel green, right gray), 96kHz (left cyan, right magenta), 192kHz (left blue, right red) (0.5dB/vertical div.).

Fig.9 Gryphon Ethos, spectrum with noise and spuriae of dithered 1kHz tone at 0dBFS (left channel blue, right red) (20dB/vertical div.).

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GRYPHON ETHOS

00049). Prokofiev’s music no longer draws me as much as it did in my childhood, when I played 78s of Peter and the Wolf many times, but I loved what I was hearing. In the second movement, baritone Andrei Laptev’s voice especially impressed with its strength and beauty. We also auditioned hi-rez files of the Soundmirror-engineered version of the Lt. Kije Suite, from Thierry Fisher and the Utah Symphony Orchestra, due out soon on the Reference Recordings Fresh! imprint—it excels in sonics rather than conducting—and discovered that the Ethos conveyed pounding percussion with aplomb. Further confirmation that the Ethos can rock out came when I played tracks from Yello’s Toy (24/48 WAV, Polydor 4782160/HDtracks) and, courtesy of Roon Radio, went flying on a pop music magical mystery tour. Taking my lead from O’Hanlon’s choice of Debussy, I cued up files of two recordings of Debussy’s haunting Trois Chansons de Bilitis: one by mezzo-soprano Marianne Crebassa and pianist Fazil Say from Secrets (24/96 WAV, Erato 564483), and the other from one of Debussy’s favorite interpreters, soprano Maggie Teyte, with Alfred Cortot, from Maggie Teyte: A Vocal Portrait (16/44.1 WAV, Naxos Historical 8110757-58). The Ethos conveyed their artistry with such clarity and beauty that for several days after, the cycle’s second song kept playing in my head. With upsampling engaged, I felt that I could hear every slight nuance and breath

superb 103dB at 20kHz. The analog noise floor was extremely low in level (fig.9), and the only power-supply–related artifacts present lie at or below –125dB ref. 0dBFS. Increasing the bit depth from 16 to 24 with a dithered 1kHz tone at –90dBFS sourced from the USB port lowered the noise floor by 23dB (fig.10). Though the low-level supply-related spuriae can still be seen, this reduction in noise suggests the Ethos offers a resolution close to 20 bits, which is excellent. With

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of Crebassa’s performance, and I was moved as never before by the intentional absence of vibrato as she deepened her voice in the final song to simulate a man saying, with great profundity, “Les satyres sont morts / Les satyres et les nymphes aussi.” No one I’ve heard does a better job with these lines than Teyte, who liberally infuses singing of exquisite delicacy and unsurpassed intimacy with an idiosyncratic downward portamento that makes me feel as though she’s experiencing any number of little deaths. (She has no equal in this regard.) As many times as I’ve heard these women’s performances, I still found myself sitting in rapt attention, as though hearing them for the first time. When we compared DSD to PCM upsampling on 24/96 WAV files of two different recordings of Debussy’s Sonata for Flute, Viola and Harp—the period instrument Claude Debussy: Les Trois Sonates/The Late Works (Harmonia Mundi HMM902303) and modern instrument Debussy Sonatas & Trios (Erato 565142)—I preferred PCM upsampling with native PCM material. Even though upsampling to DSD128 enhanced the depiction of recording venue dimensions and distance from microphones, its ultrasmoothness got under my skin. It worked fine with native DSD material, but upsampling PCM to PCM 384 transmitted more of the natural leading edge of instruments and voices, and felt more open, organic, and credible. After O’Hanlon left, I headed to Tidal and Qobuz for two

undithered data representing a 1kHz tone at exactly –90.31dBFS (fig.11), the waveform is symmetrical and the three DC voltage levels described by the data are well defined, with no DC offset present. With 24-bit data at the same level, the Ethos outputs an almostperfect sinewave, despite the lack of dither (not shown). The spectra in figs. 4–6 indicate that the Ethos has low levels of harmonic distortion. With the player driving a full-scale, 24-bit, 50Hz tone into 100k

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Fig.10 Gryphon Ethos, spectrum with noise and spuriae of dithered 1kHz tone at –90dBFS with 24-bit data (left channel blue, right red) and 16-bit data (left cyan, right magenta) (20dB/vertical div.).

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ohms (ﬁg.12), the third harmonic is the highest in level but lies at –80dB (0.01%). The second harmonic is higher in the right channel (red trace) than the left (blue) but is still more than 20dB lower in level. These harmonics didn’t increase in level when I reduced the load impedance to a punishing 600 ohms, suggesting that the Ethos has a bombproof output stage. When I tested the Gryphon for intermodulation distortion with an equal mix of 19 and 20kHz tones, actual intermodulation

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Fig.11 Gryphon Ethos, Filter 5, waveform of undithered 16-bit, 1kHz sinewave at –90.31dBFS (left channel blue, right red).

Fig.12 Gryphon Ethos, spectrum of 50Hz sinewave (DC–1kHz) at 0dBFS into 100k ohms (left channel blue, right red; linear frequency scale).

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GRYPHON ETHOS

16/44.1 tracks he’d played from disc: Bob Walsh’s “Ain’t No Sunshine When She’s Gone” and Anette Askvik’s “Liberty.” I loved the sound of both but was especially seized by the additional attention-getting clarity and bass that came with PCM upsampling. When I switched to my reference dCS Rossini DAC/ transport/clock gear, I went back and forth more times than a dog turns in circles before sitting. I felt that the circa $60,000 Rossini combo set images farther back in the soundstage, surrounded by even more air. It let me hear the back of the hall in ways I did not experience with the Ethos. On Rosa Passos and Ron Carter’s “Insensatez,” the Rossini upsampling transport conveyed more vibrant highs, more of the bass’s bottom octaves, and sounded a mite warmer and smoother. On Ashkenazy’s Prokofiev, the airier Rossini better conveyed the third movement’s humor and scamper. I had hoped to hold onto the Ethos long enough to audition it with the D’Agostino Momentum preamp that arrives next for review, which would have afforded yet another window into the Ethos’s sound. Timing is everything, however, and the Ethos had to move on to the Capital Audio Fest. If you ever hear the two together, count me eager to hear your report. God, Serinus, are you about to file yet another rave review? Have you been bought off by manufacturers, or are you listening through rose-colored glasses? Lest I come across as a perpetually smiling Girl Scout cookie salesperson, whose innate optimism could convince a diehard nutritionist that sugar and white flour are health foods, rest assured that the antiglare tint on my plastic lenses is yellow rather than rose. Regardless, my response to the sound of the Gryphon Ethos CD player and digital-to-analog converter requires more smileys and flowery GIFs than this space can reproduce. The Ethos is one open, marvelously detailed, and fresh-sounding unit that makes listening to music an absolute joy. Q

A S S O C I AT E D E Q U I P M E N T Digital sources dCS Rossini SACD/CD transport & Rossini DAC & Rossini Clock & Network Bridge; Apple 2017 MacBook Pro computer with 2.8 GHz Intel i7, SSD, 16GB RAM; Roon Nucleus+; Linksys routers (2), Small Green Computer Systemoptique optical isolation bundle, TP-Link gigabit Ethernet media converters plus multimode duplex fiber optic cable (2); Small Green Computer linear power supply (2) & Small Green Computer/HDPlex four-component 200W linear power supply (2); external hard drives, SSD USB sticks, iPad Pro. Preamplifier Audio Research REF 6. Power amplifiers Dan D’Agostino Master Systems Progression monoblocks. Loudspeakers Wilson Audio Specialties Alexia 2. Cables Digital: Nordost Odin 1 & Odin 2 & Valhalla 2 (USB) & Frey 2 (USB adapter), Wireworld Platinum Starlight Cat8 and AudioQuest Diamond (Ethernet). Interconnect: Nordost Odin 2. Speaker: Nordost Odin 2. AC: Nordost Odin 2 & Valhalla, Kimber Palladian, AudioQuest Dragon HC. Accessories Grand Prix Monza 8-shelf double rack & amp stands, 1.5" Formula platform, Apex footers; Nordost QB8, QX4 (2), QK1 & QV2 AC power accessories, QKore 1 & 6 with QKore Wires, Titanium and Bronze Sort Kones, Sort Lifts; Tweek Geek Dark Matter Stealth power conditioner with High Fidelity and Furutech options; AudioQuest Niagara 5000 power conditioner & NRG Edison outlets & JitterBugs; GreenWave AC filter; Marigo Aida CD mat; Stein Music Super Naturals, Signature Harmonizers, Blue Suns/Diamonds, Quantum Organizer; Bybee Room Neutralizers; Absolare Stabilians; Resolution Acoustics room treatment; Stillpoints Aperture panels. Room 20'L × 16'W × 9'H. —Jason Victor Serinus

measurements, continued

was extremely low, though different amounts of aliased image energy appeared in the audioband depending on which ﬁlter was in use. This can be seen with the slow-rolloff Filter 2, for example (ﬁg.13), though the levels of the spuriae are still extremely low.

With Jason’s preferred Filter 4, there are no aliased images present in the audioband (ﬁg.14). Finally, when I tested the Gryphon Ethos with 16-bit J-Test data (ﬁg.15), all the odd-order harmonics of the LSBlevel, low-frequency squarewave lie at

the correct levels (sloping green line). No sidebands can be seen. The Gryphon Ethos offers excellent audio engineering, though its sonic character will be dependent on which reconstruction ﬁlter is in use. —John Atkinson

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Fig.13 Gryphon Ethos, Filter 1, HF intermodulation spectrum (DC–30kHz), 19+20kHz at 0dBFS into 100k ohms (left channel blue, right red; linear frequency scale).

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Fig.14 Gryphon Ethos, Filter 4, HF intermodulation spectrum (DC–30kHz), 19+20kHz at 0dBFS into 600 ohms (left channel blue, right red; linear frequency scale).

Fig.15 Gryphon Ethos, high-resolution jitter spectrum of analog output signal, 11.025kHz at –6dBFS, sampled at 44.1kHz with LSB toggled at 229Hz: CD data (left channel blue, right red). Center frequency of trace, 11.025kHz; frequency range, ±3.5kHz.

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SASHA MATSON

Wilson Audio Sasha DAW LOUDSPEAKER

here is change, and also continuity, at Wilson Audio Specialties, the company founded in 1974 by recordist and loudspeaker designer David A. Wilson. David’s son Daryl Wilson was appointed president and CEO in 2016. David Wilson passed away in 2018. And in 2019, Wilson Audio Specialties released the Sasha DAW loudspeaker ($37,900/pair), designed by a team led by Daryl Wilson and named in honor of his father. The Sasha model has a history of its own. Designed as a replacement for the company’s successful WATT/Puppy two-box loudspeakers—these combined the Wilson Audio Tiny Tot compact monitor with a dedicated woofer enclosure called the Puppy—the first Wilson Audio Sasha W/P Series 1 loudspeaker was introduced in 2009; Art Dudley reviewed it for our July 2010 issue.1 A follow-up model, the Sasha W/P Series 2, was issued in 2014. The Sasha series retains a direct connection to those earlier designs within the expanding lineup of loudspeakers offered by Wilson Audio Specialties. I told my editors that I could get two sentences out of the name connection, so here they are: Even though I am legally Alexander Matson, I have always been called Sasha, the Russian diminutive form for my given name. And there’s a similar naming convention that runs through Wilson Audio’s line of floorstanding loudspeakers, from Alexandria, Alexx, and Alexia all the way to their smaller sibling Sasha. Let’s review The two-box Sasha DAW measures 44.75" tall without spikes, 14.50" wide, and 22.85" deep. These dimensions are slightly larger than those of the first Sasha model. Each speaker weighs 236lb. (The Sasha 1 See stereophile.com/content/wilson-audio-sasha-wp-loudspeaker.

SPECIFICATIONS Description Three-way, four-driver, reﬂex-loaded, ﬂoorstanding loudspeaker. Drive-units: 1" (25.4mm) textile-dome tweeter, 7" (178mm) paper and cellulose composite-cone midrange, two 8” (203mm) paper-cone woofers.

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Crossover frequencies: not given. Frequency response: 20Hz–30kHz ±3dB, roomaveraged response. Sensitivity: 91dB/W/m. Impedance: 4 ohms nominal, 2.48 ohms minimum at 85Hz. Minimum ampliﬁer power: 25Wpc.

Dimensions 44.75" (1137mm) H × 14.50" (368mm) W × 22.85" (583m) D. Weight: 236lb (107kg). Finishes A choice of automotive paint colors; custom options. Serial numbers of units

reviewed 403, 404. Price $37,900/pair. Approximate number of dealers: 39. Manufacturer Wilson Audio Specialties, 2233 Mountain Vista Lane, Provo, UT 84606. Tel: (801) 377-2233. Web: wilsonaudio.com

WILSON AUDIO SASHA DAW

W/P Series 1 weighed 197lb.) Thus the latest Sasha is just 24lb lighter than the current Alexia 2 model, though the latter is a bit more than 8" taller. Why the weight gain? The lower woofer module of the Sasha DAW increased in volume by more than 13% compared to its immediate predecessor, the Sasha W/P Series 2; the thickness of its panels also increased. The upper module, containing the midrange driver and tweeter, gained 10% in volume, and those panels also increased in thickness. The Sasha DAW cabinets are constructed from Wilson Audio’s proprietary composite mixes of resin and cellulose: XMaterial for most of the panels, with their newer S-Material formulation used for the midrange baffle. Permanent bonding, not bolts, holds everything together. The exteriors of the cabinets, the many subtly beveled edges of which add to their sculpted look, hint at the complex voicing and tuning hidden within. The binding posts mounted on the rear of the bottom enclosure—in light of Wilson Audio’s lack of enthusiasm for biwiring/biamping, only a single pair is fitted—have been redesigned: Banana plugs are now accepted. While you’re back there, you can admire the speaker’s machined-aluminum “ultra-low-turbulence” reflex port: This hefty cabinet is not meant to be jammed up against a wall or into corners. Also on the rear, next to the handsome Sasha DAW logo,

is a window that offers a view of the resistors mounted within. These function as fuselike protectors, as well as providing the ability to alter the balance between the upper and lower modules in inhospitable room setups—an adjustment that I’m told is rarely needed. The specified frequency response of the three-way Sasha DAW is from 20Hz to 30kHz, ±3dB. In the speaker’s bottom enclosure, twin 8" paper-cone woofers, fitted with ceramic magnets, are reflex loaded and wired in parallel; they both see the same signal. One can imagine how such less-than-enormous bass drivers, assuming ample excursion capabilities, could provide both bass depth and outstanding transient response. The Sasha DAW’s crossover is newly designed with all second-order slopes. No circuit boards are used: The wiring is point-to-point. Wilson Audio now makes their crossover capacitors in-house, and the Sasha DAW is their first model to use them. In the speaker’s upper enclosure is a 7" midrange driver with a paper-and-cellulose–composite cone: the same as that currently used in Wilson’s flagship model, the enormous WAMM Master Chronosonic. Wilson designer Vern Credille described it to me: “The midrange driver motor has a secondary magnet, which changes the Thiel-Small parameters and gives more control. The midrange design is

MEASUREMENTS

ecause of the Wilson Sasha DAW’s bulk and weight—as well as the fact that Sasha Matson’s listening room is on the second floor of his upstate New York home—I drove my test gear the 230 miles from my Brooklyn home to measure the speakers in situ. (I also wanted to hear the Wilson speakers driven by his McIntosh MC462 amplifier, which had impressed me when I measured it for our May 2019 issue.1) As always, I used DRA Labs’ MLSSA system and a calibrated DPA 4006 microphone to measure the Sasha DAW’s frequency response in the farfield and an Earthworks QTC-40 mike for the nearfield responses. When testing a loudspeaker, I raise it off the floor so that the tweeter is midway between the ceiling and floor. This maximizes the anechoic time window, hence the midrange resolution, of the FFT-based response measurements. Sasha M and I managed to lift one of the 236lb Sasha DAWs onto a small dolly, to make it easier to move it as necessary, but the inevitable reflection of the speaker’s sound from the floor reduces the accuracy of my measurements in the midrange. With that caution in mind, Wilson specifies the Sasha DAW’s sensitivity as 91dB/W/1m. My estimate was

slightly lower, at 89.5dB(B)/2.83V/m, but this is still usefully higher than average. The nominal impedance is 4 ohms with a minimum value of 2.48 ohms at 85Hz. My measurements of the Wilson’s impedance magnitude (solid trace) and electrical phase angle (dotted trace) are shown in ﬁg.1. While the impedance remains above 4 ohms above 160Hz, it drops to 2.415 ohms at 84Hz. The electrical phase angle (dashed trace) reaches –41.3° at 57Hz and +25.7° at 34Hz, both frequencies where the magnitude at 4.75 ohms and 5 ohms is relatively low. The Sasha DAW is an easier load than the Sasha W/P, which Art Dudley reviewed in July 2010,2 but its impedance will still be a challenge for the partnering ampliﬁer. (This would not have been a problem

for SM’s McIntosh, however.) The impedance traces are free from the small discontinuities that would suggest the presence of panel resonances. The woofer bin was impressively inert, but when I investigated the upper enclosure’s vibrational behavior with a plastic-tape accelerometer, I found a high-Q mode at 598Hz at two places on the sidewalls (ﬁg.2). The high Q, the high frequency, and the fact that the affected areas are small all work against there being any audible problems resulting from the presence of this mode. The impedance-magnitude plot has 1 See stereophile.com/content/mcintosh-laboratory-mc462-power-ampliﬁer-measurements. 2 See stereophile.com/content/wilson-audio-sashawp-loudspeaker-measurements.

Stereophile Wilon Sasha DAW Impedance (ohms) & Phase (deg) vs Frequency (Hz)

Fig.1 Wilson Sasha DAW, electrical impedance (solid) and phase (dashed) (2 ohms/vertical div.).

Fig.2 Wilson Sasha DAW, cumulative spectraldecay plot calculated from output of accelerometer fastened to upper-frequency enclosure sidewall close to the baffle (MLS driving voltage to speaker, 7.55V; measurement bandwidth, 2kHz).

January 2020

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WILSON AUDIO SASHA DAW

an acoustic impeded vent, similar to a vented enclosure but with a highly resistive port such that some characteristics of a closed box can be exploited.” The 1" textile-dome tweeter employs a neodymium magnet and is loaded with its own sealed box. For the first Sasha W/P model, the choice was a titanium inverteddome design, but over the years, Wilson Audio has auditioned various other materials as tweeter diaphragms, including Kevlar, diamond, beryllium, and carbon fiber. (As I understand it, some materials yield great results way up high but are less suited to the tweeter’s lower range, and thus have trouble mating well with the midrange driver. And as David Wilson observed, a good tweeter “has to be a team player.”) According to Wilson Audio, the Sasha DAW crosses over to the tweeter at about 1kHz, the latter driver being flat on-axis out to 34kHz. Daryl Wilson described the design priorities this way: “The two fundamental elements we always focus on at Wilson are

L–R Art Dudley, Sasha Matson, Toby, and Wilson Audio’s Peter McGrath

dynamic contrast and harmonic expression. And there is one more element that I’ve added the more we dug into it: micro detail. We are getting more resolution than we did ten or twenty years ago.”

measurements, continued

Frequency in Hz

Fig.3 Wilson Sasha DAW, acoustic crossover on tweeter axis at 50”, corrected for microphone response, with nearfield midrange (green), woofer (blue) and port (red) responses respectively plotted below 500Hz, 350Hz, and 300Hz.

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its low-frequency response with a traditional reflex alignment. Like other Wilson loudspeakers, the Sasha DAW’s upper enclosure is mounted on the woofer bin with spikes and a series of steps at the rear to allow the midrange and tweeter to be aimed at the listener’s ears. For the farfield response measurements in fig.3 and the following graphs, I calculated where the microphone should be placed on the tweeter axis at my standard 50" distance. The midrange unit’s output on this axis has a slight peak at 1kHz before crossing over to the tweeter (black trace) just below 2kHz and rolling out relatively smoothly. Small peaks in the tweeter’s output are balanced by small dips; the overall response trend is even.

The Wilson’s farfield response, averaged across a 30° horizontal window centered on the tweeter axis, is shown as the black trace above 300Hz in fig.4. The overall balance is even from the upper bass through to the top of the audioband, though there is a lack of presence-region energy. The black trace below 300Hz in fig.4 shows the sum of the nearfield woofer and port outputs, taking into account acoustic phase and the different distance of each radiator from a nominal farfield microphone position. The usual rise in response in the upper bass that is due to the nearfield measurement technique is absent. I suspect that the Wilson’s low-frequency alignment is optimized for definition rather than maximum bass power. With the low

Amplitude in dB

a saddle centered on a low 23Hz, which will be due to the tuning frequency of the large port on the woofer cabinet’s rear panel. The two woofers behave identically; the blue trace in fig.3 shows their summed nearfield response, which has its minimum-motion notch at the expected 23Hz. The nearfield response of the port (red trace) peaks at the same frequency and its upperfrequency rolloff is very clean. The woofers cross over to the midrange unit (green trace) around 200Hz with the rollout above that frequency free from any peaks. As with the earlier Sasha, the midrange unit’s initial rolloff starts at 400Hz and is very gentle. The port on the rear of the upper enclosure is used to increase the midrange unit’s power handling rather than to extend

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Frequency in Hz

Fig.4 Wilson Sasha DAW, anechoic response on tweeter axis at 50”, averaged across 30° horizontal window and corrected for microphone response, with the complex sum of the nearfield midrange, woofer, and port responses plotted below 300Hz.

Fig.5 Wilson Sasha DAW, lateral response family at 50”, normalized to response on tweeter axis, from back to front: differences in response 45–5° off axis, reference response, differences in response 5–45° off axis.

WILSON AUDIO SASHA DAW

Long day’s journey into setup You should have seen the mournful expression on the face of the Air Cargo guy as he handed me the packing slip: He wanted me to see the total weight of the shipment. I helped him trundle the three seriously well-constructed wooden crates up the driveway and into the garage. When the crates were opened, the woofer cabinets rolled out on double-wheeled casters. The Sasha DAW model incorporates a clever new design element: The formerly solid fairings on the top edges of the lower cabinet are now open and function as handles. This reduces pressure between the upper and lower modules—and helps a lot in the setup process. Once the Sashas were roughly in position in my listening room, I laid down the woofer modules and swapped out the casters for spikes, included along with tools and other parts in two nicely done boxes. Initial setup concluded with placing the upper module on top of the

measurements, continued

In the vertical plane (fig.6), a suckout develops in the crossover region 5° above the tweeter axis. However, there is more energy present between 1kHz and 3kHz 5° below the measurement axis, which suggests I should have placed the microphone a little lower to be on the exact axis intended by Peter McGrath when he set the speakers up in SM’s room. This conjecture is confirmed by the Sasha DAW’s step response (fig.7), which is almost identical to that of the Wilson Alexia 2 that I reviewed in July 2018.3 The tweeter’s positive-going step arrives first at the microphone but has started to decay before the start of the midrange unit’s negative-going step. The optimal blend between the two units’ steps occurs a little lower than the

axis that I had calculated I should use for the farﬁeld measurements. However, the positive-going decay of the midrange step does blend smoothly with the start of the woofer’s step, which indicates an optimal crossover topology. The Wilson’s cumulative spectral-decay plot (ﬁg.8) is relatively clean overall, though some low-level delayed energy is present in the treble. There is also some delayed energy associated with the small on-axis peak at 1kHz. The Sasha DAW’s measured performance has much in common with the other Wilson speakers I have measured and indicates a careful balance between frequency and time domains.—John Atkinson 3 See stereophile.com/content/wilson-audio-specialties-alexia-series-2-loudspeaker-measurements.

Data in Volts

tuning frequency of the port, boundary reinforcement will give extension to 20Hz with typical low-frequency room gain. Certainly in my own auditioning of the Sasha DAWs in Sasha M’s relatively small room, the bass sounded both full-range and powerful, but with superb leading-edge clarity. The Wilson Sasha DAW’s horizontal dispersion, normalized to the tweeteraxis response, is shown in ﬁg.5. (Due to the geometric limitations of SM’s room, I could only plot the differences in response up to 45° each side of the tweeter axis instead of my usual 90°.) This graph indicates that some of the missing presence-region energy reappears to the speaker’s sides. The contour lines in this graph are otherwise even, implying stable stereo imaging.

Fig.6 Wilson Sasha DAW, vertical response family at 50”, normalized to response on tweeter axis, from back to front: differences in response 15–5° above axis, reference response, differences in response 5–10° below axis.

Time in ms

Fig.7 Wilson Sasha DAW, step response on tweeter axis at 50” (5ms time window, 30kHz bandwidth).

Fig.8 Wilson Sasha DAW, cumulative spectral-decay plot on tweeter axis at 50” (0.15ms risetime).

January 2020

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Powering Every Legendary System Is A Legendary Amplif ier leg·end·ar·y /ˈlejənˌderē/ adjective 1. of, described in, or based on legends 2. remarkable enough to be famous; very well known

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WILSON AUDIO SASHA DAW

lower and connecting the exposed spade-tipped signal leads. It is at this point that things get uniquely Wilsonian. “Time-Alignment” is the term used in the setup manual, although “TimeCalibration” would also seem appropriate. The idea: mating the upper enclosure’s rear spikes to specific positions on an adjustable “stairstep” support, said spikes and positions selected with the aid of a calibration chart—itself based on the distance between the speakers and one’s preferred listening position—in order to synchronize the arrival times of upper frequencies. The Sasha DAW is now the lowestpriced model in the Wilson Audio hierarchy that offers this capability. Does this make a difference? You bet it does. If you change the positions or use differently sized spikes, you will hear it. Once the Sasha DAWs arrived at my house and after some juggling of schedules, Peter McGrath, Wilson Audio Specialties’ sales manager, traveled to upstate New York, and I went to fetch him from Albany airport: Whether you’re a customer or a reviewer, installation comes standard with the purchase of any Wilson Audio speakers (although not always by McGrath himself). I had hooked up the speakers earlier and been running them in. In this old house, built in 1872, my listening room was originally intended as one of two master bedrooms. The room is not huge: 13' wide by 17' long by 10' high. (I like the ceiling height you can get in an old wood Victorian.) In spite of what may well be a minefield of resonant nodes, this is the most satisfying space I have had for listening to music. Were the imposing Sasha DAWs going to be too much loudspeaker for my room? Only proper setup and listening time would tell. The afternoon McGrath arrived, we listened for a while with the Sasha DAWs where I had set them out of their crates. Peter pronounced that things weren’t too bad, and he felt the speakers might end up quite close to their starting positions. The next morning, McGrath got to work with tape measures, a pad of paper, and his ears—no electronic measuring devices. Following the Wilson Audio setup procedure, Peter proceeded to listen, over and over again, for hours, to his favorite test track, Christy Moore’s “So Do I,” from This Is the Day (Sony 5032552), which features a deep male vocal and a plucked string bass. McGrath finds this recording helpful in detecting undesirable room resonant points. With the speakers now set on large plastic furniture pads, we moved them in carefully measured half-inch increments from front to back and side to side; at each spot, McGrath stereophile.com

January 2020

would stop to listen and make notes. These included distance from the front wall and numerical grades—1 being worst, 5 being best—in five categories: Low, Low Mid, Upper Mid, Bloom, and Dynamics. McGrath is a tough grader: In only one position out of 13 did he assign three or more points in all five categories. The magic spot was 42.5" from the front wall. This was only a bit more than 4" farther from my listening chair than the speakers were initially, slightly farther apart, and Listening to toed in than the “Cousin Dupree” more speakers they replaced—and quite close to an equilateral felt like driving triangle with respect to my a really highchair. Grilles on or off? powered go-kart. They were in place when McGrath first arrived, but he wanted me to take the grilles off. We also leveled the speakers once they were set—all the floors in my old house go in different directions. This improved the stereo soundstage balance and detail. Listen to this The Wilson Sasha DAWs were well fed. Powering up the 450Wpc McIntosh MC462 stereo amplifier,2 McGrath and I began to explore a bit. The Sasha DAW’s specified sensitivity of 91dB is higher than average—they can indeed play loud—and their nominal impedance is specified as 4 ohms. Counterintuitively, McGrath suggested that with some amps the speakers might sound better using an 8 ohm output tap. We compared, and this proved to be the case: Bass was deeper and tighter and the spatial performance better using the 8 ohm taps instead of the 4 ohm taps. I ran this observation by Wilson designer Credille, who stated that “On tube amps with multiple taps, we have found that the 8 ohm tap generally works the best.” John Atkinson took another look at his measurements of the McIntosh 2 See stereophile.com/content/laboratory-mc462-power-amplifier.

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WILSON AUDIO SASHA DAW

MC462 for me and decided that “The 8 ohm tap of the MC462 has the lowest output impedance, which will control the bass best—the opposite of what I would expect.” All this adds up to: Each user will need to determine these things for themselves, case by case. Wilson’s specified minimum amplifier power for the Sasha DAW is 25Wpc. I would suggest even more—you probably won’t experience all the Sasha DAW has to offer with flea-circus amplification. I don’t know what unseen planchette guided my fingers to my original copy of Captain Beefheart and The Magic Band’s Clear Spot (LP, Reprise MS 2115 0598): my favorite album from Don Van Vliet, not only for the material but because it is by far the best-sounding recording of Don’s career. The incredible pow of the drums and the wailing harmonica on “Circumstances” . . . well, as Little Richard put it, they “made my big toe jump up in my boot.” Deputy Editor Art Dudley motored by the next day for a listen and asked to hear “Her Eyes Are a Blue Million Miles.” Art commented that this was the best he had ever heard that particular track sound, with its surprisingly soulful vocal from the Captain. Outstanding. If you want to really vet the quality of vocal reproduction from a loudspeaker, reach for Joni Mitchell’s masterpiece Blue (LP, Reprise/Rhino MS 2038). Listening to the superb recent vinyl remastering from Rhino Vinyl, my eyes welled and my ears perked up when I got to “Little Green.” I have heard this tune innumerable times, but I never noticed how long Joni sustains the last word of the song, “sorrow”: heartbreak made audible by the Sasha DAW. My reference Harbeth 30.2 40th Anniversary Edition loudspeakers, reviewed by Herb Reichert in the April 2018 issue,3 utilize a 1" soft dome tweeter, as do the Sasha DAWs. However, the Harbeths provide less texture, detail, and diction than I heard from the Wilsons. This does not mean the latter were forward or strident: With the Sasha DAWs, there was no sense of that up-in-your-face-andears sound that I have sometimes experienced with large monitors in recording studios. In the mood for some Steely Dan, I turned to the album that won them their overdue Grammy in 2000, Two Against Nature (CD, Giant/Warner Bros. 9 24719-2). Donald Fagen and Walter Becker honed what they termed their “junkie grooves” to a fine edge over the years, and this album is chock-full of ’em. Listening to “Cousin Dupree” felt like driving a really high-powered go-kart: Through the Sasha DAWs there were pace, snap, drive, and speed, all propelling the energy of the track forward. Turning to a more uptown kind of music, I streamed from Qobuz the fifth and final movement of the Shostakovich Symphony No.8 from the cycle-in-progress by conductor Andris Nelsons and the Boston Symphony Orchestra (24/96 WAV, Deutsche Grammophon 289 479 5201). As the concert bass drum and the rest of the orchestra repeat the same bone-crunching crescendo, the effect heard through the Sasha DAWs was beyond exciting—it was terrifying. I think this is what Dimitri wanted us to feel. (The subtitle on the album cover is “Under Stalin’s Shadow.”) The low-end performance of the Sasha DAWs was sui generis: Though I have owned other fine floorstanders and subwoofers, the low-end performance of the Sasha DAWs took things to another level. Shostakovich is among the most varied of composers. When he mutes the strings, and a single woodwind softly takes the lead, the Sasha DAWs reveled in the most delicate stereophile.com

January 2020

A S S O C I AT E D E Q U I P M E N T Analog sources VPI Aries turntable, 12” 3D tonearm, and Synchronous Drive System; Lyra Etna cartridge. Digital sources MacBook Air running Pure Music, Qobuz; Bricasti M1 DAC; Musical Fidelity M1 CDT transport. Preamplification McIntosh C2300 Tube Preamplifier. Power Amplifiers McIntosh MC275 Stereo Tube Amplifier, McIntosh MC462 Quad Balanced Stereo Amplifier. Loudspeakers Harbeth M30.2 40th Anniversary Edition. Cables Digital: AudioQuest Diamond AES/EBU, Coffee USB; Interconnects: AudioQuest Fire, Sky; Speaker: AudioQuest FireBird; AC: AudioQuest Dragon. Accessories AudioQuest Niagara 7000 power conditioner; Mapleshade equipment rack; TonTräger speaker stands; Audiodesksysteme Vinyl Cleaner Pro; VPI Periphery Ring Clamp. —Sasha Matson

of musical colors. The soundstage was fantastic, laid out in sparkling width, depth, and detail. Stereo soundstaging is high on my to-do list; if I want to listen to mono, I’ll crank up one of my three Victrolas. With the Sasha DAWs properly dialed in, with the room “completing the acoustic circuit,” I could answer my earlier question I started with: No, not too much loudspeaker. The electronics, the speakers, and the listening space were all pulling together now, putting their backs into it like a well-trained crew team. The sweet spot? I think it’s likely that the increased size and solidity of the Wilson Audio Sasha DAW cabinets, along with revisions to the drivers and other elements, may have resulted in improvements, overall, compared with the prior Sasha models. (John Atkinson’s measurements should shed further light on this.) There is tonal beauty, alongside an amazing dynamic range. The end result helps create the tactile sensation of actual music being performed by actual musicians, not virtual ones. Are the Wilson Audio Specialties Sasha DAW loudspeakers worth their price of admission? It’s a matter of priorities. Usually, when hi-fi buffs complain about high-end pricing, they compare audio gear to cars. But, as Dylan puts it: “I don’t have no sports car, and don’t even care to have one. I can walk anytime—around the block.” To my way of thinking, a more apt analogy for the Sasha DAW would be to a really fine musical instrument, which musicians can and do find a way to have in their lives. When I examine product lineups from high-end manufacturers, I tend to seek out the model where the cost and performance vectors intersect. In my view, within the current Wilson Audio Specialties lineup, the Sasha DAW occupies that spot. This loudspeaker is at the center of the design concepts that David Wilson first created for his company. In a less costly world, would I choose to keep the Sasha DAWs? In a needle drop. I have never heard music recreation in my own home like this before. The Sasha DAW has rocked my listening world. The Wilson Audio Specialties Sasha DAW loudspeaker is a beautifully balanced fusion of technology, craft, and art, and a fine living tribute to David A. Wilson. Q 3 See stereophile.com/content/harbeth-monitor-302-40th-anniversary-editionloudspeaker.

EQUIPMENT RE PO RT

JOHN ATKINSON

NAD Masters Series M10 STREAMING INTEGRATED AMPLIFIER

igh-quality playback of digital audio is evolving in two opposed directions. One is where a smart wireless loudspeaker, like the KEF LSX1 or DALI Callisto 6 C,2 needs to be connected to a simple source of data. The other is where a smart amplifier takes the data from wherever it needs and sends it to a pair of dumb loudspeakers. NAD’s Masters Series M32 integrated amplifier ($4848 with its optional MDC DD-BluOS module), which I reviewed in May 2018,3 is a greatsounding example of the latter approach. In the spring of 2019, NAD introduced the Masters Series M10 ($2749). At first I assumed that the M10 was a stripped-down, less-powerful version of the M32, but the new amplifier offers a unique set of features. Like the M32, the M10 offers analog and digital inputs, but here the BluOS functionality, with its network, Wi-Fi, and Bluetooth connectivity, is included rather than optional. Yes, both amplifiers use a digital output stage, but while the M32 uses a “DirectDigital” amplifier that takes a digital signal as its input, the M10’s “Hybrid Digital” amplifier takes in an analog signal. The M10 also offers 50W less power

than the >150W claimed for the M32. But NAD speciﬁes that the M10 will offer “Dynamic Power”—ie, when the power demand is short-lived, as it would be with musical transients—of 160W into 8 ohms and 300W into 4 ohms. The M10 includes multiroom capability and is compatible with home control systems from Crestron, Control4, 1 See stereophile.com/content/kef-lsx-wireless-loudspeaker-system. 2 See stereophile.com/content/dali-callisto-6-c-wireless-loudspeaker. 3 See stereophile.com/content/nad-masters-series-m32-directdigital-da-integrated-ampliﬁer.

SPECIFICATIONS Description Remote-controlled, network-connected D/A integrated ampliﬁer with Dirac Live LE Room Correction, tone controls, multiroom capability, and front-panel touchscreen. Analog inputs: 2 pairs RCA (line). Digital inputs: 1 TosLink, 1 coaxial S/PDIF, 1 HDMI, USB Type A, BluOS (Wi-Fi), Bluetooth aptX HD. Supported ﬁle formats: MP3, AAC, WMA, OGG, WMA-L, ALAC, OPUS, MQA, DSD, FLAC, WAV, AIFF. Supported sample rates: up to 192kHz with bit depths 16–32. Supported cloud services: Spo-

stereophile.com

January 2020

tify, Amazon Music, Tidal, Deezer, Qobuz, HDTracks, HighResAudio, Murﬁe, Juke, Napster, Slacker Radio, KKBox, Bugs, internet radio. Analog outputs: 1 pair unbalanced preampliﬁer (RCA), 1 pair unbalanced subwoofer (RCA), 2 pairs speaker binding posts. Maximum continuous output power: 100Wpc into 8 ohms (20.0dBW). Clipping power: >130Wpc into 8 ohms (>21.14dBW), >230W into 4 ohms (>20.6dBW). IHF dynamic power: 160W into 8 ohms (22.0dBW), 300W into 4 ohms (21.76dBW).

Frequency response: 20Hz– 20kHz, ±0.6dB. Channel separation: >75dB at 1kHz, >70dB at 10kHz. Signal/ noise: >90dB (A-weighted, ref. 1W). THD (measured using AP AUX-0025 passive ﬁlter and AES 17 active ﬁlter): <0.03% (250mW– 100W into 8 and 4 ohms). Power consumption: <0.5W standby. Supplied accessories: two AC cords, microphone, USB microphone adaptor, manual on USB thumb drive. Finish Black aluminum and “Gorilla Glass.” Dimensions 8.5" (215mm)

W × 3.9" (100mm) H × 10.25" (260mm) D. Weight: 11lb (5kg) shipping. Serial number of unit reviewed K94M1001871; “Designed and engineered in Canada,” manufactured in China. BluOS version 3.4.23. Price $2749. Approximate number of dealers: 100. Warranty: 3 years, parts & labor. Manufacturer NAD Electronics International, 633 Granite Court, Pickering, Ontario L1W 3K1, Canada. Tel: (905) 831-6555. Fax: (905) 831-6936. Web: nadelectronics.com.

NAD MASTERS SERIES M10

and Lutron. But more significantly for Stereophile readers, purchasers of the M10 receive a free license to use Dirac Live Room Correction with their new amp. (This can be upgraded to a paid Dirac Live Full Frequency version.) The M10 is supplied with a USB microphone that can be used to measure the responses of the owner’s loudspeakers at the listening position; the Dirac app then creates a digital filter to optimize the sound, after which the amplifier’s digital signal processing corrects the signal on the fly. Design The M10 is a small, elegant-looking amplifier—it is just 8.5" wide—finished in black with the front and top panels formed from “Gorilla Glass.” The top panel has an illuminated NAD logo, with a color that indicates various things that are happening inside. (In operation it shines a chaste white.) The front panel comprises a full-width, color TFT touchscreen with a proximity sensor—it senses when your finger is close and offers you items to choose from the menu. The menu itself is too complicated to describe here; suffice it to say that it allows a wide range of functions, including tone controls and crossover frequency for one or two subwoofers. When the M10 receives streamed audio, the display shows the album cover art, artist, album, composer, and track name. When the M10 receives S/PDIF digital audio and analog signals, the display shows a large pair of white-on-black VU meters. As well as two pairs of terminals for loudspeakers and the usual 15A IEC power jack, the crowded back panel has two pairs of RCA jacks for analog input signals; a pair of preamplifier output RCA jacks; a pair of subwoofer output RCA

jacks; coaxial and optical S/PDIF input ports; an HDMI port for connecting any TV that supports HDMI Control (CEC) and Audio Return Channel (ARC) functions; a combined Ethernet port and Type A USB port; a standby button; a switch for turning the M10 into a bridged-mono amplifier; and various service and trigger jacks. The M10 has Wi-Fi and Bluetooth connectivity; its USB port can accept thumb drives containing music files; and it can access music files stored on a network-attached drive using the BluOS Controller app or Roon. The M10 supports all the common file formats, including MP3, AAC, WMA, OGG, WMA-L, ALAC, OPUS, DSD, FLAC, WAV, and AIFF, with sample rates up to 192kHz and 16–32 bit depths. It can unfold MQA-encoded data and also supports Spotify, Amazon Music, Tidal, Deezer, Qobuz, HDTracks, HighResAudio, and many more streaming services, as well as internet radio. Inside the box, the M10’s brain is an ARM Cortex-A9 processor running at 1GHz. Analog signals are digitized and all the audio data are converted to analog with a 32-bit ESS Sabre DAC chip. While this can decode data sampled up to 384kHz, the maximum rate the M10 can handle is 192kHz. As mentioned above, the M10’s output stage is based on the well-regarded Hypex nCore modules, which take negative feedback from after the class-D stage rather than before, to better control the loudspeakers. Setup Though I didn’t try doing so, the M10 can be voice-controlled by Amazon’s Alexa and Apple’s Siri. As the M10 doesn’t have a conventional remote control, it needs to be

January 2020

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NAD MASTERS SERIES M10

connected to a network, either Wi-Fi or Ethernet, for full functionality. Following the excellent instructions in the manual—supplied on a USB thumb drive—I connected the M10 to my network with Wi-Fi using the BluOS Controller app running on an iPad mini. As appears to be the norm these days, the ampliﬁer contacted homebase to see if its ﬁrmware needed to be updated. It did, so I waited while the update was downloaded and installed—the NAD logo on

the top panel ﬂashes red during this process—after which the M10 rebooted itself and was ready to play music. I later used a wired network connection but didn’t hear any difference between the two modes.4 To play CDs, as I didn’t have a long-enough coaxial cable 4 Twice during the review period, the M10 stopped recognizing my network. Rebooting it with the front-panel menu command resolved whatever the problem had been.

MEASUREMENTS

measured the Masters Series M10 using my Audio Precision SYS2722 system (see the January 2008 “As We See It”1). As the NAD is a class-D design, I didn’t run my usual preconditioning test of using the amplifier to drive a 1kHz tone at one-third power into 8 ohms. Nevertheless, before doing any testing I ran it for an hour at a moderate power level, to ensure that it was fully warmed up. Because class-D amplifiers emit relatively high levels of ultrasonic noise that would drive my analyzer’s input into slew-rate limiting, all measurements were taken with Audio Precision’s auxiliary AUX-0025 passive low-pass filter, which eliminates noise above 200kHz. Without the filter, there was 250mV of ultrasonic noise present

at the loudspeaker terminals, which is typical for an nCore output stage. The M10 runs warm. After an afternoon of testing, the top panel’s temperature was 95.6°F/35.4°C. The System Info menu on the front-panel display indicated that the internal temperatures were “Left 60°C, Right 62°C.” Looking first at the analog inputs: With the NAD’s volume control set to its maximum, the voltage gain at 1kHz into 8 ohms measured a relatively low 29.6dB from the speaker terminals and 4dB from the preamplifier outputs. The line inputs preserved absolute polarity (ie, were noninverting), and the input impedance was 16k ohms at low and middle frequencies, dropping to 4.5k ohms at 20kHz. The preamplifier output impedance was a usefully low 92 ohms in the midrange above but increased to 135

ohms at the bottom of the audioband, probably due to the presence of an output coupling capacitor. The M10’s output impedance at the speaker terminals was very low, at <0.01 ohms from 20Hz to 20kHz, the measured value including the series resistance of 6’ of speaker cable. Consequently, the variation in frequency response with our standard simulated loudspeaker 2 (ﬁg.1, gray trace) is minimal. The traces in ﬁg.1 cut off sharply above 20kHz, due to the M10 converting its analog inputs to digital with what appears to be a sample rate of 44.1kHz. Unlike NAD’s more expensive M32,3 which allows the analog inputs to be digitized

Fig.2 NAD M10, analog input, small-signal, 1kHz squarewave into 8 ohms.

Fig.3 NAD M10, analog input, small-signal, 10kHz squarewave into 8 ohms.

1 See stereophile.com/content/measurementsmaps-precision. 2 See stereophile.com/content/real-life-measurements-page-2. 3 See tinyurl.com/y46pakco.

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Fig.1 NAD M10, analog input, frequency response at 2.83V into: simulated loudspeaker load (gray), 8 ohms (left channel blue, right red), 4 ohms (left cyan, right magenta), 2 ohms (green) (1dB/vertical div.).

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Fig.4 NAD M10, digital input, sample rate 192kHz, frequency response at 2.83V into 8 ohms with Bass and Treble controls set to “0dB,” “+6dB,” and “–6dB” (left channel blue, right red) (dB/vertical div.).

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Fig.5 NAD M10, analog input, spectrum of 1kHz sinewave, DC–1kHz, at 1W into 8 ohms (left channel blue, right red; linear frequency scale).

Fig.6 NAD M10, analog input, distortion (%) vs 1kHz continuous output power into 8 ohms.

NAD MASTERS SERIES M10

I connected the AES/EBU output of my Ayre disc player to a VSP digital format converter so I could send the data to the M10 via a 15' Toslink optical connection. While the BluOS app can be used to access a music library, I mostly used the Roon app—Roon recognizes the M10 as a Roon Ready zone—to send music data to the M10 via the network. Roon also recognized the NAD as an Airplay device, which I used to listen to internet radio from my Mac mini.

I used four pairs of loudspeakers during my auditioning: the inexpensive PSB Alpha P5s that I reviewed in the October 2019 issue5 and that were my personal 2019 Product of the Year; my long-term reference KEF LS50s; my vintage Rogers LS3/5a’s; and the Q Acoustics Concept 300s, which I review elsewhere in this issue. 5 See stereophile.com/content/psb-alpha-p5-loudspeaker.

measurements, continued

at 48, 96, or 192kHz, the M10’s analog/ digital converter runs at just the one rate. The M10’s reproduction of an analog 1kHz squarewave has the ringing on its leading and trailing edges that are typical of a linear phase reconstruction filter (fig.2) and a 10kHz squarewave is reproduced as a sinewave (fig.3), due to all the odd-order harmonics that would give the wave its square shape being removed by the A/D converter’s antialiasing filter. The M10’s treble and bass controls offer a maximum boost of 6dB. As you can’t have levels higher than 0dBFS in a digital system, switching on the tone controls with them set to do nothing reduces the signal level by the same 6dB. Fig.4 shows the effect of the NAD’s bass and treble controls set to their +6dB and –6dB positions. The bass control offers a range of

±6dB below 70Hz, the treble control +5.5/–6.7dB at 20kHz. I created this graph using S/PDIF data sampled at 192kHz to show what happens above the audioband. It implies that the M10’s DSP operates at 96kHz even when fed 192kHz data. Channel separation was good rather than great, at >70dB in both directions below 1kHz but decreasing to 45dB at 20kHz. With the Audio Precision ultrasonic ﬁlter, the analog inputs shorted to ground, and the volume control set to the maximum, the wideband, unweighted signal/noise ratio (ref. 2.83V into 8 ohms) measured 55.8dB in the left channel and 60.3dB in the right. Restricting the measurement bandwidth to 22kHz increased the ratio to a respectable 75dB in both channels, and an A-weighting ﬁlter increased it further, to 78.2dB. Spectral analysis of

Fig.7 NAD M10, analog input, distortion (%) vs 1kHz continuous output power into 4 ohms.

Fig.8 NAD M10, THD+N (%) vs frequency at 9.675V into: 8 ohms (left channel blue, right red), and 4 ohms (left cyan, right magenta).

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Fig.10 NAD M10, analog input, spectrum of 50Hz sinewave, DC–1kHz, at 30Wpc into 8 ohms (left channel blue, right red; linear frequency scale).

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the NAD’s low-frequency noise floor (fig.5) revealed there to be a spurious tone present at 60Hz, this related to the AC power-line frequency but probably inaudible at –68dB ref. 2.83V into 8 ohms. The M10 is specified as delivering a maximum continuous output power of 100Wpc into 8 ohms (20dBW). At our usual definition of clipping (ie, when the percentage of THD+noise in the amplifier’s output reaches 1%), with continuous drive the M10 exceeded its specified power. It clipped at 155Wpc into 8 ohms (fig.6, 21.9dBW) and at 295Wpc into 4 ohms (fig.7, 21.7dBW). Distortion levels at moderate powers (fig.8) were low and dominated by noise, more so in the left channel (blue, cyan, and gray traces) than the right (red and magenta). Although the shape of the THD+N spuriae waveform

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Fig.9 NAD M10, analog input, 1kHz waveform at 30W into 8 ohms, 0.04% THD+N (top); distortion and noise waveform with fundamental notched out (bottom, not to scale).

Fig.11 NAD M10, analog input, HF intermodulation spectrum, DC–24kHz, 19+20kHz at 30Wpc peak into 8 ohms (left channel blue, right red; linear frequency scale).

sec

Fig.12 NAD M10, digital input, impulse response (one sample at 0dBFS, 44.1kHz sampling, 4ms time window).

NAD MASTERS SERIES M10

Listening Before installing the M10 in my system, I had been listening to my resident pair of KEF LS50s driven first by a pair of Lamm M1.2 Reference monoblocks, then by the Vandersteen M5-HPA monoblocks I had used with the Vandersteen Quatro Wood CT loudspeakers that I reviewed in the November 2019 issue. The latter had their high-pass frequency set to 20Hz so they would, in effect, be driving the KEFs virtually full-range. As you might expect, these very much more expensive amplifiers—the Lamms cost $32,490/pair, the Vandersteens $15,800/pair—set a high bar for the M10. Both made the KEFs sound considerably larger, more authoritative than you might expect from what are relatively small speakers. In particular, the Vandersteen M5-HPAs proved a particularly synergistic if unlikely match. I further explore the performance of this amplifier in my review of the Q Acoustics Concept 300 elsewhere in this issue. When I started listening to the NAD M10, therefore, I was anticipating a marked diminution in sound quality— even veteran reviewers aren’t completely immune from expectation bias. Using the KEFs, I played some reference CDs, including André Previn’s performance of Rachmaninoff’s Symphony No.2 with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra (Telarc 80113) that I had auditioned with the Vandersteen speakers and amplifiers. Following the Previn performance, I cued up the DSD64 file with Iván Fischer and the Budapest Festival Orchestra performing the same symphony (Channel Classics 21604) with Roon. (Roon transcoded the DSD64 data to 24/176.4 PCM, and I couldn’t see how to tell the app to send the original DSD

data to the M10.6) With both recordings, I was surprised by a) how much I was enjoying the music, and b) how little the NAD’s presentation fell behind in comparison with the Vandersteens. Yes, the low frequencies sounded less extended, less authoritative with the NAD, even with the Dirac Live EQ for the KEF LS50s enabled—see sidebar, “Trying Dirac Live Room Correction”—but what there was of the midbass carried sufficient weight for me not to miss the M5-HPAs too much, and the M10’s upper bass was impressively articulate. My longtime test for bass articulation is the repeated 16th-note bass line in “Last Train Home,” from Pat Metheny’s Still Life (Talking) (CD, Geffen GEFD 24145-2). It is difficult for a reflex loudspeaker system to keep the onset of each bass note distinct from the overhang of the previous one, and this can be exacerbated by the amplifier used. With the KEFs driven by the M10, however, each note was clearly defined and, if I had to swear to it, better defined than with the Vandersteen amplifiers. Stereo imaging precision with all the speakers I used with the M10 was excellent, with acoustic objects palpably positioned in the soundstage. Metheny’s electric sitar in “Last Train Home” hung in space just to the left of center, and the individual voices in the song’s wordless bridge were clearly delineated. While there wasn’t quite as much soundstage depth as with the expensive Vandersteens, the M10 still scored well with this aspect of performance. As the M10 will decode MQA files, I enabled the Core decoder function in Roon and streamed an MQA file of Mozart’s Violin Concerto No.4 from Tidal, with Marianne

NAD MASTERS SERIES M10

Thorsen and the TrondheimSolistene (24/44.1 FLAC, 2L 7041888521624). Roon authenticated the stream as “MQA Studio 352.8kHz,” unfolded it to 24/88.2 data “with MQA Signaling,” and sent it to the M10, which rendered it as a stream sampled at 352.8kHz. The sound was excellent. However, even though the M10’s manual says that playback of MQA files will result in a green or blue indicator being shown both on the amplifier’s front panel and on the BluOS app’s screen, this didn’t appear. That said, both when I streamed the violin concerto from Tidal with BluOS or selected the MQA-encoded files on a USB thumb drive plugged into the M10’s rear-panel port, the MQA indicators appeared correctly, along with the Tidal logo in the former case. These indicators only operate, therefore, when the M10 is acting as both the MQA core decoder and renderer, as it does when using the BluOS app for playback but not when Roon is performing the first unfold. Digital comparisons As regular readers will know, I am not a fan of Bluetooth use for music transmission. Even so, when I sent music files to the M10 via Bluetooth, it worked well enough, the amplifier switching to the Bluetooth signal when I pressed Play on my iPhone or iPad. I had intended to perform some comparisons between the M10 fed digital data via the optical link from the Ayre player and the same data sent via AES/EBU to my reference DAC, a PS Audio DirectStream DAC (Snowmass firmware) that I purchased following Art Dudley’s review in September 2014.7 The output of the PS Audio was sent to the M10’s analog input via 12’ single-ended AudioQuest

interconnects. However, as the NAD digitizes its analog inputs, the PS Audio’s reproduction was affected first by the A/D conversion and then by the M10’s D/A conversion. I therefore connected the M10’s preamplifier outputs to the Vandersteen monoblocks using unbalanced/balanced adaptors and alternated this connection with a balanced connection from the PS Audio. Using Roon to send the same music to both the NAD and PS Audio with the levels matched with the 1kHz warble tone on Editor’s Choice (16/44.1 AIFF file, from Stereophile STPH016-2), the PS Audio was softer-balanced in the highs than the NAD, the M10’s treble sounding more forward. However, the PS Audio DAC excelled in the presentation of space. Even with the MQA unfold/upsampling rate restricted to 176.4kHz rather than to the full 352.8kHz, the DirectStream decoded more of the recorded ambience on the 2L Mozart Tidal stream. On the Pat Metheny track, the chugging bass line had a touch more upper-bass energy with the PS Audio, and though the electric sitar and Lyle Mays’s acoustic piano was sweeter-sounding, the soundstaging overall was more palpable than it had been with the NAD. But to put this comparison into perspective, with its network bridge card the PS Audio DirectStream costs $5999, more than twice the price of the NAD M10, and while it has a similar if smaller touchscreen, it is just a DAC. No amplifier. 6 Peculiarly, although the M10 is specified as being able to play DSD data, when I copied the DSF files to a USB thumb drive and plugged it into the M10’s rearpanel port, the files weren’t recognized, even though all the hi-rez PCM files on the drive were identified as such and could be played with the BluOS app. 7 See stereophile.com/content/ps-audio-perfectwave-directstream-da-processor.

NAD MASTERS SERIES M10

Luxman comparisons As coincidence would have it, the Luxman SQ-N150 that Ken Micallef very favorably reviewed in December arrived at my place for measurement as I was wondering what ampliﬁers I could compare the M10 with. While the Luxman is an integrated ampliﬁer around the same size as the NAD and, at $2795, is priced similarly, it is otherwise as different as it could be. It uses tubes, has analog inputs only, and offers

a maximum power of just 10Wpc into 8 ohms. (It does have a headphone jack, which the M10 doesn’t.) For the comparisons, I used my PS Audio DirectStream DAC with its single-ended output set to its maximum and matched the levels from both ampliﬁers with the 1kHz warble tone on Editor’s Choice. With the PSB Alpha P5s the sound was sweetened, with a mellower top end than with the M10. Orchestral violins sounded lush. While the

measurements, continued

at 30Wpc into 8 ohms (fig.9, bottom trace) is obscured by high-frequency noise, the distortion signature appears to be primarily third-harmonic in nature. This was confirmed by spectral analysis (fig.10), with the second harmonic 6dB lower in level and higherorder harmonics all lying below –100dB (0.001%). Intermodulation distortion was very low (fig.11), but as with the M32 the noise floor begins to rise above 15kHz. To examine the M10’s performance with digital input data, I used the Audio Precision’s optical and coaxial S/PDIF outputs and data sent to the M10 via Wi-Fi from my Roon Nucleus+ server. There were no significant differences between the data sources. The coaxial input locked to datastreams with all sample rates up to 192kHz. The optical TosLink input, however, was restricted to 96kHz and below. The BluOS Wi-Fi connection worked with data sampled at up to 192kHz. With digital input signals the M10’s front-panel meters are calibrated in dBFS—ie, 1kHz at –12dBFS is indicated as “–12dB.” A 1kHz digital signal at –12dBFS resulted in an output level of 15.8V into 8 ohms with the volume control set to the maximum, which suggests that the M10’s gain architecture is well-organized. The NAD’s impulse response with 44.1kHz data (fig.12) indicates that the reconstruction filter is a conventional linear-phase type, with time-symmetrical ringing to either side of the single sample at 0dBFS. With 44.1kHz-sampled white noise (fig.13, red and magenta traces), the M10’s response rolled off sharply above 20kHz, reaching full stop-band suppression just above half the sample rate (vertical green line). An aliased image at 25kHz of a full-scale tone at 19.1kHz (blue and cyan traces) can’t therefore be seen, though the noise floor starts to rise at ultrasonic frequencies. The distortion harmonics of the 19.1kHz tone are visible above

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the ultrasonic noise floor, the third harmonic being the highest in level at –60dB (0.1%). When I examined the NAD’s digital frequency response with coaxial S/ PDIF data at 44.1, 96, and 192kHz (fig.14), the response at the two lower rates dropped off sharply just below half the sample rate. The response with 192kHz data (blue and red traces) extended higher than with 96kHz data (cyan, magenta) but not by much. When I increased the bit depth from 16 to 24 with a dithered 1kHz tone at –90dBFS (fig.16), the noise floor dropped by almost 12dB, meaning that the M10 offers 18 bits’ worth of resolution, 2 bits less than the M32. With undithered data representing a tone at

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exactly –90.31dBFS (not shown), the three DC voltage levels described by the data were well resolved and the waveform was perfectly symmetrical. With undithered 24-bit data, the result was a clean sinewave (not shown). The NAD’s rejection of word-clock jitter with 16-bit Wi-Fi data (ﬁg.16) was superb, with all the odd-order harmonics of the LSB-level, low-frequency squarewave at the correct levels, indicated by the sloping green line in this graph. However, the left channel (blue trace) was a little noisier than the right (red). Like its big brother, NAD’s M10 packs a lot of well-engineered performance into its relatively small chassis.—John Atkinson

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Fig.13 NAD M10, digital input, wideband spectrum of white noise at –4dBFS (left channel red, right magenta) and 19.1kHz tone at 0dBFS (left blue, right cyan), with data sampled at 44.1kHz (20dB/ vertical div.).

Fig.14 NAD M10, digital input, frequency response at –12dBFS into 100k ohms with data sampled at: 44.1kHz (left channel green, right gray), 96kHz (left channel cyan, right magenta), 192kHz (left blue, right red) (1dB/vertical div.).

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Fig.15 NAD M10, digital input, spectrum with noise and spuriae of dithered 1kHz tone at –90dBFS with: 16-bit data (left channel cyan, right magenta), 24bit data (left blue, right red) (20dB/vertical div.).

Fig.16 NAD M10, digital input, high-resolution jitter spectrum of analog output signal, 11.025kHz at –6dBFS, sampled at 44.1kHz with LSB toggled at 229Hz: 16-bit Wi-Fi data (left channel blue, right red). Center frequency of trace, 11.025kHz; frequency range, ±3.5kHz.

NAD MASTERS SERIES M10

Luxman’s low frequencies were richer, the passages where the double basses dig down in the third movement of Beethoven’s Symphony No.4, with Simon Rattle conducting the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra (24/192 WAV file, Berlin Philharmonic download, BPHR 160091), sounded thickened, less distinct, with the tubed Luxman compared with how they did with the class-D NAD. In addition, the low-powered Luxman was close to running out of power on climaxes with SPLs in the high 80s, while the NAD was still coasting at these levels. Substituting the KEF LS50s for the inexpensive PSBs, the highs remained sweeter than with the NAD but the lows acquired a touch more authority. The double bass on “Autumn Leaves” from Cannonball Adderley’s classic Somethin’ Else (24/94 ALAC files ripped from the Classic Records DVD reissue, DAD1022), which sounded a little dry on the NAD, was warmer with the Luxman. Stereo imaging was equally well-defined with both amplifiers driving the

TRYING DIRAC LIVE ROOM CORRECTION

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bloom. This was deﬁnitely a step in the right direction. I continued listening to recordings I knew well, both classical and rock. Well-recorded classical piano fared particularly well with the small KEFs

calculated correction. (I used the same methodology I have been using for 30 years—averaging 20 spectra, taken for the left and right speakers individually using a 96kHz sample rate, in a vertical rectangular grid 36" wide by 18" high Fig.1 (left) Target response, 50Hz– 500Hz, calculated by Dirac Live for the KEF LS50s (dark blue), with responses in JA’s listening room of left loudspeaker (corrected, bold green, and uncorrected, thin green) and right speaker (corrected, bold red, and uncorrected, thin red). Fig.2 (below) KEF LS50, spatially averaged, 1/12-octave response in JA’s listening room with the NAD M10’s original Dirac correction (red), with the revised correction (green), and without correction (blue).

corrected by the M10’s Dirac Live. The weight added to the left-hand register of Evelina Vorontsova’s instrument on her hauntingly beautiful reading of Rachmaninoff’s second Piano Sonata (16/44.1 ALAC ﬁle ripped from CD, STH Quality Classics CD 1416092) was addictive. And that weight was not accompanied by any blurring or boom. However, when I listened to the Simon Rattle Beethoven symphony I had used for my comparisons with the Luxman ampliﬁer, I couldn’t escape the impression that there was too much upper bass with the Dirac EQ. Accordingly, I measured the LS50s’ spatially averaged in-room response with the speakers driven by the NAD M10 with and without the DiracAmplitude in dB

To use Dirac Live LE with the M10, I plugged the microphone supplied with the amplifier into the 3.5mm jack on the USB adaptor, also supplied, and plugged that into the USB Type A port on the M10’s rear panel. I installed the Dirac Live app on my iPad mini, after first making sure that it and the M10 were connected to the same network. When I ran the app with the M10 driving my KEF LS50s, it found and identified the amplifier, reduced the playback volume, and performed a level check. I then followed the on-screen instructions, placing the microphone in each of the nine positions specified by the app and performing a “chirp” test at each. After the last test, Dirac calculated a correction filter and asked for it to be named and saved to the M10’s internal DSP. Imaginative as always, I called the correction filter “LS50.” When I then ran the BluOS app on the iPad, the Audio Settings menu now included an on/off switch for “LS50.” The target response for the filter is shown as the dark blue trace in fig.1 and can be compared with the before and after responses for each speaker (respectively thin and bold green and red traces). I was listening to J.S. Bach’s “Wachet Auf,” from a favorite album, Yo-Yo Ma and the Amsterdam Baroque Orchestra’s Simply Baroque II (16/44.1 ALAC files ripped from CD, Sony Classical 60681) when, using the BluOS app, I turned on the low-frequency correction Dirac had calculated for the KEF LS50s. The low frequencies became richer and the orchestral sound acquired greater

Frequency in Hz

and centered on the positions of my ears. The only change from past practice was to show 1/12 octave–smoothed spectra rather than 1/6 octave, in order to reveal more detail.) The results are shown in ﬁg.2. (Ignore for now the green trace.) The blue trace is the in-room response of the uncorrected speakers. It slopes

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To find a dealer near you and to learn more about Vienna Acoustics loudspeakers, visit bluebirdmusic.com/vienna

NAD MASTERS SERIES M10

KEFs, but the solo woodwinds in the mysterious opening of the Beethoven symphony’s first movement were clearly set farther back with the NAD. This is the opposite of what I would have expected, given the prevailing meme that tube amplifiers offer excellent soundstage depth. I enjoyed the two days I spent living with the Luxman SQ-N150. It offers the virtues of a classic tubed amplifier without any of the vices, other than restricted maximum power. Overall, however, even without considering its digital and network functionality, NAD’s M10 offers a more neutral tonal balance, greater transparency, and as much power as I would ever need with the speakers I choose to use. Conclusions NAD’s Masters Series M10 may be small, but don’t let that fool you. Hidden within its unassuming exterior are a powerful, transparent, clean-sounding amplifier, a versatile streaming DAC, and the ability to optimize the sound of its owner’s preferred speakers. Voted EISA’s “Smart Amplifier of 2019–2020,” the M10 was described as “a true master of modern music playback.”8 Amen to that sentiment: Other than a pair of loudspeakers, the relatively affordable M10 offers everything serious audiophiles and music lovers need to enjoy their music. Q

A S S O C I AT E D E Q U I P M E N T Digital Sources Roon Nucleus+ file server; Mac mini and iPad mini running Roon 1.6, BluOS apps; Ayre Acoustics C-5xeMP disc player, Digital Domain VSP digital format converter. Integrated Amplifiers Luxman SQ-N150. Power Amplifiers Lamm M1.2 Reference, Vandersteen M5HPA, both monoblocks. Loudspeakers KEF LS50, Rogers LS3/5a, PSB Alpha P5, Q Acoustic Concept 300. Cables Digital: AudioQuest Vodka (Ethernet), Esperanto Audio (S/PDIF), DH Labs (AES/EBU), generic plastic TosLink optical (15’). Interconnect: AudioQuest Fire & Cheetah (unbalanced), AudioQuest Wild Blue (balanced). Speaker: AudioQuest K2. AC: AudioQuest Dragon Source & High Current, manufacturers’ own. Accessories Target TT-5 equipment racks; Celestion 24" and Q Acoustics speaker stands; Ayre Acoustics Myrtle Blocks; ASC Tube Traps, RPG Abffusor panels; Shunyata Research Dark Field cable elevators; Cardas unbalanced/ balanced adaptors; AudioQuest Niagara 5000 Low-Z Power/Noise-Dissipation System. AC power comes from two dedicated 20A circuits, each just 6’ from breaker box.—John Atkinson

8 See stereophile.com/content/2019-2020-eisa-hi-ﬁ-expert-group-citations.

TRYING DIRAC LIVE ROOM CORRECTION Continued down below 200Hz and above 2kHz. The former is due to the fact that the speakers are positioned well away from the room’s sidewalls and front wall and don’t, therefore, benefit from any lowfrequency boundary reinforcement. The latter is due to the room’s increasing absorption at high frequencies—the KEF’s highs actually sound neutrally balanced at the listening position. The red trace in fig.2 shows the LS50s’ spatially averaged in-room response with Dirac Live correction applied between 50Hz and 500Hz. You can see that the corrective filter calculated by Dirac has flattened the balance in the lower midrange but has overcompensated for the KEFs’ shelved-down low frequencies. There is now an apparent excess of energy of 2–5dB from 40Hz to 150Hz, correlating nicely with my perception. Note that the measured responses roll off rapidly above 20kHz. This is due to my feeding the diagnostic test signal to the M10’s analog inputs, which digitize it with a 44.1kHz sample rate. Repeating a response measurement with digital data sampled at 96kHz and 192kHz fed to the M10’s coaxial S/PDIF input indicated that the Dirac filter did function identically at the higher sample rates.

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January 2020

Though both are centered on the position of my head in my chair, the grid spacing and layout I use for my traditional measurements and those used by Dirac Live are slightly different. (This shouldn’t make a big difference because once the number of positions where the responses are measured reaches nine, the spatially averaged response converges on a consistent result.) I also use a high-end Earthworks omnidirectional microphone for my measurements, though I doubt that would account for the differences between the red and blue traces in fig.2. Nevertheless, I plugged the NAD mike and USB adaptor into my laptop, where it was identified as “NAD USB Audio” and could be set to sample rates of 44.1kHz or 48kHz with a bit depth of 16. I did some tests comparing the NAD mike with my Earthworks mike, and the two had identical responses below 1kHz. More experimentation was necessary. I turned off the original LS50 filter and ran the Dirac Live app again. However, this time, when I had finished the measurements and the app had calculated the correction filter, instead of accepting what I was shown, I used the Control buttons—the solid circles superimposed on the target trace in

fig.1—to reduce the intended levels below 200Hz by 2dB or so. The new spatially averaged room response is shown as the green curve in fig.2. Now when I listened to the Simon Rattle Beethoven recording, the mid- and upper-bass regions were in better balance with the midrange. And there were sufficient lows for the Rachmaninoff piano sonata recording still to sound magnificent. The subtle organ bass pedal line in the “Kyrie Eleison” from the sublime Robert Shaw/Atlanta Symphony Orchestra recording of the Duruflé Requiem (16/44.1 ALAC file ripped from CD, Telarc CD-80135) was more evenly balanced with the Dirac EQ than it was without. The extra bass energy didn’t seem to stress the KEFs, and though I haven’t shown them, the responses for the left and right speakers at the positions of my ears now matched very closely below 500Hz. To sum up, NAD’s incorporation of Dirac Live in the M10 is a huge added value, especially if you have a small-tomedium–sized room and minimonitors that you like or need to place a ways away from the room boundaries. As much as I love the unequalized LS50s, their presentation corrected with Dirac Live was addictive.—John Atkinson

EXCEPTIONAL AUDIO SYSTEMS

NEW ON AUDITION AT EXCEL AUDIO ALL NEW! WILSON AUDIO CHRONOSONIC XVX Wilson Audio’s Chronosonic XVX is now available for audition at Excel Audio. This speaker has to be heard to be believed. Borrowing components and design elements from the Master Chronosonic, the XVX is both visually and sonically stunning. Come in and audition as part of our new million dollar plus reference system, an experience you don’t want to miss. MSRP $329,000.00

Come in and browse through our records. Excel has the largest selection of audiophile vinyl in southern CA. Titles from Analogue Productions, Impex, MoFi, and many more.

dCS BARTOK The new dCS Bartok is ﬁrst and foremost a state of the art network streaming dac. With the addition of a unique headphone ampliﬁer it brings the dCS experience to both headphone and stereo listeners. This level of digital playback has never been available at this price point. Feel free to bring in your favorite headphones for a listen. MSRP $15,000.00 w/ headphone amp $13,500.00 w/o headphone amp

dCS VIVALDI The dCS Vivaldi redeﬁnes the state-of-the-art in digital audio playback and represents the pinnacle of digital audio design. Whether you purchase the stand alone dac or the full stack you won’t be prepared for the listening experience. The best digital playback available and it’s here for audition at Excel. MSRP Dac $35,999.00 Clock $14,999.00 Upsampler $21,999.00 SACD transport $41,999.00

AMG • Audio Research • Aurender • Clearaudio D’Agostino • dCS • Gold Note • Harbeth • Isotek KEF • Klipsch • Koetsu • Levinson • Line Magnetic Luxman • MoFi • Nordost • TAD • Wilson Audio ... and more

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EQUIPMENT RE PO RT

HERB REICHERT

Elac Carina BS243.4 LOUDSPEAKER

o one thinks I have a good memory, but I can easily remember a few sentences from my March 2016 review1 of Elac’s Debut B6 loudspeaker. The sentence I remember best: “I might be able to forgive you for liking Paul more than John, George, or Ringo, but if you don’t grasp the genius of Mel Tormé, only God can save you.” I felt guilty for bringing God into the story, but I sincerely wanted everyone to experience the wonder of the Velvet Fog (Tormé) and to realize how good Mel could sound on a pair of $279.99/ pair upstart speakers with audiophile pretensions. And I can’t forget this one: “Impulsively, I jumped up and put my hands on their cabinets. . . . They were vibrating like sex toys!” I was not exaggerating. When Elac’s new $1200 Carina BS243.4 loudspeakers arrived, I noticed how completely different they looked elevation, the cabinet rises Assorted room sounds from the Debut B6s. No vibrating, upward front to back about and applause were wellcheap-vinyl-covered boxes here. The 1.68"—leaving space for the BS243.4s looked sleek, solid, curvy, wind from the port to exit described. Rhythm-keeping and moderne, with chamfered front-side gracefully from three sides. was better than first-rate. corners and a trapezoidal footprint. I wondered if the cabinet The BS243.4’s expensive-looking had been designed specifimatte-black finish looked like steel. Curious, I tapped the cally for desktop positioning, and if my 24" Sound Anchors cabinet sides and top with a small flashlight. It sounded like Reference stands, which are partially open at the top, would MDF, but each side surface sounded different. I used the properly load the port. Then I remembered . . . flashlight to peer inside and measure the plastic bottomAt audio shows, when I enter the Elac room, I always feel firing port (6" × 1.75"). This bottom port is able to work this sort of bouncy energy that makes me smile and perks because the front of the BS243.4’s cabinet is attached to me up. Then, of course, I see Andrew Jones’s electric grin a strong hard-plastic base, making it look like a normal rectangular speaker from the front. However, in the side 1 See stereophile.com/content/elac-debut-b6-loudspeaker.

SPECIFICATIONS Description Two-way reﬂexloaded, stand-mounted loudspeaker. Drive-units: JET folded-ribbon tweeter, 5.25" (133mm) aluminum-cone midbass driver. Crossover frequency: 2.7kHz. Frequency response: 46Hz–30kHz, ±3dB. Nominal impedance:

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6 ohms. Minimum impedance: 4.8 ohms. Sensitivity: 85dB/2.83V/1m). Recommended ampliﬁer power: 30–150Wpc. Peak power handling: 100W. Dimensions 12.54" (318mm) H × 8.06" (205mm) W × 8.52" (216mm) D. Weight:

14.73lb (6.8kg). Finishes Satin black and satin white. Serial numbers of units reviewed 32302E000037/38. Price $1199/pair. Approximate number of dealers: 30. Warranty: 3 years.

Manufacturer Elac Electroacoustic GmbH, Fraunhoferstrasse 16 Kiel, 24118, Germany. US distributor: ELAC Americas LLC, 11145 Knott Ave., Suites E & F, Cypress, CA 90630. Tel: (714 ) 252-8843. Web: elac.com

www.kimber.com

ELAC CARINA BS243.4

jutting above the swarming heads. Then, of course, I see the newest Elac speakers. (There are always new Elac speakers.) On one such occasion, I waited for Andrew to finish his spiel and the crowd to disperse, then found a seat next to America’s most popular speaker designer. He laughed as I sat down: “Vibrated like sex toys, huh?” Moments later, while listening to a song with copious bass, I noticed the curtains behind the left speaker blowing wildly in the wind from the speaker’s rear port. I smiled and tapped Andrew on the shoulder and pointed. We both laughed. Description Elac Americas’ Carina series consists of three models: the BS243.4 bookshelf speaker, the FS247.4 floorstander, and the CC241.4 center-channel speaker. “We are on a nautical theme at Elac, since the Germany office is in Kiel, Germany, an important sailing town,” Andrew told me. “Kiel is German for keel, the stabilizer for a boat. So, Carina comes from the Latin for the keel of a ship.” For the Carina series, Jones combines an updated (made in China) version of Elac Germany’s famous JET tweeter with a 5.25" aluminum-cone midbass driver with a compound curvature that extends frequency response and allows for the BS243.4’s relatively high (2.7kHz) crossover point. JET tweeter My personal experience suggests that the overall sound of any loudspeaker is greatly determined by the designer’s choice of tweeter. For that reason, most speaker manufacturers build their entire line around a particular type of tweeter. Lately, Dr. Oskar Heil’s air motion transformer (AMT) has been the tweeter of choice in several prominent manufacturers’ lineups. GoldenEar calls their version of the AMT a High-Velocity Folded Ribbon (HVFR). Adam Audio calls

theirs a Unique Accelerated Ribbon Tweeter (U-ART). Martin Logan calls theirs a Folded Motion (FM) tweeter. And Elac calls their version a Jet Emission Tweeter (JET). No matter what highfalutin name they give it, the AMT is a simple dipole transducer that squeezes air from the curtainlike folds of a sheet of polyimide film suspended in a strong magnetic field. You can’t usually see it, but these membranes have a thin, continuous conductor deposited on their surface.2 My friend, audio-design wizard Jeffrey Jackson of EMIA, believes Heil was a god and described to me how the AMT works: “The voice wire goes up and down and back up again . . . it is the direction of current flow being in opposition to its neighbor (like Coltrane’s “One Down, One Up”) that makes it squeeze or push.” We call them “air motion transformers” because they move air at a velocity several times higher than that of the diaphragm moving it. As a result, the AMT tweeter’s sensitivity and transient response are improved. The sonic effect of all this high-speed, high-volume air movement is, to my ears, one of quiet, fatigue-free detail and apparently low distortion. Setup Unlike dome tweeters, folded ribbons allow designers to control both horizontal and vertical dispersion. Therefore, AMTs usually provide wider horizontal dispersion than domes. Andrew Jones told me in an email, “The Carina BS243.4 has virtually no change in response at 15-degrees horizontally right out to nearly 15kHz and still not much change at 30 degrees. Therefore, you cannot easily change the speaker’s tonality by how much you toe it in. “Facing straight forward will give a broad but not super2 See en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Air_Motion_Transformer.

MEASUREMENTS

used DRA Labs’ MLSSA system and a calibrated DPA 4006 microphone to measure the Elac Carina BS243.4’s frequency response in the farfield, and an Earthworks QTC-40 mike for the nearfield responses. The measurements were taken without a grille. Though Elac specifies the BS243.4’s sensitivity as 85dB/2.83V/m, my estimate was closer to 82.5dB(B)/2.83V/m. The impedance is specified as 6 ohms with a minimum value of 4.8 ohms. The solid trace in fig.1 shows that while the impedance magnitude does briefly drop below 6 ohms, in the midbass and lower midrange, the average impedance in the treble is closer to 8 ohms. The minimum magnitude is 4.6 ohms at 190Hz, and while the electrical phase angle (dotted trace) reaches –57.4° at 101Hz, the magnitude at that frequency is 12.65 ohms. The BS243.4 is therefore

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not a particularly difﬁcult load for an ampliﬁer to drive. There don’t appear to be any small discontinuities in the impedance traces that would suggest the presence of cabinet vibrational resonances. When I investigated the enclosure’s vibrational behavior with a plastic-tape accelerometer, however, I found two high-level modes, at 453Hz and 566Hz, on the

sidewalls (ﬁg.2), as well as on the top panel. Both of these modes have a high Q, meaning that they need to be excited for a while to be fully developed, and, as they also have relatively high frequencies, it is unlikely that they would lead to audible congestion in the midrange. The impedance-magnitude plot has a saddle centered on 54Hz, which implies that this is the port’s tun-

Stereophile ELAC Carina BS243.4 Impedance (ohms) & Phase (deg) vs Frequency (Hz)

Fig.1 Elac BS243.4, electrical impedance (solid) and phase (dashed) (2 ohms/vertical div.).

Fig.2 Elac Carina BS243.4, cumulative spectraldecay plot calculated from output of accelerometer fastened to center of sidewall (MLS driving voltage to speaker, 7.55V; measurement bandwidth, 2kHz).

ELAC CARINA BS243.4

focused image; a little toe-in will give you a little more focus. What really matters is how close your side walls are. Toe them in further if you are too close to your side walls.” When I asked about how far they should be placed from the wall behind them, he replied, “Twelve inches from the [front] wall is about right in general, but this can be very room dependent. As usual, move them around until they sound good to you.” The BS243.4 is biwireable via rugged-looking binding posts but does not include grilles. Back in the fog The first record I listened to critically through the Elacs was by that most artful of singers, Mel Tormé: Live at the Crescendo (LP, Affinity AFFD 100). I wanted to see how the BS243.4 compared to my memory of the Elac B6. The first songs I played were “Autumn Leaves” and “It’s Alright With Me,” and the first sonic thing I noticed was a distinct lack of saturated Mel-tone. Standup bass was fingersnappy and flesh-on-strings detailed. Assorted room sounds and applause were well-described. Rhythm-keeping was better than first-rate. But overall, the sound was slightly dry, and some measure of Mel-harmonics were missing. At that point, I had not received Andrew Jones’s placement instructions, and the BS243.4s were about 30" from the wall behind them, measured from their cabinet backs. In search of Mel’s true voice, I began moving the speakers backward—slowly. While the difference wasn’t huge, every inch made a noticeable difference. When they reached 12" from the wall, the Velvet Fog was restored: I was able to

enjoy the Carinas at their full tonal potential. I did all my critical listening with the BS243.4s five feet apart, on 24" Sound Anchors Reference stands, and never more than six feet from my listening position. I experimented with loudspeaker wires from AudioQuest and Black Cat (both sounded good), but I ended up using Triode Wire Labs American Series loudspeaker cables because I liked how they presented the top octaves. Powered by the Rogue Stereo 100 The $3400, 100Wpc Rogue Stereo 100 is my day-to-day reference amplifier; it lit up the little Elacs, making them sound weighty and dynamic. Powering the BS243.4s, the Rogue made French pianist Alexandre Tharaud’s instrument sound so satisfyingly solid and true-of-tone that it fueled my budding addiction to his 2017 album Barbara (44.1/24-bit FLAC, Erato-Warner Classics/Qobuz). It is always a pleasure to discover another demonstrationquality recording and, simultaneously, become enthused with the artistry of every track on it. If you could hear, like I did, the natural density and tone of Tharaud’s piano, you would be calling up your friends, begging them to come over. Like I did. (One night my Russian neighbor came by; he liked the Elacs but hated Alexandre Tharaud and “all that French cabaret nonsense.”) Keep in mind, I was listening to these modest Elacs in my main reference system: the HoloAudio Spring DAC with Rogue Audio’s RP-7 preamp and Stereo 100 amplifier. Of equal importance, I was listening from a quasi-nearfield position: Room-speaker interaction was minimal. With this

measurements, continued

Frequency in Hz

Fig.3 Elac Carina BS243.4, acoustic crossover on tweeter axis at 50", corrected for microphone response, with nearfield woofer (blue) and port (red) responses respectively plotted below 350Hz and 700Hz.

stereophile.com

which assumes the woofer is mounted in a baffle that extends to infinity in both horizontal and vertical planes. Higher in frequency in fig.3, the farfield outputs of the BS243.4’s woofer (blue trace) and tweeter (green trace) are impressively flat within their passbands, with the crossover occurring at the specified 2.7kHz. The aluminum-cone woofer does have some resonant peaks present at 5kHz and above, but the high-order crossover suppresses these by close to 20dB. The Elac’s farfield response above 300Hz,

averaged across a 30° horizontal window centered on the tweeter axis, is shown in fig.4. The midrange and treble are superbly flat. The black trace below 300Hz in fig.4 shows the sum of the nearfield woofer and port outputs, taking into account acoustic phase and the different distance of each radiator from a nominal farfield microphone position. Again the nearfield bump can be seen, but the BS243.4’s low frequencies are tuned to be maximally flat and down by 6dB at the port tuning frequency. Fig.5 shows the Elac’s horizontal

Amplitude in dB

ing frequency. The blue trace in fig.3 shows the woofer’s nearfield response, which does indeed have its minimummotion notch at 54Hz. (This is the frequency at which the back pressure from the port resonance holds the cone stationary.) The nearfield response of the downward-facing port (red trace) peaks at the same frequency; while its upper-frequency rolloff is clean, there are a couple of small peaks present between 400Hz and 550Hz. The small rise in the upper bass is due to the nearfield measurement technique,

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Frequency in Hz

Fig.4 Elac Carina BS243.4, anechoic response on tweeter axis at 50", averaged across 30° horizontal window and corrected for microphone response, with the complex sum of the nearfield woofer and port responses and plotted below 300Hz.

Fig.5 Elac Carina BS243.4, lateral response family at 50", normalized to response on tweeter axis, from back to front: differences in response 90–5° off axis, reference response, differences in response 5–90° off axis.

ELAC CARINA BS243.4

setup, piano notes appeared clean and fully expressed from impact to extended decay. Bass power and definition were exceptional but not excessive. The bass alignment seemed just right. Consequently, there was sufficient bass drive and hammer-hitting-string detail to properly flesh out the left hand side of Tharaud’s keyboard. Notes from Alexandre’s right hand displayed satisfying amounts of percussiveness and color. I used this recording to test the JET tweeter. Was it dull or soft? No. I thought the JET delivered high piano notes with a finely drawn attack and no blurring or ringing on overtones. A nice light filled the air throughout the treble region. With the Schiit Aegir amplifier I had high hopes for the Carina BS243.4 with Schiit’s new $799 Aegir power amplifier. If this combo could play demonstration-quality recordings with demonstration-quality sound, the world be a better place. I already knew the Elacs could do elegant and refined, but there remained in my mind some X-factor, some sonic issue I was not quite noticing. I felt this because, while I listened, my brain kept scanning the soundfield for anomalies, trying to decide whether the BS243.4s can focus and image with sufficient precision. I realized that, despite the Elacs’ good dispersion—or perhaps because of it—toe-in was working like the focus ring on a camera lens. But unfortunately, at this point in the review, my brain could not decide when the best focus had been achieved.

Needing assistance, I played dual-mono pink noise from Stereophile’s Editor’s Choice test CD. Of course, before the pink noise, I listened to the “Channel Phasing” track— which I turned up loud with the 20Wpc Schiit Aegir and discovered how impressively the little Elac-Aegir combo could power the lower octaves, down to about 50Hz. (As usual in my room, the 100Hz region seemed 3-5dB up.) The dual-mono pink noise showed me a stable, centrally focused mass—noticeably wider than the images produced by the Falcon LS3/5a, KEF LS50, or Magnepan LRS. The tone of the noise changed very little as I moved one seat right or left from the sweet spot. The vertical window, however, was much narrower: I recommend sitting with ears roughly at the height of the tweeters. Image of the Passion As a child, I attended a serious Wisconsin Synod Lutheran elementary school, where it was required that all students sing in the church choir. Our academic year was organized around the Christian Liturgy. As a result, I continue to respond, body, heart, and soul, to musical memorials of Christ’s Passion. One of my special favorites is Passion selon St. Matthieu, composed in 1673 by Johann Theile (LP, Harmonia Mundi HMC 1159). Theile’s Passion emphasizes the solo arias over the musical accompaniment, which lyrically halos Christ’s words with twin violins and the other characters’ monologues with continuo. The choir is

measurements, continued

than 5° above and 10° below the woofer axis. These speakers should be used on stands that are sufﬁciently high that the listener can’t see their top panels. Turning to the time domain, the Carina BS243.4’s step response (ﬁg.7) indicates that both the tweeter and midrange unit are connected in positive acoustic polarity. (I checked this by looking at which way the woofer moved when I applied a 2V DC voltage to its terminals.) The decay of the

tweeter’s step, which arrives ﬁrst at the microphone, smoothly blends with the start of the woofer’s step, suggesting optimal crossover implementation. The Elac’s cumulative spectral-decay plot (ﬁg.8) is extremely clean, with the high-frequency resonances in the woofer cone well-suppressed. For a fairly expensive minimonitor to justify its price, it should offer excellent audio engineering. The Elac Carina BS243.4 does so. —John Atkinson

Data in Volts

dispersion and reveals that there is a very slight lack of energy off-axis at the top of the woofer’s passband, which might make the speaker sound polite in large rooms. The BS243.4 rapidly becomes directional above 7.6kHz to its sides, and as the on-axis response doesn’t have the usual top-octave peak, this speaker’s balance will lack air in overdamped, medium-to-large rooms. In the vertical plane (ﬁg.6), a suckout develops in the crossover region more

Fig.6 Elac Carina BS243.4, vertical response family at 50", normalized to response on tweeter axis, from back to front: differences in response 45–5° above axis, reference response, differences in response 5–45° below axis.

Time in ms

Fig.7 Elac Carina BS243.4, step response on tweeter axis at 50" (5ms time window, 30kHz bandwidth).

Fig.8 Elac Carina BS243.4, cumulative spectral-decay plot on tweeter axis at 50" (0.15ms risetime).

January 2020

stereophile.com

ELAC CARINA BS243.4

supported by organ. Astonishingly, the Aegir-powered Elacs reproduced the force, scale, and mass of charged energy inside the Church of St. James, Clerkenwell, London. Few recordings capture a sense of enormous energy like this one. Few recordings locate choir, soloists, and organ with the weight and precision of this one. I absolutely did not expect the $799 Schiit Aegir and $1200 Elac BS243.4 to bring it all through like they did. A very recommendable amp-speaker combination. With the Line Magnetic LM-518IA Remembering how well Elac’s B6s performed with the 22Wpc Line Magnetic LM-518IA integrated amplifier, I switched from the Schiit Aegir to the Line Magnetic, used as a power amp and driven by the Rogue Audio RP-7 preamp. The change in sound quality was not subtle.3 Immediately, the BS243.4’s top octaves became more transparent, spacious, and detailed. On Alexandre Tharaud’s dreamy arrangement of “Septembre” (also from Barbara), there was a trace of blur on the leading edges of piano notes, but I didn’t mind at all because the extended harmonics and resonant, glowing tone of those notes was pure and radiant. Through the Elacs, Camélia Jordana’s vocals inspired admiring reverie. (I had to look her up on Google, and I now follow her on Instagram.) On this recording, the piano tone has layered depth and fragrance. Observing the piano’s reverb trails stole hours from my day. Camélia’s vocals were obviously flirtatious—something I hadn’t noticed through my Harbeth or Falcon speakers. Now: I can’t imagine that Andrew Jones designed the BS243.4 with single-ended directly heated triodes in mind. But to my ears, this combination of $3400 single-ended 845 tube amp plus $1200/pair speaker generated some highly engaging musical magic. I believe this was caused by the relaxed character of the Elac’s JET tweeter enhancing the quality of the LM-518IA’s extraordinary high-frequency reproduction. One record in my collection tells me instantly how good my system is sounding—a Kenneth Wilkinson recording that I only enjoy on systems with correct tone and exceptional resolution: Vivaldi’s Gloria and Pergolesi’s Magnificat, performed by the Choir of King’s College, Cambridge directed by David Willcocks (Argo LP ZRG 505). Only moments after lowering the Koetsu Rosewood Signature Platinum cartridge to the groove, it was obvious: The Elac BS243.4s could resolve supermicro information better than any speaker I know in its price range. The choir appeared as genuine little heads with faces and moving mouths, the sound of each singer unique and distinct. The voices on this record are my best tools for measuring loudspeaker distortion, and the BS243.4s seemed as clean and distortion-free as any speaker I have played this record through. In comparison, the Harbeth P3ESRs played Vivaldi’s Gloria with a fuller, more naturally saturated tone and a more dramatic sense of chapel space. The Falcon LS3/5a’s made the soloists more present and lifelike—but surprisingly, the Falcons’ sound was noticeably more grainy than that of the Elacs, which are extremely smooth and grain-free. The slender Magnepan LRS panels displayed a sharper focus and more transparency than the Elacs, but the BS243.4s sailed through this complex classical music with inspiring grace and surprising power. Their 5.25" woofer did a morestereophile.com

January 2020

A S S O C I AT E D E Q U I P M E N T Analog sources Dr. Feickert Analogue Blackbird turntable, Jelco TK-850L tonearm, Koetsu Rosewood Signature Platinum moving-coil cartridge. Digital sources Apple Mac mini running Audirvana Plus. HoloAudio Spring “Kitsuné Tuned Edition” Level 3, Chord Qutest, Denafrips Ares D/A processors. Preamplification Excel Sound ET-U50 Phono step-up transformer; Tavish Design Adagio phono preamplifier; Rogue Audio RP-7 line-level preamplifier. Power amplifiers Benchmark AHB2, PrimaLuna Prologue Premium, Schiit Aegir, First Watt J2, Rogue Audio Stereo 100 power amplifiers; Line Magnetic LM-518IA integrated amplifier used as amplifier. Loudspeakers KEF LS50, Magnepan LRS, Falcon LS3/5a, Harbeth P3ESR. Cables Digital: AudioQuest Cinnamon (USB), Kimber Kable D60 Data Flex Studio (coax). Interconnect: Triode Wire Labs Spirit, Auditorium 23. Speaker: AudioQuest Triode Wire American Series. AC: AudioQuest Tornado. Accessories AudioQuest Niagara 1000 power conditioner; Harmonic Resolution Systems M3X-1719-AMG GR LF isolation platform; Sound Anchors Reference speaker stands. —Herb Reichert

than-satisfying job with the King’s College organ. Compared to the KEF LS50 To survive and prosper, I imagine the Elac BS243.4 will have to meet or exceed the unrivaled punch and coherency of the extremely popular and similarly priced ($1499) KEF LS50s. I can confess it now: When I started this review, and right up until this moment in the review process, I was not completely sold on AMT tweeters. They always seemed low distortion but also low excitement. Maybe I’ve become accustomed to tweeters with a little resonant zing? That prejudice is gone now. In audio analysis, sequence is everything, and when I switched from the JET to KEF’s Uni-Q tweeter, I could finally observe the slight bluntness KEF’s ribbed dome lends to the LS50’s high frequencies. Suddenly, I could sense the Uni-Q homogenizing voices in the choir. In comparison, Elac’s JET tweeter seemed more precise, but also a little rolled off. The best tweeter is the one I can’t hear; on Gloria, the JET folded ribbon seemed completely inaudible, which made the KEF dome seem very subtly but distinctly audible. However, this comparison also showed me that the LS50 had considerably more punch and drive—especially through the upper bass and lower midrange. Overall, the Elac felt refined while the KEF felt vigorous. Truths be told In a confession booth or while handling snakes by a pulpit, I’d have to swear: Elac’s new Carina BS243.4 loudspeaker sounded more refined than any similarly priced loudspeaker I know of. Mainly, though, the stand-mounted Elac’s greatest virtue is its supersmooth octave-to-octave balance. Throughout my review process, the word elegant kept forcing itself on me. Bravo, Andrew and Elac! Q 3 See stereophile.com/content/elac-debut-b6-loudspeaker-page-2.

GAUDER AKUSTIK - LOUDSPEAKERS HANDMADE IN GERMANY · Accuton Drivers · Mundorf Components · 60-dB-High Slope Filters · Symmetrical Crossovers · WBT Binding Posts · Massive Aluminium Rib Construction Cabinets (DARC series) · Nothing else! Questions?

LOUDSPEAKERS FOR LIFE „It’s amazing how wonderful music sounds when you play it over a pair of our loudspeakers. It is impossible to tell the emotions I have when I do it. Experience it by yourself and start a wonderful journey into your music wonderland! Some songs sound like a rainbow in the DARC!“ DR. ROLAND GAUDER/CHIEF DESIGNER

GAUDER AKUSTIK Germany · LOUDSPEAKERS FOR LIFE · gauderakustik.com · questions@acga.de Come meet us in Chicago at Axpona and in Munich at the HighEnd show!

EQUIPMENT RE PO RT

KALMAN RUBINSON

Benchmark LA4 LINE PREAMPLIFIER

pon hearing about this new product from Benchmark Media, the LA4, my mind turned to Laurindo Almeida, Bud Shank, Ray Brown, and Shelly Manne—the original L.A. Four jazz quartet. No such association was intended, however: the “4” merely designates change from previous Benchmark designs.1 The LA4 is housed in a shoeboxy, half-rack chassis that stands apart from the contemporary hi-fi wide-and-flat norm. A large touchscreen, an enunbalanced (RCA) outputs, and a The LA4 is probably the most single mono balanced output that graved Benchmark logo, transparent and revealing audio sums the stereo pair. There is also and a single large volume component I’ve ever used. a pair of bidirectional 12V trigger control knob dominate jacks and an IEC power inlet. the front. At the bottom But inside the LA4 lurks more interesting stuff, most left are a small on/off button and the IR sensor. The action of the large knob is stepped, and an audible notably that stepped volume control, which is based on relay click accompanies each 0.5dB step change. I am accusarrays of precision resistors and sealed relays. The traditional audio volume control is a potentiomtomed, as perhaps many are, to smooth, silent operation, and I hastily concluded that the clicking would be intolerable. eter in which a spring contact (wiper) is rotated along a Nevertheless, I was wrong, especially as this construction contributes to some of the virtues I observed later. 1 The LA4 follows the HPA4 ($2999)—a very similar product, intended to drive headphones. The HPA4 followed on the heels of the Benchmark HPA1 and All the other relevant external features are on the back: HPA2 headphone amps—but Benchmark skipped 3 to indicate a major change in two pairs of balanced inputs (XLR), two pairs of unbalchassis design and to avoid confusion with the company’s DAC-3, one version of anced inputs (RCA), one pair each of balanced (XLR) and which, the HGC, incorporates the HPA2 headphone amplifier.

SPECIFICATIONS Description Solid-state, stereo preampliﬁer with touchscreen and remote control. Inputs: 2 pairs single-ended (RCA), 2 pairs balanced (XLR). Outputs: 1 pair stereo single-ended (RCA), 1 pair stereo balanced (XLR), 1 mono balanced (XLR). Input impedance: >50k ohms (balanced/unbalanced). Output impedance: 60

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ohms (balanced); 30 ohms (unbalanced). Frequency response: –0.005dB at 10Hz, –0.001dB at 20kHz (balanced); –0.008dB at 10Hz, –0.005dB at 20kHz (unbalanced). S/N (A-weighted): 137dB (balanced), 116dB (unbalanced). Output noise (20Hz–20KHz): <2.1μV (balanced), <8μV (unbalanced). THD+N (20kHz

bandwidth): –115dB (balanced). Maximum output: 19.5V RMS (balanced), 3.2V RMS (unbalanced). Dimensions 8.65" (220mm) W × 3.88" (99mm) H × 9.33" (237mm) D including feet, connectors, and knob. Weight: 8lb (3.6kg). Serial number of review sample 19130330-0. Price $2599 (including

remote control). Approximate number of dealers: 35. Warranty: 5 years with registration. Manufacturer Benchmark Media Systems, Inc., 203 East Hampton Place, Ste. 2, Syracuse, NY 13206. Tel: (315) 437-6300. Fax: (315) 437-8119. Web: benchmarkmedia.com.

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BENCHMARK LA4

curved, stationary resistive element, changing the amount of resistance in the signal path. For audiophiles, there are two concerns. The ﬁrst is the reliability of the electrical connection between the wiper and the stationary element: Any compromise in contact integrity could result in distortion and/or nonlinear signal attenuation as the control is operated. The second concern, speciﬁc to stereo potentiometers, is how to maintain identical inputs/outputs for two potentiometers on a single shaft; often with potentiometer volume controls, the channel balance varies with the volume setting. The most common way to deal with this in high-quality audio is to use a stepped attenuator that replaces the potentiometer with an array of discrete resistors and the springloaded wiper with a rotary switch. In volume controls like

this, the signal still must pass through one or more switch contacts and, like the wiper, all need to maintain their integrity over a long duty cycle. Balanced circuitry has twice as many elements that need to be precisely paired and maintained. For multichannel control, the demands expand further. The LA4’s 16-step gain stage feeds a 256-step attenuator with 12 gold-contact relays and 64 precision (0.1%) thin-ﬁlm resistors, switched by an array of 40 sealed, gold-contact precision relays. The use of physically large, metal-ﬁlm resistors ensures rapid heat dissipation, preventing heat-induced increases in resistance values. The relays are controlled by an FPGA to ensure precise timing of relay switching, which Benchmark says reduces transient currents that can cause pops, clicks, and “zipper noise.”

MEASUREMENTS

measured the Benchmark LA4’s performance with my Audio Precision SYS2722 system (see the January 2008 “As We See It”1). The gain for the balanced inputs to the balanced output with the volume control set to “+15” was exactly 15dB, and reducing the control to “0.0” resulted in a gain of 0dB—ie, the output voltage was the same as the input voltage. For the unbalanced inputs to the unbalanced output, the maximum gain was 5.25dB. Pressing the “–20” mute button on the touchscreen reduced the balanced gain by 20dB, the unbalanced gain by 10dB. The preamplifier preserved absolute polarity (ie, was noninverting) with both balanced and unbalanced inputs and outputs. (The XLR jacks are wired with pin 2 hot, the AES convention.) The LA4’s balanced input impedance was both usefully high and higher than the specified >50k ohms, measuring 80k ohms (40k ohms per phase) at 20Hz and 1kHz and still 75k ohms at 20kHz. The unbalanced input impedance was a little lower than specified but still high, at 37k ohms at 20Hz and 1kHz and 29k ohms at 20kHz. The balanced output impedance was a low 61.5 ohms, the unbalanced impedance 201 ohms, both values consistent across the audioband. The preamplifier’s frequency response in both balanced and unbalanced modes was flat from 10Hz to 200kHz both into the high 100k ohm load (fig.1, blue and red traces) and into 600 ohms (cyan, magenta). Fig.1 was taken with the LA4’s volume control at its maximum setting; both the response and the superb channel matching were identical at lower set-

stereophile.com

January 2020

tings of the control. Channel separation was simply superb, at >140dB, R–L, and >132dB, R–L, below 2kHz, respectively decreasing to 130dB and 112dB at 20kHz (not shown). The superb separation measurement is a testament to excellent circuit-board layout, something I have commented on before with Benchmark D/A processors. From balanced inputs to balanced output, the Benchmark preamp offered extremely low noise, with virtually no power-supply–related spuriae in its output (ﬁg.2). The wideband, unweighted signal/noise ratio, measured with the balanced input shorted to

ground but the volume control set to its maximum, was 71.4dB, left, and 83.6dB, right, both ratios ref. 1V output. It is possible that with its very wide bandwidth, the LA4 was picking up some RF-related noise in my test lab. Restricting the measurement bandwidth to the audioband increased the S/N ratio to an astonishing 105.5dB for both channels, while switching an A-weighting ﬁlter into circuit further improved this ratio, to 108.7dB! Fig.3 plots the percentage of THD+noise in the LA4’s balanced 1 See tinyurl.com/4ffpve4.

d B r

Fig.1 Benchmark LA4, balanced frequency response with volume control set to “+15” at 1V into: 100k ohms (left channel blue, right red), 600 ohms (left cyan, right magenta) (0.5dB/vertical div.).

Fig.2 Benchmark LA4, balanced spectrum of 1kHz sinewave, DC–1kHz, at 1V into 100k ohms (left channel blue, right red) (linear frequency scale).

Fig.3 Benchmark LA4, balanced distortion (%) vs 1kHz output voltage into 100k ohms.

Fig.4 Benchmark LA4, unbalanced distortion (%) vs 1kHz output voltage into 100k ohms.

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BENCHMARK LA4

The LA4’s design, the company says, ensures long-term, low-distortion, low-noise operation with accurate interchannel balance and repeatability. It also means that one can use multiple LA4s and know that they are accurately matched. Using the LA4 Upon power-up, the LA4 displays the Benchmark splash screen that, after a few seconds, switches to the Main Screen dominated by the bold letters

measurements, continued

output into 100k ohms. The THD+N rises below 8V output due to the fixed level of noise becoming an increasing percentage of the signal level. The LA4’s balanced output doesn’t clip (ie, when the THD+N reaches 1%) until a very high 24V. Reducing the load to a punishing 600 ohms reduced the maximum output level to 15V, which is still much higher than will be needed to drive a power amplifier into clipping. The unbalanced output clipped at much lower output levels, 3.9V into 100k ohms (fig.4) and 2.9V into 600 ohms. Nevertheless, these lower maximum levels will be sufficient to drive amplifiers with single-ended inputs to their rated powers. To be sure that the reading was not dominated by noise, I measured how the LA4’s distortion changed with frequency at 5V, where figs.3 and 4 suggested that actual distortion was starting to rise above the low noise floor. The THD+N percentage was extremely low throughout the audioband into 100k ohms (fig.5, blue and red traces). Into 600 ohms (cyan, magenta traces), though the THD+N percentage rose in the top audio octaves, it was still just 0.0045% at 20kHz. I looked at the spectrum of the distortion at a similarly high output level (fig.6); while the second and third harmonics can be seen, these are still at astonishingly low levels: each harmonic is at or below –120dB (0.0001%) and is close to the residual level of these harmonics in my Audio Precision SYS2722’s signal generator. The level of the noise floor might also be due to the SYS2722 A/D converter’s self-noise. I repeated the spectral analysis, therefore, with a loan sample of Audio Preci-

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January 2020

sion’s more-recent, higher-performance AP555x system that I am evaluating; the spectrum was identical, as it was when I reduced the load impedance to 600 ohms. The second harmonic was virtually absent when I drove the unbalanced output at 2V into 100k ohms; though the third harmonic was higher in level than it had been for balanced operation, it was still negligible, at –109dB in the right channel and –117dB in the left. Tested for intermodulation distortion in balanced mode with an equal mix of 19 and 20kHz tones at

peak level of 5V, the second-order difference product at 1kHz was effectively absent, and the higher-order products all lay at or below –114dB (0.0002%, fig.7). These products rose to –100dB (0.001%) at 5V into 600 ohms (fig.8), correlating with the reduction in highfrequency linearity into this impedance seen in fig.5, but are still very low in absolute terms. Benchmark’s LA4 is the widestbandwidth, widest-dynamic-range, lowest-noise, lowest-distortion preamplifier I have encountered. —John Atkinson

d B r

Fig.5 Benchmark LA4, balanced distortion (%) vs frequency at 5V into: 100k ohms (left channel blue, right red), 600 ohms (left cyan, right magenta).

Fig.6 Benchmark LA4, balanced spectrum of 50Hz sinewave, DC–1kHz, at 5V into 100k ohms (left channel blue, right red; linear frequency scale).

d B r

Fig.7 Benchmark LA4, balanced HF intermodulation spectrum, DC–30kHz, 19+20kHz at 5V into 100k ohms (left channel blue, right red; linear frequency scale).

Fig.8 Benchmark LA4, balanced HF intermodulation spectrum, DC–30kHz, 19+20kHz at 5V into 600 ohms (left channel blue, right red; linear frequency scale).

BENCHMARK LA4

“LA4.” The main screen shows the input selection by number and user-programmable name, the volume level by number and by a bar graph. The touch-sensitive screen has “buttons” for screen dimming, additional settings, balance setting, –20dB reduction, and muting. Tapping Settings takes you to three screens that access optional settings for Display, Input & Volume Setup, Power Control, Remote, and options for locking/resetting all. The LA4’s remote control is the same one supplied with the DAC3 in all its incarnations; it works with both the DAC and the LA4. When used with either the LA4 or the DAC3, the remote control’s arrows allow the user to step through the inputs in either direction. Six discrete input buttons permit direct-access input selection, but these work only for the DAC3. Benchmark sent along a DAC3 B,2 which I connected to the Balanced 1 inputs of the LA4. I connected the front L/R outputs of my

MULTICHANNEL APPLICATION I am, by preference but not exclusion, a multichannel guy and, while the LA4 is a two-channel line ampliﬁer, I wondered how using three LA4s might work for my 5.1 setup. It seems that Benchmark does this for show demonstrations, so they were quite willing to accommodate me. The physical setup was trivial, with the ﬁrst LA4 handling the front L/R channels, the second LA4 the center and sub, and the third LA4 the surround L/R channels. Because the LA4 uses a discrete relay-based stepped volume control, Benchmark said that the three LA4s clustered together should respond synchronously to the remote control. They did, most of the time, when I was careful with my aim. However, there were problems when I was aiming the remote control over my right shoulder from my usual listening spot. The displays indicated any discrepancy among the units, but correction required me to get up and tweak a knob on one of the LA4s. The synchronization of the volume controls was a bit of a problem with the three units, but there is a simple and inexpensive solution. With a little searching on the internet, I purchased an IR receiver/splitter (about $20). This little box accepts a tiny wired IR sensor as input and has four tiny wired IR transmitters as outputs, each of which attaches to and covers the IR sensor on one LA4. Now any IR signal from the remote control gets to all the LA4s simultaneously, and that includes volume control and all other remote functions. It ain’t perfect, but it works well with some opaque tape over the transmitters to make sure that no IR signals leak into the Benchmark. Need more channels? Get more transmitter wires: The box will accommodate up to 12. The stack of LA4s was a delight as a multichannel preamp and is easily extensible to eight or more channels. There is no pure-analog, fully balanced, multichannel preamp on the market at this time, and it is not likely that one will appear. I am not sure I would go this route, but stacking LA4s does offer a valid if somewhat lavish DIY solution. —Kal Rubinson

exaSound e38 Mk.III DAC to the Balanced 2 inputs. Independent AudioQuest Coffee USB cables from the outputs of my Baetis Prodigy X server fed both DACs. Monoblocked AHB2s were connected to the balanced outputs. Listening to the LA4 As soon as everything powered up, there was a big smile on my face. With the LA4 in control of the system, everything sounded right, and subtle differences among recordings, amplifiers, and speakers were clear. I have omitted DACs from that listing because, after trimming the gain on the Benchmark and exaSound DACs to match within 0.5dB (the limit of my control resolution), they were indistinguishable in nonblind A/B comparisons. Was the LA4 masking any difference? Recently, two Stereophile writers have been discussing a listening comparison of two excellent power amplifiers. The two agreed on their perceptions of the audible difference, but not on its likely basis. One suggested that it could be due to one amp doing something to reveal more low-level recorded detail. The other, who heard the same difference, insisted it is due to the other amp removing something. In the absence of any objective reference or evidence, we can only regard these as expressions of philosophical differences. However, with the LA4, I had an objective reference. By physically connecting the input XLR cables directly to the output XLR cables, I could compare the sound of the LA4 at unity gain to that of a bypass with the DACs connected directly to the power amps—ie, it was the LA4 vs nada. I failed to hear any change in balance, tonality, dynamics, details, or soundstage. The LA4 seemed to neither add nor subtract anything. On the other hand, compared to the other preamps on hand, the LA4 was consistently quieter, more open, and more revealing of detail. What the LA4 offers over the bypass is the convenience of control and switching of the LA4 and a bit less noise. Yes, insertion of the LA4 actually resulted in less noise, although the difference could be appreciated only within 1"–2" of the speaker. I suspect this has to do with the ability of the LA4’s potent output stage and low output impedance to drive the amps through my 30' balanced interconnect cables. As for the relay clicking that originally bothered me, I quickly adapted to it and now find it trivial when the music is playing. I will decline to list specific details about individual recordings where the LA4 improved what I heard, because I believe that it would really be a list of what other components fail to do. Instead, and somewhat gratuitously, I offer two new recordings that I particularly enjoyed with the LA4. The first is a refreshing performance of Mussorgsky’s Pictures at an Exhibition by pianist Natasha Paremski (CD, Steinway & Sons STN 30093). Her adjustments and phrasing, generally subtle and always appropriate, seem to restore the colors of this familiar art tour. Her technique is formidable and is 2 The DAC3 B is offered as a companion to the LA4 line amplifier and HA4 headphone amplifier because it eliminates functions from the HGC and L versions of the DAC3 that would be redundant when used with those devices: The DAC3B has no volume control, analog inputs, mute/polarity controls, or headphone amplifier. It is said to be equal in DAC performance to the HGC but priced lower, at $1699.

January 2020

stereophile.com

BENCHMARK LA4

also demonstrated in Fred Hersch’s delightful Variations on a Theme by Tchaikovsky, which I found a suitable companion piece. But listen to the body and presence of the pianos—a Hamburg Steinway in Pictures and a New York Steinway in the Variations, recorded in different halls with different teams—and see if you can appreciate those differences, made apparent to me via the LA4. When I listened to the various formats of the Beatles’ Abbey Road Super Deluxe 4 Disc Edition (Y4CDBE003), the experience benefitted from using the LA4 (at times, three of them). I almost do not hear the sound of the original much anymore because, having lived with Abbey Road since its original release, it really lives mostly in my mind. Playing it now via the LA4, and with focused attention, I renewed my appreciation of the art, effort, and intent. I found the new stereo remix to be strikingly clearer, more open, and with much better bass definition, but it doesn’t taste the same. Only time will tell if the new stereo mix, even via the LA4, even in 24/96, can win me over. The new 5.1 mix is another story, since the new spatial cues clash with and distract me from my embedded memories. That said, the sound of the original and the new mix both delighted with the LA4. The LA4 is probably the most transparent and revealing audio component I’ve ever used. It does not seem to leave any fingerprints on the sound. It has a useful array of inputs, outputs, and functions, and the use of sealed relays for volume and input selection assures a long and noise-free life. Benchmark might improve on the display and remote control, but I do not have any criticism of the LA4’s sonic performance. Q

A S S O C I AT E D E Q U I P M E N T Digital sources Oppo Digital UDP-105 universal disc player, Baetis Prodigy-X PC-based music server running JRiver Media Center v25 and Roon, exaSound e38 Mk.III D/A processor, QNAP TVS-873 NAS. Preampliﬁers Audio Research MP1, Parasound P7. Power ampliﬁers Benchmark AHB2, Hegel C-53, Classé Sigma Mono, Parasound Halo A 31. Loudspeakers Revel Ultima2 Studio, Vivid Kaya45. Cables Digital: AudioQuest Coffee (USB); Analog interconnects: AudioQuest Earth/DBS balanced, KubalaSosna Anticipation (RCA); Speaker cables: Benchmark Studio&Stage (NL2 to banana), Canare 4S11 (Blue Jeans Cable); AC cables: Kubala-Sosna Emotion, SignalCable MagicPower 20A. Accessories AudioQuest Niagara 5000 and Brick-Wall BrickWall 8RAUD power conditioners, HDPLEX 400W ATX Linear Power Supply, CyberPower 850PFCLCD AC battery backup (supplied with Baetis server). Listening room 24' L × 14' W × 8' H, furnished with 2 MSR Acoustics Dimension4 SpringTraps in the front corners, 2 Ready Acoustics Chameleon Super Sub Bass Traps to the sides, and moderately sound-absorbing furniture. Front wall has large windows partly covered by fabric drapes and 4" thick 2' × 4' OC 705 panels. Rear of room opens into 10' × 7' foyer and a 12' × 8' dining area.—Kal Rubinson

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EQUIPMENT RE PO RT

JOHN ATKINSON

Q Acoustics Concept 300 LOUDSPEAKER

hen I performed the measurements of the Q Acoustics Concept 500 loudspeaker to accompany Thomas J. Norton’s review in March 2019,1 I was impressed by what I found. The floorstanding Concept 500 offers a high level of audio engineering excellence for its price of $5999.99/pair. When I attended a Q Acoustics press briefing a few months back, where the English company announced the US availability of their stand-mounted Concept 300, I didn’t hesitate to ask for a pair to review. Design The Concept 300 costs $4499.99/ pair, including a pair of unique stands: skeletal, 26"-tall Tensegrity supports, each with three tubular stainless-steel legs, pretensioned A large sprung plate on rubber surround, and a glass-fiber voice-coil. with wires. A small platform at The tweeter is mounted to the baffle with the enclosure’s base the top of the tripod formed by a rubber gasket to isolate it from vibrations couples to the top plate from the woofer, and its front plate has a the legs engages with a sprung plate in the speaker’s base; more of its Tensegrity stand. shallow waveguide profile. Both drive-units on that later. are fastened from behind, using spring-tenThe Concept 300 is a fairly sioned retaining bolts. The woofer is reflexlarge two-way design, deeper than it is high. A 1.1" (28mm) loaded with a large flared port, 7" deep and 2" in diameter, tweeter, using a dome fabricated from “super-fine strands on the enclosure’s rear panel. Foam plugs are provided, to of coated microfiber,” is mounted above a 6.5" (165mm) woofer, this featuring an impregnated/coated paper cone, a 1 See stereophile.com/content/q-acoustics-concept-500-loudspeaker.

SPECIFICATIONS Description Two-way, stand-mounted, reﬂex-loaded loudspeaker. Drive-units: 1.1" (28mm) fabric-dome tweeter, 6.5" (165mm) coated paper-cone woofer. Crossover frequency: 2.5kHz. Frequency response: 55Hz–30kHz, +3dB, –6dB. Nominal impedance: 6 ohms. Minimum impedance: 3.7 ohms. Sensitivity: 84dB/W/m. Recommended

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January 2020

power: 25–200W. Dimensions Loudspeaker: 14” (355mm) H × 8.6" (220mm) W × 15.7" (400mm) D. Effective internal volume: 11.4 liters. Weight: 31.9lb (14.5kg) each. Shipping weight: 36.3lb (16.5kg) each. Tensegrity stand: 27.2" (690mm) H × 18.1" (460mm) W × 18.1" (460mm) D. Weight: 8.6lb

(3.9kg) each. Shipping weight (per pair): 27.1lb (12.3kg). Finishes Gloss black with rosewood veneer, gloss white with pale oak veneer, polished tourmaline with desert ironwood veneer. Serial numbers of review samples QA2715 1018 00103 & ’00116; “Designed and engineered in the United Kingdom”; made in

China. Price $4499.99/pair with stands. Approximate number of dealers: sold direct only. Warranty: 5 years. Manufacturer Q Acoustics, Stortford Hall Industrial Park, Dunmow Road, Bishop’s Stortford, Hertfordshire CN23 5GZ, England, UK. Tel: (855) 279-5070. Web: qacoustics.co.uk (UK), qacoustics.com (US).

A REVOLUTION OF SOUND INTRODUCING A REVOLUTIONARY NEW STEREO AMPLIFIER FROM AIR TIGHT THAT WILL TRANSFORM THE WAY YOU EXPERIENCE MUSIC. IMMERSE YOURSELF IN A 360° SOUNDSCAPE OF UNFORGETTABLE RICHNESS, DETAIL, AND CLARITY—EACH INSTRUMENT AND VOICE DISTINCT AND SEPARATED IN SPACE. IT’S A SOUND SO POWERFUL, SO SUBLIME, IT’S LIKE BEING THERE.

ATM-300R STEREO POWER AMPLIFIER Ý«iÀÌ Þ i } iiÀi` E > `VÀ>vÌi` >«> ] Ì i Ƃ/ Îää, >Ã Lii Ài >} i` > ` Àiw i` Ì >Ý âi Ì i ÕÃ V> ÌÞ v Ì i Îää ÌÕLi° / i Ƃ/ Îää,½Ã Õ µÕi V ÀVÕ Ì ìÃ } ÌÀ> Ãv À Ã Ì i `Þ > VÃ > ` L>ÃÃ «iÀv À > Vip ì ÛiÀ } ÌÀ> Ã«>Ài Ì Ã Õ ` ÃÌ>} } > ` ìi«iÀ ÀiÃ ÕÌ ° Ì > Ã vi>ÌÕÀiÃ > > ` Ü Õ `] «>«iÀ ÜÀ>««i` V i > ` /> ÕÀ> ÕÌ«ÕÌ ÌÀ> Ãv À iÀÃ] « ÕÃ Þ ÕÀ V Vi v > `L Ü Îää ÌÕLiÃ v À Ì i Õ Ì >Ìi «iÀÃ > âi` Ã Õ `° ,iÛ ÕÌ >ÀÞ ìÃ } ° * ÜiÀvÕ «iÀv À > Vi° ÃÌi > ` Li ÌÀ> Ãv À i`° Visit www.axissaudio.com À V> Î£ä ÎÓ ä£nÇ Ì w ` Ì i ì> iÀ i>ÀiÃÌ Þ Õ°

Q ACOUSTICS CONCEPT 300

convert the speaker into a sealed box, speakers have consistently worked for use in rooms with low-frequency well in my room: 75" from the wall problems. The third-order crossbehind them, 122" from the listening position, with the left speaker over uses premium parts, including d 29" from the LPs that line the left polypropylene capacitors. Electrical B sidewall, the right speaker 46" from connection is via two pairs of termir the books that line that sidewall. nals to allow biwiring or biamping. A (All distances were measured from Three 4mm sockets accommodate a the front baffles; the asymmetry is jumper to allow the tweeter level to due to there being two stairs up to a be raised or lowered by 0.5dB. small platform behind the rightThe enclosure, with its radiused hand speaker.) The Concept 300s sidewall edges and a combination of Hz looked top-heavy on their spindly two different wood veneers finished tripod stands and seemed too wobbly in a high-gloss lacquer, looks elegant Fig.1 Vandersteen M5-HPA, frequency response at 2.83V for comfort with their sprung bases in the extreme. As it says on the Q into 8 ohms with high-pass filter frequency set to 20Hz (red), 40Hz (magenta), 80Hz (green), 100Hz, (blue), and sitting on top of the stands’ top Acoustics website, “The Concept 200Hz (black) (1dB/vertical div.). plates; as we have three cats, two of 300 is a high-end, high-performance which occasionally jump on to loudloudspeaker that’s respectfully sophisticated and able to interact discreetly with any interior speakers, I rocked the Concept 300s back and forth and side design vocabulary.” Couldn’t have said it better myself! to side on the stands, and they appeared too stable to topple. The elegance extends inside the cabinet. The enclosure The speakers were toed-in to the listening position. walls are constructed from three layers of MDF, each sepaTo use the Vandersteen M5-HPA power amplifiers with the Q Acoustics speakers, I set the Vandersteens’ high-pass rated by a gel that absorbs and dissipates any high-frequency filters to their lowest frequency, 20Hz (fig.1, red trace). The vibrations. Lower-frequency vibrations are handled by amplifier’s response is down by 3dB at 20Hz, and 1dB at strategically placed internal bracing. A large sprung plate on 38Hz, which is below the tuning frequency of the Concept’s the enclosure’s base, which Q Acoustics calls the “isolation port—see “Measurements” sidebar—so its lower limit should base suspension system,” couples to the top plate of the not have an appreciable effect on the loudspeaker’s lowTensegrity stand, creating a low-pass filter that isolates the frequency performance. Although I left the loudspeakers’ stand and floor from the speaker, and vice versa. rear-panel jumpers in the Normal (flat) position when I used the Vandersteen and Lamm M1.2 amplifiers, I reduced Setup the tweeter levels by 0.5dB for best sound with the NAD No grilles were provided with the review samples, nor did M10 streaming integrated amplifier. (See my review the package include the typically supplied foam port plugs elsewhere in this issue.) (“foam bungs” in Brit-speak). From the look of the packaging, these samples were much-traveled. Listening After some experimentation, I ended up placing the Q I started my auditioning of the Concept 300s with the test Acoustics Concept 300s close to the positions where small

MEASUREMENTS

used DRA Labs’ MLSSA system and a calibrated DPA 4006 microphone to measure the Q Acoustics Concept 300’s frequency response in the farfield, and an Earthworks QTC-40 mike for the nearfield and in-room responses. Q Acoustics specifies the Concept 300’s sensitivity as 84dB/W/m. My estimate was slightly higher, at 86dB(B)/2.83V/m. The Concept 300’s impedance is specified as 6 ohms, with a minimum value of 3.7 ohms (on the website) or 4.7 ohms (in the product’s white paper). My impedance measurements, which I took with MLSSA then checked with Dayton Audio’s DATS V2 system, tell a different story. The impedance magnitude (fig.1, solid trace) only drops below 6 ohms in the lower midrange and above 10kHz. The minimum magnitude—4.9 ohms between

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January 2020

175Hz and 200Hz—is higher than both specified values. Though the electrical phase angle (dashed trace) reaches –57° at 90Hz and +54.5° at 23Hz, the magnitude at those frequencies is high, mitigating any drive difficulty. The Q Acoustics is not a particularly demanding load to drive. With the port sealed, the impedance has a single peak in the bass, indicating that the Concept 300 behaves as a sealed box tuned to a relatively high 67Hz. I measured the Concept 300’s impedance first with it supported by upturned cones at the corners of the enclosure, then with it sitting on the Tensegrity stand. I didn’t find any differences. The very slight discontinuity between 400Hz and 500Hz in the impedance traces, which suggests there is a panel resonance in that region, was the same with both measure-

ments. However, when I investigated the enclosure’s vibrational behavior with a plastic-tape accelerometer, I found that a fairly high-level mode at 473Hz on the sidewalls with the speaker mounted on upturned cones (ﬁg.2) was reduced by 5.4dB when the speaker was placed on its dedicated Stereophile Q Acoustics Q300 Impedance (ohms) & Phase (deg) vs Frequency (Hz)

Fig.1 Q Acoustics Concept 300, electrical impedance (solid) and phase (dashed) (2 ohms/vertical div.).

Q ACOUSTICS CONCEPT 300

tracks I created for the magazine’s Editor’s Choice CD (Stereophile STPH016-2),2 driving the speakers with the NAD M10. The Concept 300s reproduced the 1/3 -octave warble tones with full weight down to the 40Hz band, with a slight reduction in level for the 50Hz band. The 32Hz tone was boosted by the lowest-frequency mode in my room, the 25Hz warble was faintly audible, and I couldn’t hear the 20Hz tone at my normal listening level. There was no audible wind noise from the port with these lowest-frequency tones. The half-step–spaced low-frequency tonebursts on Editor’s Choice spoke cleanly down to 32Hz, with no emphasis of any of the tones. When I listened to the cabinet walls of both speakers with a stethoscope while these tones played, I could hear some liveliness just below 500Hz. The dual-mono pink noise track on Editor’s Choice sounded uncolored unless I sat so high that I could see the tops of the loudspeakers. The image of the noise was precisely placed in the center of the stereo image and very narrow, with no “splashing” to the sides at any frequency. The stable, accurate imaging of the Concept 300s with recordings of music rather than test tones impressed me from the outset. Lindsey Buckingham’s double-tracked vocal on “Never Going Back” from Rumours (24/96k ALAC ﬁle, ripped from DVD-A, Warner Bros.) was reproduced as an impressively stable central image between the multiple acoustic guitars that were spread across the stereo stage. And when the backing vocals occasionally came in to the left of

center, it was as though I could hear a tunnel of reverberation behind them. The Q Acoustics pair deliciously decoded recorded spatial information, with zero ambiguity in the soundstage positions of acoustic objects at all frequencies. Provoked by Richard Lehnert’s 1981 interview with Keith Jarrett, recently posted on the magazine’s website,3 I streamed the pianist’s “Kyoto, November 5, 1976” from The Sun Bear Concerts (16/44.1k ECM/Tidal stream) with the NAD M10. The somewhat forward sound of the piano in this live recording was solidly set within a delicate dome of ambience. The Q Acoustics speakers stepped out of the way of Jarrett’s improvising, leaving me marveling at the depth and breadth of his creativity. Every live concert is different, the man never seeming to repeat himself. Low-level detail in the sound of the piano was well-preserved by the Concept 300s, even when Jarrett was comping at high levels with his left hand. I followed “Kyoto” with The Carnegie Concert (16/44.1k ALAC ﬁles, ripped from CD, ECM 07362), for which I had been in the audience back in 2005. Whereas the Sun Bear improvisations are unbroken stretches, sometimes lasting more than 40 minutes, Carnegie comprises shorter pieces, more akin, dare I say it, to songs. The image of the piano is wider and closer than it 2 I created the test signals on this CD to make it easier for audiophiles to optimize the setup of their loudspeakers. See stereophile.com/reference/1008speaks/index. html. 3 See stereophile.com/content/dancing-edge-keith-jarrett-music-art.

measurements, continued

ary.) The nearfield response of the port (red trace) peaks between 30Hz and 60Hz; while its upper-frequency rolloff is clean, there is a significant peak just above 800Hz. The woofer’s output has a slight peak in the upper bass, which will be due in part to the nearfield measurement technique, which assumes the drive-unit is firing into half-space rather than in all directions. The woofer’s balance is flat before it starts to cross over to the tweeter (green trace) just below the specified 2.5kHz. The crossover appears to be configured with symmetrical, ultimate 18dB/octave slopes. (Each drive-unit’s rollout is slower than that for an octave

or so below and above the crossover frequency.) The tweeter’s response appears identical to that used in the floorstanding Concept 500.1 The black trace below 300Hz in fig.5 shows the sum of the Concept 300’s nearfield woofer and port outputs, taking into account acoustic phase and the different distance of each radiator from a nominal farfield microphone position. The output is down by 6dB at the port tuning frequency, below which the speaker rolls off with the usual 24dB/octave reflex slope. The Q 1 See fig.4 at stereophile.com/content/q-acousticsconcept-500-loudspeaker-measurements.

Amplitude in dB

stand (fig.3). This mode was the only one present on any of the panels; it is sufficiently high in frequency and Q (Quality Factor) that even without the attenuation provided by the speaker’s sprung base, it probably wouldn’t have any audible effects. The port on the Q Acoustics’ rear panel is tuned to 44Hz, this indicated by the fact that the impedance-magnitude plot has a saddle centered on that frequency. The blue trace in fig.4, which shows the woofer’s nearfield response, has its minimum-motion notch at 44Hz. (This is the frequency at which the back pressure from the port resonance holds the cone station-

Frequency in Hz

Fig.2 Q Acoustics Concept 300, cumulative spectral-decay plot calculated from output of accelerometer fastened to center of sidewall with speaker supported on upturned cones (MLS driving voltage to speaker, 7.55V; measurement bandwidth, 2kHz).

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Fig.3 Q Acoustics Concept 300, cumulative spectral-decay plot calculated from output of accelerometer fastened to center of sidewall with speaker sitting on its dedicated stand (MLS driving voltage to speaker, 7.55V; measurement bandwidth, 2kHz).

Fig.4 Q Acoustics Concept 300, acoustic crossover on tweeter axis at 50”, corrected for microphone response, with nearfield woofer (blue) and port (red) responses respectively plotted below 350Hz, 1kHz.

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Q ACOUSTICS CONCEPT 300

The Highest Echelon of Moving Coil Cartridges

is on “Kyoto,” and the instrument has more low-frequency power. Again, the Concept 300s offered a transparent window into the concert hall. As I was about to start my auditioning of the Concept 300s with the Vandersteen monoblocks replacing the NAD integrated, I heard that drummer Ginger Baker had passed away. I had been a fan of this superbly inventive musician since, at the age of 18, I attended a gig in our little English town where the trio who would become Cream were trying out. I last saw him play at the 2005 Cream reunion concerts in London’s Royal Albert Hall and New York’s Madison Square Garden. Roon found “Straight No Chaser” from Going Back Home, which Baker recorded in 1994 with a jazz dream

team comprising guitarist Bill Frisell4 and acoustic bassist Charlie Haden (16/44.1k ALAC file, ripped from CD, Atlantic 75678265228). This superb album was produced by Chip Stern, who wrote equipment reviews for Stereophile in this century’s first decade. Played on the Q Acoustics speakers driven by the Vandersteen amplifiers, Baker’s tom toms and kickdrums at the start of this track were reproduced with excellent weight and leading-edge definition. There was a good sense of space around and behind the drums, which were placed—unambiguously— across almost the entire stage. Haden’s bass solo was evenly balanced across the instrument’s range, the presentation acquiring greater low-frequency 4 See our feature on Frisell in this issue.

measurements, continued

ORTOFON INC 500 Executive Blvd, Suite 102 Ossining, NY 10562 914.762.8646 info@ortofon.us ortofon.com

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Acoustics’ farfield response, averaged across a 30° horizontal window centered on the tweeter axis, is shown as the black trace above 300Hz in fig.5. The balance is superbly flat and even up to the mid-treble, above which there is a very slight rising trend. This graph was taken with the Concept 300’s rear-panel jumper set to Normal. Changing the jumper settings as indicated in the manual raised or lowered the level by exactly 0.5dB, as specified. The frequency responses of the two Q Acoustics Concept 300s matched very closely. Fig.6 shows the Q Acoustics’ horizontal dispersion, referenced to the response on the tweeter axis, which thus appears as a straight line. Other than a very slight flare at the bottom of the tweeter’s passband, the contour lines in this graph are even throughout the midrange and treble, implying stable stereo imaging. This graph also shows that the Concept 300 becomes quite directional in the top audio octave, which will work against the audibility of the small peak in the same region in the on-axis response in all but very small rooms. In the vertical plane (fig.7), a suckout develops in the crossover region 10° above and 15° below the woofer axis. The Q Acoustics speaker will sound at its best with the listener’s ears level with the tweeter. Fortunately, the Tensegrity stand places the Concept

300’s tweeter 36" from the floor, which a 1990s survey by my colleague Thomas J. Norton indicated was the average ear height for listeners sitting in regular chairs (but not in folding “director” chairs). The red trace in fig.8 shows the Concept 300s’ spatially averaged response with the grilles on in my room. This is generated by averaging 20 1/ -octave–smoothed spectra, taken 6 for the left and right speakers individually using a 96kHz sample rate, in a vertical rectangular grid 36" wide × 18" high and centered on the positions of my ears. For reference, the blue trace shows the spatially averaged response of the KEF LS50s I purchased following my review in 2012.2 The inroom response of both loudspeakers is very similar in the midrange, with a slight rising trend evident between 150Hz and 800Hz. Both roll off slowly below 100Hz, but the Concept 300s excite the lowest-frequency mode in my room at 32Hz to a significantly greater extent than the KEFs. At the other end of the spectrum, the slightly sloped-down output of both speakers is due to the increased absorptivity of the room’s furnishings as the frequency rises. While the LS50s have more presence-region energy than the Concept 300s, the latter have more output in the top two octaves of the audioband. (The in-room responses of 2 See stereophile.com/content/kef-ls50-anniversary-model-loudspeaker.

January 2020

stereophile.com

Q ACOUSTICS CONCEPT 300

authority with the Vandersteens, especially when he plays a double-stopped passage in “Ginger’s Blues.” The lows better balanced the Q Acoustic’s highs with the speaker’s rearpanel jumpers set to Normal. From a great-sounding jazz album to an equally greatsounding classical classic: I cued up Jacqueline du Pré’s performance of Elgar’s Cello Concerto with John Barbirolli conducting the London Symphony Orchestra in London’s Kingsway Hall (24/96k FLAC ﬁles, EMI/HDtracks). I had attended a master class on this work’s ﬁrst movement given by Ms. du Pré long after MS had destroyed her ability to play. Nevertheless, as she sung and spoke the cello part in this concerto, it was perhaps the greatest performance I have experienced even if virtual. Played on the PS Audio/ Vandersteen/Q Acoustics system, the bravura opening set the solo cello within a warmly supportive acoustic. And when Du Pré skitters down to her instrument’s lowest register in the concerto’s fourth movement, the power of her playing was reproduced in full measure, despite the Concept 300s’ small size. The speakers’ transparency allowed through the slightly brittle texture of the orchestral violins on this

range unit are connected in positive acoustic polarity. The decay of the tweeter’s step, which arrives ﬁrst at the microphone, smoothly blends with the start of the woofer’s step. This implies optimal crossover implementation. The Q Acoustics Concept 300’s cumulative spectral-decay plot (ﬁg.10) is superbly clean overall,

cleaner even than that of the Concept 500. This may well correlate with the extremely transparent window the pair of Q Acoustic speakers offered into recorded spaces. The Q Acoustics Concept 300 offers excellent measured performance, indicative of equally excellent loudspeaker engineering. —John Atkinson

Fig.6 Q Acoustics Concept 300, lateral response family at 50", normalized to response on tweeter axis, from back to front: differences in response 90–5° off axis, reference response, differences in response 5–90° off axis.

Fig.7 Q Acoustics Concept 300, vertical response family at 50", normalized to response on tweeter axis, from back to front: differences in response 45–5° above axis, reference response, differences in response 5–45° below axis.

Amplitude in dB

both speakers drop like a stone above 20kHz; this is because I performed the measurements using the NAD M10 ampliﬁer I review elsewhere in this issue, which digitizes its analog inputs with a 44.1kHz sample rate.) Turning to the time domain, the Concept 300’s step response (ﬁg.9) indicates that the tweeter and mid-

almost 55-year-old recording. Turning to the Lamm amplifiers, the midbass sounded tubbier than it had with the Vandersteen monoblocks. Though the review samples did not have the foam port plugs, I did have a suitable pair of plugs in my spare parts box. Using these minimized the tubby quality. Whether I preferred the ports blocked or open depended on the music I played. With the speakers sealed, the balance was still surprisingly rich-sounding with “The Way Young Lovers Do,” from Van Morrison and Joey de Francesco’s You’re Driving Me Crazy (16/44,1k ALAC file ripped from CD, Exile/Legacy 19075820041), for what is a relatively small loudspeaker. With the Keith Jarrett “Kyoto” concert recording, the piano’s left-hand register lacked power—especially when, toward the end of the second part of the concert, Jarrett hammers down on bass chords—unless I left the ports open. I recently purchased the live recording of Tchaikovsky’s Symphony No.6, with Kirill Petrenko conducting the Berlin Philharmonic (24/192k FLAC file, BPHR 190261). In contrast to the Jarrett, on this recording, played on the Q Acoustic speakers driven by the Lamm amplifiers, the sound

Frequency in Hz

Data in Volts

Amplitude in dB

Fig.5 Q Acoustics Concept 300, anechoic response on tweeter axis at 50", averaged across 30° horizontal window and corrected for microphone response, with the complex sum of the nearfield woofer and port responses plotted below 300Hz.

Frequency in Hz

Fig.8 Q Acoustics Concept 300, spatially averaged, 1/ -octave response in JA’s listening room (red) 6 and of the KEF LS50 (blue).

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Time in ms

Fig.9 Q Acoustics Concept 300, step response on tweeter axis at 50" (5ms time window, 30kHz bandwidth).

Fig.10 Q Acoustics Concept 300, cumulative spectral-decay plot on tweeter axis at 50" (0.15ms risetime).

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Q ACOUSTICS CONCEPT 300

was richly detailed even with the ports blocked. A thought occurred to me when I was listening to this symphony: While many speakers accompany the sound they produce with noise—resonances of all kinds, cone break-up, cabinet vibrations, chuffing from the port—the Concept 300 didn’t do that. This is a quiet loudspeaker. I had never before been made so aware, as when listening to these speakers, of the rhythmic emphasis in the first part of Tchaikovsky’s 5/4 second movement: 1-2-3, 1-2, 1-2, 1-2-3, with the only linear 1-2-3-4-5 measure coming at the end of each phrase. If the Q Acoustics did anything wrong—and all loudspeakers do something wrong—it wasn’t sufficiently high in level to get in the way of the music’s dynamics. A KEF komparison Even with the Concept 300s’ rear-panel jumpers removed to reduce the level of their tweeters by 0.5dB, the Q Acoustics’ balance had more high-treble energy than my long-term reference KEF LS50s. The KEFs and Concept 300s threw equally detailed, well-defined and stable soundstages. The speakers also sounded very similar in the midrange, though the larger Q Acoustics had more lowfrequency weight. If you read my review of the NAD M10, you will note that I felt the KEFs benefited from the lowfrequency correction provided by the amplifier’s Dirac LE app. I didn’t feel the need to use Dirac with the Concept

300s. Despite the Concept 300’s woofer being only a little larger than that of the KEF—a radiating diameter of 5" vs 4"—it could play louder in the bass than the LS50 before starting to feel the strain. As good as the KEFs are at their price, their presentation was less dynamic, less full-range, than that of the Q Acoustics speakers. Conclusion This is not a speaker for all systems. Even with the tweeterlevel adjustments, the Concept 300 can be a touch unforgiving of bright-sounding electronics. And the appearance of the loudspeakers on their Tensegrity tripod stands will not suit all tastes or decors. However, looking back at the words I have written about the Concept 300s, I notice that I kept digressing from discussing sound quality to talking about music. This is not surprising, as these speakers stepped out of the way of the music in a manner I have only experienced from more expensive models, such as Wilson’s Alexia 2, Magico’s S5 Mk.II, and KEF’s Blade Two, to name three speakers that I have reviewed in the past few years. Transparent and neutral-sounding, with superbly stable, well-deﬁned stereo imaging, and more extended low frequencies than you’d expect from a loudspeaker this size, Q Acoustics’ Concept 500 gets an enthusiastic recommendation from me. Q

A SPRUNG SUSPENSION ON A LOUDSPEAKER? After I attended the launch event for the Q Acoustics Concept 300 with John Atkinson, I found myself interested in this speaker’s unique stands—which, as JA points out in his review, incorporate a sprung, low-pass vibration filter to isolate the speaker from its surroundings, much as a suspended turntable isolates the platter from floor-borne vibrations. It’s an interesting idea—especially in the context of a dynamic loudspeaker, which has drivers moving in and out over a wide range of frequencies. When a driver cone moves, its motion imparts a reactive force on the cabinet that holds the drivers (think: Newton’s First Law). With rigid spikes, that recoil energy can escape into the floor. A sprung suspension—in contrast to rigid spikes—allows the loudspeaker to move in response to those forces, the motion limited only by its own mass/inertia. Transmission of that energy to the floor isn’t possible above the corner frequency of the low-pass filter formed by the speaker’s mass and the compliance of the sprung suspension. According to what some Q Acoustics engineers told me, that corner frequency is likely to be around 10Hz. If your floors are made of wood and your loudspeakers have spikes, you may find that your floors make music, too: Turn up the volume and put your ear to

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January 2020

the floor. Hear it? That sound is partly transmitted through the air (even so, with rigid spikes, some of that energy could make its way back into the speaker with no isolation), but it is also due to the speaker coupling directly to the floor through the spikes. The floor is now part of your loudspeaker, but not a very good part, as the energy it radiates is delayed and distorted relative to the music the speaker drivers are producing. What if your floor is made of concrete instead of wood? Then the floor will influence the sound in a different way; as a former resident of a concreteand-steel condo building, I can attest that concrete can transmit low frequencies exceedingly well, and over long distances. In other words, with rigid spikes, the floor affects how the speaker sounds in ways that can’t be predicted reliably by the speaker designer. If, instead, you isolate the loudspeaker vibrations from the floor as you would isolate a suspended turntable platter from the surface the turntable sits on—employing a low-pass filter so that higher-frequency vibrations don’t pass—then the loudspeaker will behave the same way no matter what kind of floor it sits on. The following comes from the Q Acoustics engineering team: “Spikes

provide a mechanical connection/ coupling to the boundary that the speaker is resting on, and the boundary will impart its sound characteristic to the overall sound in the room (and surrounding structures!). With the C300, we chose to isolate the speaker from mechanically coupling to foreign structures, thus controlling/significantly reducing any colorations/delayed sounds that can alter the pure acoustic signature of the speaker.” Two other designers I talked to told me that any reactive motion of the cabinet should be prevented—ie by rigid spikes—lest the cabinet motion smear the sound, especially that coming from the tweeter. Q Acoustics says such matters are managed by using a massive cabinet: That mass imparts considerable inertia, so it doesn’t move much. One oft-cited sonic problem with such an approach is smearing of the stereo image—but apparently not here, since JA found the Concept 300’s images to be “superbly stable” and “well-defined.” I like the idea of isolating a loudspeaker from supporting structures that will influence its sound in unpredictable ways, but I cannot judge what other effects this will havce. Ultimately, whether Q Acoustics’ suspension approach is, um, sound is up to your ears to determine.—Jim Austin

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EQUIPMENT RE PO RT

MICHAEL FREMER

PS Audio Stellar Phono PHONO PREAMPLIFIER

e usually save the question of Apart from its rear-mounted The Stellar should value for the end of a review, but master power switch, a pair of rearpartner well with this time it’s worth mentionmounted potentiometers for dialing any MC cartridge in custom resistive loads, and its fronting up front, if only because logo—I’ll come back to that last PS Audio has been in the news lately. Late last out there now and panel one in a moment—the Stellar Phono August, the company announced they were probably ever. is operated entirely from its remote switching from a traditional dealer network to a handset; a series of LEDs on the front factory-direct sales model. So, to some readers, it might seem fair to judge the brand-new, full-featured Stel- panel alerts you to the selected operating status. The handset is encased in plastic and nonilluminated, but ergonomics are lar Phono Preamplifier ($2500) against ones selling in stores good, and it’s easy to use. for $5000. From the handset you can turn the Stellar Phono on and Then again, to speak with the Stellar Phono’s talented deoff, select MM or MC inputs—there’s one pair of each—togsigner, 30-something engineer and vinyl enthusiast Darren Myers,1 is to know that this is a product that will stand or fall gle through various gain settings (44dB, 50dB, and 56dB for MM cartridges, 60dB, 66dB, and 72dB for MC), and select on its own merits, regardless of price. between buttons for four preset loads—60 ohms, 100 ohms, The Stellar Phono, designed and assembled in Boulder, 200 ohms, or 47k ohms—or a button that enables the aboveColorado, using globally sourced parts, is an attractive and mentioned custom-setting knobs, which range from 1 ohm unique-looking piece, available in both black and matte to 1k ohms. There’s also a Mute button that, when pressed, silver finishes with a curved/split front surface and a switchilluminates a red LED on the left side of the Stellar’s front free fascia. Any way you look at it, from any angle, the understated and entirely bling-free Stellar is a damn handsome, panel; the rest of the indicator lights are blue. The ideneven fashionable piece of hi-fi. At 21.6lb, it’s also relatively tifying labels next to the latter aren’t illuminated, and the heavy—and from the looks of its sleek outer skin, the weight bright LEDs overwhelm the text, but it doesn’t really matter of the approximately 17" × 13" × 3" Stellar is mostly in its 1 See youtu.be/oFspgDyjEQo for the AnalogPlanet interview with Myers, concomponentry, not its casework. ducted at AXPONA 2019.

SPECIFICATIONS Description Solid-state phono preampliﬁer with unbalanced inputs and both balanced and unbalanced outputs. Overall voltage gain: MM: 44dB, 50dB, 56dB. MC: 60dB, 66dB, 72dB. Input loading: MM: 47k ohms (100pf). MC: 60, 100, 200, 47k ohms, Custom, 1 ohm–1k ohms.

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Output impedance: unbalanced <200 ohms, balanced <200 ohms per leg. (All measurements are with both channels operating, gain set to low, and balanced outputs. Input frequency is 1kHz.) Frequency response: 20Hz–20kHz ±0.25dB. THD @0.5V, 1kHz: <0.01%. Maximum output: @1%THD:

24VRMS. Overload margin: @1kHz: >22dB. S/N ratio MM: >82dB A-weighted. MC: >74dB A-weighted. Channel separation >74dB. Dimensions 17" (430mm) W × 3.25" (82.5mm) H × 13" (330mm) D. Weight: 21.6lb (9.8kg). Serial number of review samples SPH-A-9G0363

(listening), SPH-B-9J0100 (measurements). Designed and assembled in the US. Price $2499. Approximate number of dealers: Sold direct. Manufacturer PS Audio, 4865 Sterling Drive, Boulder, CO, 80301. Web: psaudio.com

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Testing Wireworld Cable Technology was founded with the unique mission of perfecting audio cables through objective listening tests. Far more revealing than normal cable comparisons, these tests compare cables to virtually perfect direct connections between components. Robert Harley, editor of The Absolute Sound, described this “Cable Polygraph” as, “illuminating insight into exactly how each cable affects the sound.”

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PS AUDIO STELLAR PHONO

because those LEDs are logically grouped, their meanings easy to remember. Around back are rear-panel–mounted, gold-plated MM and MC inputs (RCA), the latter separated by the custom loading knobs. There’s also one pair each of balanced (XLR) and single-ended (gold-plated RCA) jacks. A ground lug located between the MM and MC inputs is of the useful banana jack/threaded-screw type. Circuit details In the manual, designer Myers both describes the design and makes some bold claims. He writes, “It is inconvenient . . . to realize that measurements don’t always correlate with what we hear. Some of the most commonly used circuit topologies suffer from what I call overexposed sound—the edge transients lead with far too much high-frequency energy and the overall tonality has a grey sheen that washes out the tonal contrast. Many have claimed that this is what happens when a circuit is transparent and has low distortion. I beg to differ.” That design philosophy led Myers to implement a fully discrete circuit that doesn’t rely upon high amounts of global feedback to lower distortion or increase bandwidth. “To the contrary,” he writes, “[the circuits] were designed to be innately transparent and present the music with a correct display of tonal balance.” To that end, Myers designed a circuit that is “DC coupled from input to output and doesn’t contain any complementary circuits.” The short signal path utilizes class-A–biased MOSFETs and JFETs. MC and MM inputs feature paralleled Toshiba JFETs, which are directly coupled to low-

feedback, high-bandwidth discrete amplifiers. Each fully class-A output stage uses a single MOSFET output device; Myers says this approach produces “subjectively innocuous distortion products compared to complementary designs.” The passive RIAA EQ implementation uses Wilson Audio Specialties–manufactured REL film and foil capacitors. The designer concludes by claiming, in the manual, “I ended up with a phono preamp that always presents the music in the correct light.” Of course, that’s what they all say! At least those who say anything like that. Setup and use The well-written, informative instruction manual makes several important points, including the suggestion that, if the choice is between a long AC power cord or long interconnects, go for the long, well-shielded power cord. The instructions aren’t afraid to claim “significant performance improvements” with the use of high-quality aftermarket power cords. In my view, anyone unwilling to try such a cord because they “just know” it can’t possibly make a difference deserves the degraded sonic performance they will get. Upon powering up, the front-panel PS Audio logo lights up and the unit loads the default settings: “mute,” “MM” and “47k ohms.” Pressing either the PS Audio logo or the remote’s On/Off button extinguishes the logo LEDs and puts the unit into “idle mode,” which retains all of your settings and deactivates the output relays. Holding down the PS Audio logo button for more than 3 seconds will activate or deactivate the “mute” function. You can still play music even if you lose the remote! This is an extremely wellthought-out operating system, making the feature-packed

MEASUREMENTS

measured the PS Audio Stellar Phono phono preamplifier using my Audio Precision SYS2722 system (see the January 2008 “As We See It”1). For logistical reasons, I tested a different sample (serial number SPH-B-9J0100) from that auditioned by Michael Fremer. To get the lowest measured noise, I floated the signal generator’s unbalanced output from ground and ran a separate connection from the analyzer’s ground to the grounding post on the preamplifier’s rear panel. PS Audio specifies the voltage gain for the moving-magnet input as Low (44dB), Medium (50dB), or High (56dB), depending on the setting selected with the remote control. Looking at the Stellar’s balanced output, I measured gains of 43.9dB, 49.35dB, and 54.8dB, very close to those specified. The gain at the unbalanced output was exactly 6dB lower at each setting. The nominal MC input gain is 60dB, 66dB, or 72dB. With the MC input’s input impedance set to 47k ohms, I measured gains of 59.9dB, 65.4dB, and

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January 2020

70.8dB. The gains at the unbalanced output were again 6dB lower. Both the moving-magnet and moving-coil inputs preserved absolute polarity. My estimates of the PS Audio preamp’s output impedance were lower than the speciﬁed values, at 100 ohms vs <200 ohms unbalanced, and 300 ohms vs 400 ohms balanced. The differences will be inconsequential given the much higher input impedances offered by the line preampliﬁers with which the Stellar will be partnered. The Stellar’s moving-magnet input imped-

ance was 47k ohms at 20Hz and 1kHz, dropping slightly to 42.4k ohms at 20kHz. Set to 47k ohms, the movingcoil input’s input impedance was 45k ohms at low and middle frequencies and 40.5k ohms at the top of the audioband. Set to 200 ohms and 100 ohms, the measured MC input impedance was identical to the speciﬁed values and consistent from 20Hz to 20kHz. With it set to 60 ohms, I measured 67 ohms, this again consistent 1 See stereophile.com/content/measurementsmaps-precision.

d B r

Fig.1 PS Audio Stellar, MM input, Low gain, response with RIAA correction into 100k ohms (left channel blue, right red) (0.5dB/vertical div.).

Fig.2 PS Audio Stellar, MM input, High gain, spectrum, DC–1kHz, of unbalanced output ref. 5mV input (linear frequency scale).

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Stellar a most pleasant and conﬁgurable phono preamp. At this price point, you usually get either little adjustability or the dreaded adjustment-by-DIP-switch torture. One boldface caution in the manual: “Activate idle mode before powering down your unit using the rear panel master power switch.” It doesn’t say why, but I assume it’s to avoid a nasty “thump” through the speakers. The instructions also offer useful load- and gain-setting guidance and advice on what to do if you hear whining, beeping, humming, buzzing, whistling, or any other kind of noising. Darren Myers and PS Audio’s Bill Leebens delivered and installed the Stellar. I think they wanted to hear how a $2500 phono preamp would perform when driven by a $200,000 front end, itself driving a bigger rig than would most likely be used by most Stellar purchasers. Tell me something I don’t already know At the 2019 Rocky Mountain Audio Fest, I got a preview listen to the Stellar phono preamp in the PS Audio room. The turntable there was VPI’s new HW-40 direct-drive model, combined with a VPI Fatboy tonearm ($15,000 together), on which was mounted a low-output MC cartridge. (It might have been an Ortofon A95—I forget.) The rest of the system was (of course) PS Audio electronics driving PS Audio loudspeakers. Though I was unfamiliar with much of the system, I felt by the end of the show that I could probably write the review then and there. (That’s a game I often play at shows listening through unfamiliar systems to gear I’m about to review at home.)

What I heard at home more or less confirmed what I heard at RMAF (though the home experience was considerably better than the already fine performance I heard under typically lousy show conditions)—that is, once the “whining, beeping, buzzing” issues had been solved. That’s not a product indictment! It’s more about Myers’s “no compromise” design philosophy, which is well documented in the instruction manual: As I immediately discovered, and as Myers and Leebens also heard, the Stellar is extremely sensitive to grounding, ultralow-capacitance cables, RF, and other kinds of interference. High-quality, well-shielded cables and careful cable positioning and grounding solved every issue I encountered, including an alarming “whistle” when I tried Luminous Audio’s superlow-capacitance interconnects (which I really like!) between the VPI HW-40 and the Stellar Phono. (Substituting Analysis Plus Silver Oval, which I also really like in spite of its being less open on top, solved the problem.) I also encountered motor noise pick up using the SAT CF109 tonearm’s hard-wired cables—adjusting cable placement cleared that up—and buzzing that I solved by running a ground wire from the VPI’s ground lug to the Stellar Phono’s. My point: If you audition this phono preamp and run into these issues, don’t fret and don’t blame the Stellar. They are solvable. But is it worth going to all that trouble? As I mentioned above, what I heard at the show was confirmed by what I heard at home: The midrange on this phono preamp is as open, uncongested, transparent, and revealing as that of any phono preamp I’ve heard at any price.

measurements, continued

across the audioband. The PS Audio Stellar Phono Preamplifier offers superbly accurate RIAA equalization (fig.1), with an inconsequential 0.1dB difference between the channels in the midrange. This graph was taken with the MM input; repeating the measurement with the MC input reduced the upper –3dB frequency from 80kHz to 45kHz (both frequencies the average of the two channels), but the response was still flat to 20kHz. Channel separation was good, at 63dB in both directions below 500Hz, increasing to 73dB at 3kHz, though it was a little asymmetrical above that frequency. Spectral analysis of the PS Audio’s low-frequency noise floor with the MM input set to High gain (fig.2) indicated that random noise components were low in level. However, very low-level, power supply–related spuriae at 60Hz, 120Hz, and 240Hz can be seen in this graph. The PS Audio’s unweighted, wideband S/N ratio, measured with the input short-circuited to ground and with the preamp again set to MM High gain, was an excellent 80dB with an

stereophile.com

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input signal of 1kHz at 5mV. Restricting the measurement bandwidth to 22Hz–22kHz increased the ratio to 87.6dB, while switching an A-weighting ﬁlter into circuit increased it further, to 89.3dB. Switching the MM gain to Medium, then to Low, respectively reduced the unweighted, wideband S/N ratio by 6dB and 12dB. Spectral analysis with these two lower gains revealed that the decreases in the S/N ratios were due to the supply-related spuriae increasing in level. These spuriae must therefore be introduced after the MM gain stage—

as the output level increases as the gain increases, a constant level of noise becomes correspondingly lower when referenced to the output. However, even in the Low gain condition, the MM input is still very quiet in absolute terms. The MC input is also very quiet, and by contrast with the MM input, its S/N ratio didn’t change by much when the gain was changed. The unweighted, wideband ratio, referenced to an input of 1kHz at 500μV, measured 58.4dB with Low gain, 59.4dB with High gain, these ﬁgures increasing to an excellent 73.1dB and 75.8dB, respectively, when

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Fig.3 PS Audio Stellar, MM input, Low gain, spectrum of 1kHz sinewave, DC–10kHz, into 100k ohms for 10mV input (linear frequency scale).

Fig.4 PS Audio Stellar, MM input, Medium gain, spectrum of 1kHz sinewave, DC–10kHz, into 100k ohms for 10mV input (linear frequency scale).

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How’s that for a “pull quote”? But it’s true, not hyperbole, and I stand by it. In the midrange department, the Stellar Phono is the darTZeel of phono preamplifiers. Considering the price differential, that’s saying a lot! Because of its openness, transparency, and freedom from midband congestion, the Stellar did tell me some things I didn’t already know, on many recordings. Small, subtlethough-significant things that surprised me. Sure, it could have just been slight frequency anomalies compared to my reference electronics. (John Atkinson’s measurement will be interesting 2). As I played more favorite records, I kept hearing familiar things with a slightly different twist—like putting the accent in a different place on a familiar word or seeing a familiar object from a slightly different perspective. Not what I was expecting from a modestly priced phono preamp. At RMAF, I played the test pressing of the first movement of the upcoming Bruckner Symphony No.7 recording with Bernard Haitink conducting the Berlin Philharmonic, and the crowd sat through the entire movement, clearly enthralled (despite the noise outside the room) by the recording’s insane transparency, three-dimensionality, textural delicacy, and airiness. The string sound is to die for, and the Stellar captured and unleashed all of it. At home, using the Ortofon Anna Diamond cartridge on the SAT arm, the result was sensational and fully corroborated Myers’s claim that his design was “innately transparent and present(s) the music with a correct display of tonal balance.” It did that and more. The brass on the Bruckner

was equally glorious, sacriﬁcing none of its “bite” in service of string tone. Nor was transient performance diminished. Through the Stellar Phono, the Dave Rawlings Machine’s all-analog, string-driven (acoustic guitars, mandolin, ﬁddle, and string section) Nashville Obsolete (Acony ACNY-1512LP) delivered all of what I assume producer David Rawlings intended, especially in terms of the clean, shiver-inducing acoustic guitar transients. The Side One closer, “The Trip,” is a very long, “Desolation Row”–like (or “Sad Eyed Lady of the Lowlands”–like) downer tune that climaxes with a furious (though intensely pleasing) onslaught of acoustic strings that the Stellar delivered with full transient clarity and instrumental separation while never turning it mushy or hard. It got this just right. I wish Mr. Rawlings could hear his production through this system, with this phono preamp. The RMAF attendees did, and one came up to me and said, “That was long, repetitive, and seemed to go on forever, but once ‘locked in,’ I couldn’t not listen.” Exactly. Yet when I switched to Joel Ross’s new mallet-driven Blue Note release, KingMaker (Blue Note B003046301), the vibraphone’s round, bell-like transients weren’t softened or diminished in intensity, nor was the decay shortchanged. When Darren Myers visited my home, I played him some things that he was unfamiliar with, like the Move’s rousing “Tonight,” from the UK compilation California Man (Harvest 2 As you can see in the measurements section, JA called the RIAA response “superbly accurate.”

measurements, continued

A-weighted. As you might expect, both overload margins and distortion levels varied according to which input was in use and which gain had been selected. With the MM input set to Low gain, the overload margin, ref. 1kHz at 5mV, was an extraordinary 30dB at 20Hz and 1kHz, dropping to a still good 13.25dB at 20kHz. Surprisingly, the MC margins were 4dB higher, despite the higher gains. The distortion signature was virtually pure second harmonic (fig.3). Increasing the gain by 6dB reduced the overload margins by the same 6dB and while the distortion was still predominantly second harmonic, its level had increased by 9dB (fig.4) and the third harmonic appeared at –90dB (0.003%). With the MM input set to High gain, the overload margins were reduced by another 6dB, which meant there was almost no margin at 20kHz. The distortion also increased (fig.5), with the second harmonic now lying at –56dB (0.2%) and the third at –80dB (0.01%). However, reducing the load impedance to the current-demanding 600 ohms didn’t increase the levels of these harmonics. The PS Audio Stellar

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phono preampliﬁer must have a beefy output stage. Fig.6 shows how the PS Audio Stellar’s MM input, set to Low gain, handled an equal mix of 19kHz and 20kHz tones, at a peak input level equivalent to 1kHz at 10.5mV. This is 7dB below the 20kHz input level where the harmonic distortion reaches 1%, but while higher-order intermodulation products are low on level, the secondorder difference product at 1kHz has reached 1% (–40dB). This graph was taken from the single-ended outputs; as with the harmonic distortion mea-

surements, the behavior was identical from the balanced outputs, apart from the doubled output level. Overall, the PS Audio Stellar appears to be a well-engineered, versatile device, and is among the quietest phono preampliﬁers I have encountered. The way in which its measured distortion and overload margin vary with the gain setting suggests that its owner use the lowest gain setting that will give acceptably loud listening levels with their preferred cartridges, both movingmagnet or moving-coil types. —John Atkinson

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Fig.5 PS Audio Stellar, MM input, High gain, spectrum of 1kHz sinewave, DC–10kHz, into 100k ohms for 10mV input (linear frequency scale).

Fig.6 PS Audio Stellar, MM input, Low gain, HF intermodulation spectrum, DC–30kHz, 19+20kHz at 1V peak output into 100k ohms (linear frequency scale).

January 2020

stereophile.com

PS AUDIO STELLAR PHONO

SHSP 4035), which features masses of strummed acoustic guitars, electric slide guitar, joyous vocal harmonies, and a rousing, slamming ﬁnale. Through lesser phono preamps it can sound congealed, confused, cacophonous, and “meh”— or worse, it can sound harsh, as the hard strums can turn edgy. Not so through the Stellar Phono. I also played, for Myers and Leebens, “Transfusion” from John Renbourn’s Sir John Alot . . . (UK Transatlantic TRA 167), which features one of the most transparent and pristine recordings of a glockenspiel you’ll ever hear, along with ﬁnger cymbals and various exotic drums accompanying Renbourn’s guitar, all set in three-dimensional relief against

a black background. “Insane!” Myers exclaimed. And that it was, though through lesser gear it can sound bland and very sane, or disappointingly coarse and edgy. This is one of the records that, upon hearing it for the ﬁrst time through the original SAT CF1-09, got me to drain the bank account for that very expensive tonearm. The $2500 Stellar Phono did not diminish the experience. Dynamics and bass extension The Stellar’s portrayal of microdynamics, the small shifts in volume that let music breathe, left little to be desired. The Stellar got that part so right, especially noticeable on the aforementioned Bruckner. The Stellar gave way somewhat on macrodynamic expression and “slam,” yielding to the far costlier phono preamps here (costing up to 20 times as much) on ultimate bottomend extension and grip—something you’ll only notice and/ or miss if your system has full or near-full bottom-end extension and grip. The Stellar’s bottom end was, however, very well-extended, well-focused, forceful, and not at all wimpy. While I thoroughly enjoyed through the Stellar the double 45rpm Mobile Fidelity “One Step” edition of Monk’s Dream by the Thelonious Monk Quartet (UD1S2-011), especially Charlie Rouse’s jagged sax riffs, when I switched back to one of my references (the CH Precision P1/X1) I heard the slam, crackle, and sizzle of Frankie Dunlop’s drum kit that the Stellar somewhat diminished—but not to where I noticed it until I made the change. Even on Tyler, the Creator’s highly entertaining and well-crafted album Igor (Columbia 19075965221), where the synth bass is probably wider than it is deep, the Stellar lost a bit to the far more costly references, more in terms of weight than extension. But until the swap I didn’t feel as if anything on bottom was lacking. I could cite a half-dozen more references to jazz, rock, chamber, and symphonic music I listened to through the Stellar Phono over the weeks I had it in the system, using it with the Continuum Caliburn turntable/SAT CF1-09 tonearm, the HW-40 turntable/Fatboy tonearm, and, at the very end, the Air Force One Premium/Graham Elite stereophile.com

January 2020

combo—all far beyond the Stellar’s pay grade. But, rather than go through that list, I’ll just reiterate and certify as true what Myers said in his manual note: “(The Stellar is) innately transparent and present(s) the music with a correct display of tonal balance.” Conclusion I spent a great deal of time listening to and enjoying this $2500 phono preamp—not enjoying it “for the price” but just enjoying listening to music, oblivious to its price and that of the product it stood in for, be it the Ypsilon VP100 (silver edition) phono preamp/MC16LSUT step-up trans-

former combination or the CH Precision P1 phono preampliﬁer/X1 power supply combination, both of which cost more than 20 times as much. I left the Stellar Phono in the system far longer than needed for me to draw conclusions, because I found listening to it pleasurable, particularly its midrange clarity, transparency, textural and tonal richness, and accurate and generous spatial performance. It’s a preamp you want to listen to. With up to 72dB of gain, >74dB A-weighted S/N ratio, and unlimited loading options, the Stellar should partner well with any MC cartridge out there now and probably ever. Aside from the aforementioned areas where it falls somewhat short of the best out there, were there any other sonic areas worth criticizing? I have to reach to ﬁnd anything, but I’ll say that the midrange might be slightly overripe, though its transparency and freedom from congestion mitigate that as an issue. In the PS Audio room, using a cartridge that would normally load at 60 or 100 ohms, we found 200 ohms sounded best, and that’s what I found at home as well. I’d say unless you like really rich and ripe, you’re better off pairing the Stellar with a neutral or even a lean, not-rich– sounding cartridge. Myers used among his references the Ortofon A90—one of my favorites, so I used that for some listening and found it to be a fabulous combo (loaded at 200 ohms)—but so was the Stellar Phono when paired with the Lyra Atlas SL and with less costly cartridges like the $1800 Goldring Ethos. I recommend a listen to the Stellar to anyone in the market for a new phono preamp, regardless of price. I don’t think I’ve ever written that. before Like darTZeel’s clever engineer Hervé Delétraz, Myers designs using a deft combination of technical knowhow and careful listening, more interested in the sonic outcome than in getting the absolute best measured performance. In my view, that’s a winning approach. Q

In the midrange department, the Stellar Phono is the darTZeel of phono preampliﬁers.

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THE GUITARIST TALKS ABOUT FINDING NEW IDEAS IN OLD SONGS, DIGITAL AND ANALOG SOUND, AND THE MANY MEANINGS OF HARMONY by KEN MICALLEF

Of the celebrated triumvirate of John Scofield, Pat Metheny, and Bill Frisell—the most original and influential jazz guitarists of the past 50 years— none is more distinctive, or self-effacing, than Frisell, a true changeling of the guitar. Frisell is a jazz-based musician, but his music crisscrosses genres, and his guitar playing isn’t bound to or limited by a specific technique. He’s a master illusionist, able to alter a song’s meaning far beyond its original intent with the aid of a Telecaster guitar, a modest effects chain, and, most importantly, his rich imagination. In concert—as I heard at a 2014 Lincoln Center performance with singerguitarist-songwriter Buddy Miller and vocalist-fiddler Carrie Rodriguez—Frisell creates virtual worlds in

BILL FRISELL stereophile.com

January 2020

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“Flawless”

First and foremost, the amp’s musical performance was ﬂawless.

The Orchestra Reference is a classic 40 watt

The Orchestra Reference was as beautifully built as the somewhat more

EL34 integrated ampliﬁer. But with Jadis’ new

expensive Jadis I-35. Apart from three small circuit boards - the amp

third generation custom in-house hand-wound

is hand-wired, point-to-point. The layout is sensible, the wiring and

transformers this amp is truly exceptional and

soldering are impeccably done, and the parts quality ranges from very

offers spectacular musicality. Optional remote

good to superb.

available. Outstanding value at $4,795.

The amp’s sound was richly colorful and beautifully balanced, with very good musical drive. It was about as perfectly balanced an amp as I ever heard. The Orchestra made no secret of its dynamic expressiveness.

Please visit www.bluebirdmusic.com to ﬁnd a Jadis dealer near you.

And the steady, stately way in which the Orchestra played the melody and chorale-like harmonies of the Molto adagio was further testament to its superb musical timing. In the long run, I could live with the Orchestra Reference quite happily. For a (mostly) tubed integrated of this performance level to sell for under $5,000 is noteworthy. Rest assured the Jadis Orchestra Reference is extremely unlikely to disappoint. Strongly recommended. - Art Dudley, Stereophile, Class B Recommended Component.

P A S S I O N , CR A FT S M A N S H I P A N D M U S I CA L I T Y L I K E N O O T H ER .

BILL FRISELL

which his audience experiences interstellar vistas, country music–ﬂecked nostalgia, and Hendrix-caliber experimentation. Highlights of Frisell’s discography, which began with his 1983 ECM debut, In Line, include the 2005 Grammy Award–winning album Unspeakable (Elektra Nonesuch); the landmark sessions for bassist Marc Johnson’s Bass Desires (ECM) and Second Sight (ECM); and his work with saxophonist Joe Lovano and drummer-leader Paul Motian, including One Time Out (Soul Note), On Broadway Volumes 1 and 2 (JMT), I Have the Room Above Her (ECM), and Time and Time Again (ECM). Frisell’s current release, Harmony (Blue Note), ﬁnds the 68-year-old Maryland native leading a group that includes Petra Haden (vocals), Hank Roberts (cello, vocals), and Luke Bergman (guitars, vocals). With its focus on harmony vocals, the quartet performs such traditional songs as “Red River Valley,” “Lush Life,” “Where Have All the Flowers Gone?,” Stephen Foster’s “Hard Times,” and a sublime version of Lerner and Loewe’s “On the Street Where You Live,” alongside some of Frisell’s compositions. I began my conversation by asking: What sound or feeling were you looking for with this new group? BILL FRISELL: I never know what it’s going to be before it happens. I’m going by my instincts. I am super close friends with each of these people in the band, but they had never met or played together. My initial thought was to Petra’s singing, Hank playing cello, and Luke playing baritone guitar, and stereophile.com

January 2020

Left to right: Frisell, Luke Bergman, Petra Haden, and Hank Roberts.

that we should all get together. We had a rehearsal before a gig where we performed new music I wrote, a commission by the FreshGrass Music Festival. I thought, “Petra, Luke, and Hank are really good singers.” We worked up “Red River Valley,” they sang that, and I realized, “Oh man, now we’re onto something.” I got super fired up about that. That kind of pushed it into a whole new world that I wasn’t even prepared for. The gig was a first inkling of what we could do featuring the singing. It was selfishness on my part, an opportunity to push my guitar up into the sound of those voices together. I was seduced by the beauty of it. Then we did a few gigs, then the record. KEN MICALLEF: What do you look for when creating an album? BF: This isn’t a protest record, but it provides comfort or an oasis of beauty in the midst of everything else. I look for this place in music where no matter how dark things get on the outside, I enter into the music and it gives me a framework to deal with the real world. And the things that are going on these days—it’s frightening what’s happening in the world. It’s incomprehensible. KM: Your music always provides a feeling of escape. BF: Thank you. The definition of harmony is not just a musical thing. Music is for me this model for how we can get through all of this. [Music and harmony] also give you a framework for how people can get along. There’s tension and release and rhythm and melody and that’s how we interact

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Why does a cable company love “wireless”? Easy —“wireless” is almost never wireless. For maximum performance, wireless components need the world’s greatest power cables. In his review of Dali’s Callisto 2C wireless speaker system, The Absolute Sound’s Muse Kastanovich upgraded the stock AC cords with AQ’s NRG-Z3. He exclaimed … “I had no idea AC cables could make such a large difference in the sound. It wasn’t just emerging from a blacker background; everything was more crisp and exciting. The soundstage was better defined, and the music seemed louder … Do not even consider running your Callistos with the included power cords… Is it crazy to spend $500 on a pair of AC cords for a sub-$5000 system? Not after hearing the sonic improvements they bring.” —Muse Kastanovich, The Absolute Sound, April 2019

ORANGE is the new Blue.

ลชฦ ฦ ฦ ฤบฦ ฦ -ัดัด ย -ัดย ;vฤบ ฦ ฦ ล 7-ย mo ubvhฤท lom;ย 0-1h ]-ย u-m|;; -| r-uเฆ 1br-เฆ m] 7;-ัด;uvฤบ

BILL FRISELL

with each other. You push up against each other and there can be clash, but there’s also resolution. Music is this perfect thing. It’s amazing what happens in music. KM: The new album deﬁnitely provides musical escape. It’s very homey sounding. I was particularly taken with your version of “On the Street Where You Live.” Petra’s vocal and your guitar playing and the group’s performance—it’s amazing. BF: I’ve played that song a lot over the years. I keep coming back to it. I tried to be true to the song. It was hard. But it’s pretty democratic how we come up with arrangements. On that one, Luke Bergman came up with the vocal parts and the counterlines. KM: The song was written in 1956, and the feeling it expresses, kind of a community-felt innocence, isn’t the country we live in today. BF: If you go on the street now and listen to those lyrics, it’s a surprising sentiment. Now we have people living on the street. KM: What about the song appealed to you? BF: The melody, if you pick it apart, is incredible. Just two days ago, I was in my room struggling with the bridge of that song. It’s really insane. There’s all kind of subtle, unusual chord movements. I recorded that song years ago with Ron Carter and Paul Motian [Bill Frisell, Ron Carter, Paul Motian (Elektra Nonesuch, 2006)]. I think I understand the song, and a couple years go by and I look at it again and I realize all these things I’ve missed. That’s constantly happening to me, even with my own songs. I’ll come back to some song I wrote 30 years ago and I’ll notice things that I didn’t know were there the ﬁrst time around. KM: Who is your role model in playing standards? BF: I’d hear Sonny Rollins play whatever songs he chose, and sometimes people would say “Why is he playing these corny songs?” “I’m an Old Cowhand” or “Surrey with the Fringe on Top.” But he transforms them into this amazing thing. And that made me want to play those songs that’s he’s playing. Sonny or Miles Davis played those songs because they’d heard them on the radio. They’re part of their life. I’ll play a Beatles song and it’s almost like Sonny Rollins gave me the keys or a clue of how to do it. KM: Your signature is your use of color, space, and texture within the stereophile.com

January 2020

framework of jazz, pop, and country music standards. You conjure this magic and bring the listener along for this startling journey. How do you translate those ideas of color, sound, and texture on the guitar and in your music? BF: It becomes more and more and more as time goes on, but the whole time I’ve been in music, there’s always something beyond my grasp out there. I’m hearing something that I can’t articulate. It’s like I’m constantly reaching for this thing, “Oh, there it is.” But I can’t get it. KM: You hear a sound you can’t get? BF: Yeah, it’s like the sound and the notes and everything are always beyond my grasp. I’ve seen that almost crush musicians. It’s so huge. As long as I’ve been playing, and still, what’s out there in front of me is infinite. I keep learning and growing, but I had to become comfortable with the fact that I am never going to get there. When I was younger, I had this misconception that if I practiced really hard, I’d get it. Like, “Just get it all together and then you can do anything,” but it’s never going to happen. Sonny Rollins said, “You can’t be thinking about that stuff.” He says you just have to practice, keep working on it. He is beyond a virtuoso of expression, but he’s still humbled by the music. So whatever sound I’m getting, it’s an approximation of something that’s in my imagination. I’m reaching for it; I could be hearing something that might not have a lot to do with the guitar. It’s more when I think of all the music that I’ve heard, it could be the sound of an orchestra or the sound of a drum or a voice, and I’m sort of making a stab at it. I’ll hear that in my head, trying to mimic it or imply it with what I play. Often I try to approach it like Jim Hall, who is another big influence on me, the way he would play smaller things that can become large if they’re placed in the right environment. KM: You’re a master of placing things, sonically. I saw you in 2014 with Carrie Rodriguez at Lincoln Center: You created beautiful architecture in sound, then you’d take it some other place. BF: Sometimes things are happening and I can think about it too much. There’s something good about being naive in what you’re doing. If you figure it out, it takes some of the magic away. KM: You note Sonny Rollins, but to me

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BILL FRISELL

DRAGONFLY “good,

better, bloody hell!”

“If you have a demonstration of two or more DragonFlys, it takes longer to swap the DACs over than it does to hear the benefits of the Cobalt.

you more resemble Wayne Shorter, that surreal, cerebral nature of his music. BF: Sonny and Wayne are like gods for me. It’s incredible to watch Wayne. The way he waits till the exact moment to act. And you can see it. Maybe he’s going in a certain direction, then he stops and doesn’t. Miles, too. He had the idea that it’s just as important what you don’t play. Whatever you play or don’t play, or what you play before or after it, or where you maintain silence is absolutely as important as whatever you actually play. KM: Are you happy with the way your sound has been captured on recordings? BF: I feel really lucky with that. [Producer] Lee Townsend, who I’ve done so many records with, and Tucker Martine, the engineer, make it so I don’t have to think about it. I can talk about something sounding a certain way, and there’s so much trust with those guys. I feel happy with the way we’re using the studio. We’ve found a way so that the band aren’t squashed by headphones and all that technical stuff, but at the same time they’ve got it set up so we can really play. Hopefully it sounds good to other people. KM: Do you overdub guitar on the records? stereophile.com

January 2020

THERE’S TENSION AND RELEASE AND RHYTHM AND MELODY AND THAT’S HOW WE INTERACT WITH EACH OTHER.

Whenever there are three products in a line, there’s a temptation to class them, ‘good, better, best!’ but in this case, it’s, ‘good, better, bloody hell!’ “Get one. Now!”

BF: There’s a few overdubs here and

there on the new record, but it’s a pretty true representation of what the band sounds like. My previous solo guitar album [Music Is] was mostly recorded in real time, but we stacked things more. KM: Does a particular guitar or amp aﬀect what you play? BF: Deﬁnitely. That’s why I’ve developed a little bit of a problem with guitars. We recently moved back to New York from Seattle, and I don’t have room for all 40 or 50 of my guitars. But every one of them has something unique. It’s some sort of feel that one has, the kind of tension and how much you have to push up against it, but every single guitar has a different thing. Even if you put ten Fender Telecasters next to each other, each one is going to have something different. It’s like a different rainbow or different overtones. The way things ring, certain frequencies come out in a different way. Each guitar leads me to different places.

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BILL FRISELL

KM: What guitar, ampliﬁer, and

effects pedals are we hearing on Harmony? BF: I’m playing one guitar. A Bill Nash Telecaster. I met his brother, [Jazz at Lincoln Center tenor saxophonist] Ted Nash. Their father, Dick Nash, is an extraordinary trombone player that you’ve heard all your life. He’s on thousands of soundtrack albums. He was in The Tonight Show band and on all of Henry Mancini’s records. They invited me to lunch, where I also met Bob Bain, the guitarist who played on the theme to Bonanza and on the Audrey Hepburn version of “Moon River” from Breakfast at Tiffany’s. And at that lunch I got to meet another guitar hero of mine, Dennis Budimir. They had these incredible stories of working with Frank Sinatra and Marilyn Monroe. KM: What else are you using on the album? BF: I played Luke’s acoustic guitar on a couple songs. It’s a Waterloo by Collings guitar. I use a Line 6 Delay for loops and delay, and a reverb unit, a Strymon Flint. I don’t use much distortion. It’s mostly just the guitar. Ninety percent of what I play is just the guitar going into the Strymon into Tucker Martine’s old Gibson GA-18 Explorer amp. I have one at home. I also used his Carr Rambler amp. I plug into both running stereo. KM: The trio you maintained with Joe Lovano and Paul Motian was such a unique space, so much color and texture. How did you approach your space in that trio? BF: There was a definite learning curve. We’d been playing as a quintet and then Paul wanted to try a trio. I remember the very first time we played trio, I had this feeling of almost like not quite panic, but I felt I needed to fill in space—like, “Oh, I need to play a low note here to get this feeling.” I was afraid of the space. There was a point where I realized, “Okay, I can let this go. I don’t always have to play [the lower register] all the time.” Then the sounds or frequencies of Paul’s drums suddenly became clear and had meaning; the bass drum became a whole instrument unto itself. Theoretically, it should always be the same. It’s just people listening and playing together, but that trio was reconfigured to where we had the opportunity to place things. It opened up the lower register of the guitar for me. And also when I wasn’t playing down there, the whole lower stereophile.com

January 2020

part of the drums suddenly became a voice. I’ve learned how in some groups you can turn things upside down, like have a bass part happen in a higher register. You can turn things on their head. I learned a lot about that in that trio. And we played together for so many years, since the mid-’80s until Paul passed away. So there was a point where we weren’t trying to figure anything out at all. KM: What’s in your hi-fi? BF: It’s better than it used to be. Before, I had stuff from Goodwill. Now I have a decent separate amplifier, a Hafler Trans-Nova P3000 power amp that a friend in Boulder recommended, and a Hafler DH-110 preamplifier. I have a Yamaha KX-W202U cassette player and a Denon CDR-W1500 CD player. And I got really good speakers, a pair of ProAc Studio 100s. They’re ones that we’ve always used for mixing for many years. They’re small, but I’ve mixed all my records on those. And then I recently got a functioning Audio-Technica AT-LP120-USB Direct Drive turntable. This new record is coming out on vinyl. KM: Do you prefer vinyl or CD? BF: I remember when CD was new. I was with Paul Motian in Paris and we went to this store and they played us a CD and I thought, “Wow, this is incredible. There’s no noise.” Within a couple years, it was all CDs. I totally went for it. Then 10 years ago, I had this Deutsche Grammophon record of Stravinsky’s The Soldier’s Tale. I hadn’t listened to a record in so long. I played this Stravinsky record almost as an afterthought. And immediately I was like, “Oh man, we’ve been screwed. How did that happen? Why does this record sound so good?” The sound of the vinyl sort of enveloped me. It sounded so much better. And even though it was scratched, I was like, “Wow.” I realized we’d really been had. The reality is I still miss the way we used to play records. I’m talking about 40–50 years ago when I used to sit around with my friends, and we’d put on a record and it was an event. We’d all gather around the stereo, put on the new Miles Davis record, and just flip out. It was special. It was a sacred time focused entirely on one side of the record, then we’d turn it over and do it again. These days for me to be able to have enough time to sit there and listen, it doesn’t happen as often as it used to. I miss that. Q

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REVINYLIZATION

A MONTHLY SURVEY OF THE BEST NEW LP REISSUES

BY ART DUDLEY

THIS ISSUE : New reissues from Speakers Corner, Blue Note, the Electric Recording Company, and Intervention Records.

The Burrito Brothers ﬂy again

hink of the greatest commercial LPs made during the past 72 years: the Solti-Culshaw recording of Wagner’s Der Ring des Nibelungen, Magda Tagliaferro’s D’Ombre et de Lumiere, Ornette Coleman’s The Shape of Jazz to Come, John Lennon’s John Lennon/Plastic Ono Band, and a thousand or

so others. Music lovers were able to buy those records because somebody believed that selling them could be proﬁtable. If that’s capitalism at its best, then capitalism at its second-best is surely those somebodies who rescue long-unavailable LPs from commercial and/or sonic oblivion by investing time and money in tracking down the original master tapes, acquiring permission to reissue them and the artwork that accompanied their original release (the latter more daunting than it sounds), and remastering and re-pressing high-quality LPs for contemporary listeners. The opportunity no longer exists to hear the above-named artists in concert; the opportunity to buy their original recordings has also come and gone. Yet, today one can purchase on LP a greater number of historically great titles than even ﬁve years ago, and more are on the way.

ince making a name for themselves in the 1990s by reissuing a great many titles from Decca’s SXL series of classical LPs—recordings that have few if any peers, musically and sonically— German reissue house Speakers Corner has directed their attention to other labels, including classical titles from Columbia (US). Their most recent LP in that series is a reissue of the recording by George Szell and the Cleveland Orchestra of Richard Strauss’s Symphonia Domestica (Columbia MS 6627), originally released in 1964. Szell’s catalog with the Cleveland is inconsistent, some recorded performances offering little beneath their icy crust, but this one is full of passion. The recorded sound is like the playing: crisp, clear, and forceful, but not at all lacking color. If you think Columbia never made good-sounding classical recordings, you really must hear this. Also new from Speakers Corner is a 1960 live recording from Charles Mingus and assorted luminaries: Mingus at Antibes, a two-LP set that was originally released in 1976 on Atlantic (SD 2-3001). The program of mostly Mingus originals is challenging yet

stereophile.com

January 2020

accessible, the performances are electrifying, and the live sound is almost miraculously good. Other Stereophile contributors have written about the Tone Poet series of LP reissues from Blue Note: allanalog remasterings of lesser-known classics from the label’s roster of historically great artists. If you haven’t yet sampled this series, I urge you to seek out a copy of tenor saxophonist Wayne Shorter’s Etcetera (Blue Note B1 7243 8 33581 1 3), which was released during the ﬁrst half of 2019. Recorded in 1965 but kept in the vaults until 1980, Etcetera is a collection of mostly Wayne Shorter compositions made with Herbie Hancock on piano, Cecil McBee on bass, and Joe Chambers on drums, and with typically vivid, lifelike sound from engineer Rudy Van Gelder. The music

is equal parts moody and muscular, the latter quality thanks largely to Chambers’s often astonishing drumming. For three months running, this stunning LP has been in the short pile next to my turntable, and I won’t be ﬁling it away any time soon. While planning this column, I intended to highlight the most recent release from the Electric Recording Company, the British reissue house known for investing enormous sums to purchase and refurbish their own all-analog, all-vintage record-mastering chain—and for selling their carefully curated, strictly limitededition reissue LPs at prices that are distinctly higher than average (yet that typically don’t approach the stratospheric prices of the rare originals they duplicate, in sound, look, and feel). Trouble is, as we go to press, it appears that ERC 049, a reissue of the 1960 Leonid Kogan-Constantin Silvestri recordings of the Mozart Violin Concerto No.3 in G and the Mendelssohn Violin Concerto in E minor (Parlophone SAX 2594), has already sold out. In the event that some of those copies went to resellers, note that the sound of this ERC LP is sublime and the performances therein—especially the Mendelssohn—are best described as events. A ﬁnal bit of news for this month: In September, Intervention Records ordered yet another pressing—the sixth, I believe—of Gilded Palace of Sin (A&M SP 4175), the 1969 debut by the Flying Burrito Brothers, which had been out of print for a time. (To maintain the highest sound quality, Intervention replaces its stampers every 500 copies, which I believe is half the volume of some contemporary LP vendors, and less still than some old-testament record companies.) The IR reissue sounds less compressed than my already good-sounding original, and offers more touch and force. Bonus points for the faithfully reproduced cover art. Q 125

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RECORD REVIEWS

just measured the Keith Part I churns and circles in EDITOR’S PICK Jarrett shelf in my CD place for 14 minutes, a turbulent library and it’s 25” long: pool of thematic recurrence. It 51 CDs and CD sets. But has no shape except energy. Part when I played the new Munich II turns this evening in Munich 2016, I felt like I was rediscoversuddenly inward, as Jarrett ponders and searches and comes ing him after an unexplained upon a fragile tone poem. Careabsence. Jarrett has been off my radar fully, beautifully, he marks it lately. Apparently I am not out. He gradually frees it to ring alone. The single best indicaforth until it finds silence. Part III extends this rapt atmosphere, tor of a jazz musician’s critical in what sounds like a ballad you standing is the DownBeat Interalmost know, or perhaps a folk national Critics Poll. In 2017, song, or even a hymn. It is a Jarrett did not make the top 10 song in the moment, snatched in the piano category. In 2018, from free air. (At the end of Part he did not make the top 20. III, the crowd erupts. Munich Jarrett’s lower profile is partly is into it.) Part IV is a startling because he has not performed outbreak of dance, a wicked in public in more than two groove. years. It’s not because ECM So the suite unfolds. Part V is has stopped putting out Jarrett pure disembodied lyricism, but records: The flow of Jarrett KEITH JARRETT Part VI may reflect back to the releases has been steady. But, formality of Part II. The twowith one exception (Creation, Munich 2016 minute Part VII may draw upon in 2015), it’s all been older stuff the intensity of Part I. Part VIII from the ECM vaults. ECM 2667/2668 (2 CDs). 2019. Keith Jarrett, prod.; is a mesmerizing meditation But now there’s Munich 2016, Martin Pearson, eng.; Christoph Stickel, mastering eng. that climbs and falls away and from July 16, 2016, the last night PERFORMANCE ascends again. The three-minute of Jarrett’s most recent EuroSONICS Part IX prances like Part IV. pean tour. It’s the newest Jarrett Parts X and XI merge into one music currently available. Lisact, a pattern within the greater design, tening to it reminded me of something very long. In 2005, with Radiance, he the towering arc of this concert. I knew but had momentarily forgotfundamentally altered the model. He The immediacy of the listener’s discontinued those gigantic hourten: Keith Jarrett is our greatest living experience is not separable from the long outpourings and began to string jazz pianist. lifelike recorded sound achieved by the together much shorter improvised This is a “solo concert,” of the toECM team: executive producer Mansegments. Munich 2016 contains 12 tally improvised live genre that Jarrett separate pieces. invented in 1973 with Solo Concerts: fred Eicher, engineer Martin Pearson, Those of us who loved the original Bremen/Lausanne and continued in and mastering engineer Christoph solo concert albums had a tough time 1975 with The Köln Concert. These Stickel. There is a close focus on the with the change. The sheer excess of performances, sometimes more than piano, but it is placed in the ambient the long solo concerts was thrilling. an hour in length, were astonishing acoustic environment of the Munich To be swept up in Jarrett’s streams of onslaughts of spontaneous creativPhilharmonic Hall. musical consciousness was to transcend For an encore, Jarrett makes a choice ity. They demanded much from the the role of passive listener and feel like he never would have made in 1973. listener—patience, openness, imaginaa creative participant. After creating 12 spontaneous compotive engagement, and a good attention If Munich 2016 does not reach the span—which makes their commercial sitions, he plays three standard ballads. heights of earlier solo concert albums success no less astonishing. Sales of “Answer Me, My Love,” “It’s a Lonelike La Scala, it is nonetheless an some Old Town,” and “Somewhere The Köln Concert have exceeded 3.5 imposing achievement. Jarrett still sets Over the Rainbow” are traced with a million copies. his hands free to flow into motivic devotion that lights them from within Since 1983, Jarrett’s primary format continuums and harmonic epiphanies and makes extended improvisation unhas been his “Standards Trio” with and polyrhythmic furies and melodic Gary Peacock and Jack DeJohnette, necessary. They complete the musical revelations, all of which could have but he never stopped performing and and spiritual journey. This night is one been discovered in no other way. recording solo concerts, or not for song. —Thomas Conrad stereophile.com

RECORDING OF THE MONTH

January 2020

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RECORD REVIEWS

CLA S SIC AL

JAN GARBAREK/ THE HILLIARD ENSEMBLE

Remember Me, My Dear ECM New Series 2625 481 7971 (24/48 WAV). 2019. Manfred Eicher, prod.; Lara Persia, Michael Rast, engs. PERFORMANCE SONICS

There’s a bittersweet quality to this live recording that will surely touch lovers of Ofﬁcium, the label’s ﬁrst expansive meeting between the Hilliard Ensemble and Norwegian saxophonist Jan Garbarek. Twenty years and two albums after the release of that melding of medieval with modern, the original members of the Hilliard Ensemble plus tenor Steven Harrold, who came onboard in 2001, united with Garbarek for a series of farewell concerts. Recorded in 2014 in the Chiesa Collegiata dei SS Pietro e Stefano in Bellinzona, Switzerland, the performance conveys much of the space’s sacred ambience. (Had the sampling rate been higher than the 48kHz of my review copy, the space might have made additional impact.) There’s a fair amount of audience noise, but the emotions that accompany this farewell radiate without impediment. Garbarek sounds wonderful, his instrumental “voice” as searching and plaintive as ever. Sometimes he sings prominently; other times he adds only the most prudent commentary. Beginning with “Ov Zarmanali,” a Hymn of the baptism of Christ by Komitas, and ending with “Remember me, my dear,” an anonymous ballad from 16th century Scotland, he allows space for the music (including two of his own compositions) to soar. Some of the Hilliards, though, reveal why their retirement was at hand. John Potter often sounds covered and bottled up, and the tonal beauty of some of the other vets is marred by occasional wobble. But the spiritual essence of the repertoire and collaboration, which has taken too long to reach us, propels it aloft. —Jason Victor Serinus 128

PALESTRINA

PROKOFIEV

Lamentations

Alexander Nevsky; Lieutenant Kijé Suite

Cinquecento Hyperion CDA68284 (24/96 WAV). 2019. Adrian Peacock, prod.; Markus Wallner, eng. PERFORMANCE SONICS

For high Renaissance polyphony, one can do no better than 16th century composer Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina. As is clear from his “Lamentations for Maundy Thursday, Good Friday, and Holy Saturday”—the three days in Holy Week that lead to the celebration of the death and subsequent resurrection of Christ—Palestrina could create a thing of beauty from even recitation of the number that precedes a verse from the Roman liturgy. There are lots of numbers, and lots more verses, in this recording’s 73 tracks, many of which last less than a minute. Palestrina’s emphasis is less on musical development per se than on evenness of flow and sentiment. That he succeeds in holding attention with the beauty of his multivoiced unaccompanied polyphony, and transforms texts that could have been a big downer into elevating and inspiring music, is a testament to his genius. When Claude Debussy lauded the “delicate traceries” in Palestrina’s music for Holy Week, he was pointing not only to the past but to the path that he, too, would follow, albeit in a secular context. In this recording, Vienna-based vocal ensemble Cinquecento (the Italian term for the 16th century) makes a better case for the European Union than many a politician. A border-erasing band of five male singers from five European countries, here sometimes augmented by as many as three additional tenors, Cinquecento has toured the world since their formation in 2004. Their tuning is almost ideal, as is the recording, which was made in Kartause Mauerbach, Vienna, in September 2018. The blend of direct sound, vocal color, and acoustic resonance is exemplary. —Jason Victor Serinus

Alisa Kolosova (mezzo-soprano), Utah Symphony Chorus, University of Utah A Capella Choir, University of Utah Chamber Choir, Utah Symphony, Thierry Fischer (conductor). Reference Recordings Fresh! FR-735 (SACD). 2019. Dirk Sobotka, prod.; John Newton, Mark Donahue, engs. PERFORMANCE SONICS

Prokofiev wrote a lot of music for films, and much of it has made its way to the concert hall. The Alexander Nevsky cantata, which derives from his score for Eisenstein’s movie, begins dramatically with brass and string choirs. The tension builds progressively through “Russia under the Mongolian Tyranny,” which ends in quiet desperation. Utah’s choirs enter with “Song of Alexander Nevsky,” their voices in perfect balance. With “Arise, People of Russia,” the pace quickens toward war, culminating with “The Battle on the Ice.” I’ve never heard a rendering of the battle as bleak and crushing as this. One feels the impact of the breaking ice and the noise of war. By the end, we are spent, as the strings linger over the now-quiet battlefield. This segues into “The Field of the Dead,” a requiem. Kolosova’s tone is pained, warm, and kind; she’s good, but she does not supplant Lili Chookasian as my favorite in this role. The cantata concludes with a joyous and triumphant celebration, as “Alexander enters Pskov.” This is a performance of gravity and grace. The Lieutenant Kijé Suite, which is based on a short satire about the life of a fictitious hero, is all wit and charm, but Fischer and the Utah orchestra avoid the trap of treating it as a set of bonbons. SoundMirror’s recording team delivers sound that is remarkably transparent, balanced, and powerful. These are the best sounding versions available of both of these popular pieces.—Kalman Rubinson January 2020

stereophile.com

RECORD REVIEWS

GOUNOD

Faust (1859) Benjamin Bernheim, Faust; Véronique Gens, Marguerite; Andrew Foster-Williams, Méphistophélès; others; Flemish Radio Choir, Les Talens Lyriques, Christophe Rousset, cond. Bru Zane 1037 (3 CDs). 2019. Jiri Heger, prod.; Bergame Periaux, Charles-Alexandre Engelbert, engs. PERFORMANCE SONICS

Palazetto Bru Zane is an organization devoted to French music of the period starting in 1780 and continuing through 1920, and this recording of the 1859 version of Gounod’s Faust is their project. Gounod revised and subtracted from his score for 10 years; this performance returns to his original thoughts (in addition to orchestrating some bits that had disappeared). Much like the restoration of a piece of Renaissance art, wherein all subsequent layers of paint have been lovingly scraped off to reveal a work with the same bones but a somewhat new aspect, here we get a Faust that is quick and sharp rather that lugubrious and sentimental. It will be a revelation, particularly for those familiar with the work in its popular, far-too-saccharine form. Spoken dialogue in place of the sung recitatives—this is an opéra-comique— helps ﬂesh out the characters: Méphistophélès and Dame Marthe add comic relief, and Faust’s and Marguerite’s feelings are clearer. The primarily francophone cast deliver the dialogue naturally. There’s a “new” trio in the ﬁrst act for Faust, Siebel, and Wagner, and a clever song for Siebel after Marguerite’s Spinning Aria. These bits offer an “aha!” feel, not something we didn’t expect from good old Faust. Some familiar, beloved music is missing—Valentin’s “Avant de quitter ces lieux” and the Soldier’s chorus—but a more densely written death scene for the former is riveting, and the soldiers have a merry chorus instead. Like its revised version, this is almost three hours long, but the period instruments, model “Frenchness” of the cast, and Christophe Rousset’s ideal tempi stereophile.com

January 2020

for each scene give it an easy flow and leave a strong dramatic impression. Scenes follow one another organically. The seduction scene, after the giveand-take before it, is luxurious, gentle, and sincere. The gut strings offer great color and pliancy, and the winds have a sharper edge than their modern counterparts. Benjamin Bernheim sings a Faust that is perfect, going vividly from bored to ardent to penitent, and whether singing in full or voix mixte— a perfect high C—his sound is brilliant and clean. His impeccable diction implies an elegant man; the character’s selfishness, turning to self-loathing, is all there. Véronique Gens is not a chirpy Marguerite; her more womanly sound makes her a truly tragic figure, and her phrasing, whether hopeful or knowingly resigned, is warm and forward. But she has the technique to conquer the scales and trills in the “Jewel Song” with ease. Among the recorded Marguerites, this one is the most realistically drawn and the saddest. Andrew Foster-Williams, not a cavernous bass but rather a dark baritone, brings wit and nastiness to Méphistophélès, never distorting the vocal line, a formidable foe. In place of the deep velvet sound of some others, he instead is assertive and earthy. The Valentin of Jean-Sébastian Bou unifies manliness with tenderness. A restored scene with the sincere Siebel of Juliette Mars lets us in on the characters’ back stories. One would like to hear Valentin’s big aria: too bad it was not included as an appendix. (Also missed is the devil’s “Le veau d’or,” but I’m weeping over spilled highlights.) Les Talens Lyrique play, as suggested above, with expression, warmth (and vibrato when needed), and handsome tone. The Flemish Radio Choir does itself proud. The three CDs come with a wellput-together book, with fascinating essays and texts and translations. The sound is mostly clear and light, consistent with the performances. The emphasis is on the voices, but the orchestra is well-recorded. His voice interacting with the hall, Bernheim’s Faust sometimes takes on an edge, as in the first scene: Set the volume too loud and it grates, but set it just right and the vocals are creamy and good. Stereo imaging is precise, providing a near-visual perspective on the soundstage: a welcome aid in a recorded opera performance. —Robert Levine

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RECORD REVIEWS

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A new masterpiece THE FRED HERSCH TRIO

10 Years / 6 Discs Palmetto Records PMO10.2 (6 CDs). 2019. Fred Hersch, Bryan Ferrina, Missi Calazzo, prods.; James Farber, Tyler McDiarmid, Geoffrey Countryman, Stef Lenaerts, engs. PERFORMANCE SONICS

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Fred Hersch has been a stellar jazz pianist for 25 years, but in the last decade his star has started to glow, and that’s the era covered in 10 Years / 6 Discs. In 2008, Hersch, openly gay and HIVpositive, fell into a coma and, upon awakening, had lost his reflexes, requiring strenuous rehab to rebuild them. The next year he formed a new trio, with bassist John Hébert and drummer Eric McPherson. The year after that they recorded their first album, Swirl (Disc 1 in this boxed set). It was cozy and lyrical—Hersch had long been known, sometimes misleadingly typed, as a lyrical balladeer, in the vein of Bill Evans—but it had the feel of a spring training session, where the pitching coaches nod at each other (“The kid is coming along”) but know he needs a bit more seasoning. Then in 2012 came a double album (Discs 2 and 3), Alive at the Vanguard, recorded at the jazz shrine in Greenwich Village, and the title (not Live but Alive) said it all: Hersch was back. The music ranged from stormy to rhapsodic to bluesy to sweet—a mix of standards and originals, which Hersch explored as an intimate journey with Alpine twists and turns. Two years later came Floating, which was stronger still. It begins with a tango-lilted “You and the Night and the Music,” a heady display of twohanded counterpoint. The title tune, an original called “Autumn Haze,” and a slow, slow cover of “If Ever I Would Leave You” are dreamy ballads, roused by knife-edged chords and haunting Ravelian filigree, Hersch coaxing the keys with a muscular touch. I remember seeing him play around this time and thinking, “He’s completely recov-

ered, plus some.” In 2016, he recorded another live date, Sunday Night at the Vanguard (a nod to Evans’s Sunday at the Village Vanguard), and it showed Hersch, at age 50, firing on all cylinders: sparkling tone, harmonic inventiveness, dynamic control, mastery of rubato, all unfurled in seamless service of the music. Finally there’s his most recent album, Live in Europe (Disc 6), recorded in 2017, and it finds him, remarkably, plowing new ground—not just in repertoire (Wayne Shorter and Sonny Rollins as well as Monk and some originals). As I wrote of this album on stereophile.com, “He is known for his lush harmonies and galvanic rhythms. He’ll occasionally toss a discordant number into a set, but it often comes off as an excursion. Here, though, he weaves the lyrical and the adventurous into a seamless web. His touch is, at times, both fleet and percussive, measured but swinging.” Throughout, Hersch’s bandmates provide ideal support, loosening or tightening the reins at just the right moments, and as the decade progresses, the interplay approaches clairvoyance: Hébert and McPherson don’t stick out because they’re locked in synch with Hersch; and Hersch probably couldn’t stretch so far without that mind meld. The sound quality on the discs is excellent: palpable, dynamic, tonally true, transparent. The two-disc Alive at the Vanguard is the one album mixed to analog, which may account for its warmth. Three other albums were engineered by James Farber and mastered by Mark Wilder, two of the best in the business. The sixth, Live in Europe, was recorded in a superb hall, with a superb piano, and it sounds terrific too. None of the discs have been remastered since their original release; they contain no alternate takes or bonus tracks. If you already own some, there’s no reason to buy the box. But if you don’t, 10 Years / 6 Discs offers a deep look into the growth to peak powers of one of the best pianists in today’s jazz. —Fred Kaplan IN ROTATION AT FRED’S Kronos Quartet/Terry Riley Sun Rings NONESUCH

Petra Haden Petra Goes to the Movies ANTI/EPITAPH

January 2020

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RECORD REVIEWS

ROC K/ POP This changes everything!

TED NASH

NEIL YOUNG/CRAZY HORSE

Somewhere Else: West Side Story Songs

Colorado

Plastic Sax Records PSR-5 (CD). 2019. Nash, prod.; Marc Urselli, eng. PERFORMANCE SONICS

This is a cool album in the tradition of the drummerless jazz trios of the late 1950s and early ’60s, reveling in crisp lines, fleet tones, and crafty interplay— more “dancing in your head” than swinging in the ballroom or belting out the blues. A few years ago, the same trio, which has played together for years, recorded the aptly titled Quiet Revolution, a terrific tribute album to reedman Jimmy Giuffre and guitarist Jim Hall, rebel-pioneers who melded this tradition with modern chamber elements and a free-jazz sensibility that made the music simmer. With Somewhere Else, they take a similarly skewed dive into Leonard Bernstein’s songs from West Side Story. Ted Nash, who also did the arrangements, has just the right sound for this melange—at once spare, lush, and crusty. Guitarist Steve Cardenas strums color and counterpoint with an economical verve that would do Jim Hall proud. Ben Allison, one of the most agile bassists around, swerves deftly from timekeeping anchor to high-flying energizer and back again. Together, they evoke the balletic spirit of Bernstein’s score while infusing it with their own accents and flavors. The highlight is “Tonight”—in fact, this may be the most captivating four minutes I’ve heard in jazz all year. It begins with Nash blowing a spirited improvisation, his trio-mates swaying in and out of his patterns with their own adventurous moves—till, after several gripping choruses, they settle into the straight melody in a triumphant resolution. The sound quality is very good, fittingly close-miked and intimate, the guitar and bass strings clear and plucky. The sax rings a bit on the bright side, but not annoyingly so. —Fred Kaplan stereophile.com

January 2020

Reprise Records 599670 (24/96 FLAC). 2019. John Hanlon, Neil Young, prods. PERFORMANCE SONICS

Neil Young has released dozens of studio albums and countless live ones, and many others are available as bootlegs. Of the studio albums, something like 18 are with Crazy Horse, his semisteady sidekicks since 1969. In the Neil Young discography, I’m partial to the early Crazy Horse albums, plus a few that added other musicians to the mix, such as On the Beach and After the Goldrush. Officially credited or otherwise, Crazy Horse is Neil Young’s band that rocks the best. Here’s a new one with most of the gang, recorded high in the mountains near Telluride, Colorado. Guitarist/ pianist Nils Lofgren was appointed an official Crazy Horser. Oxygen tanks were used, and members flew and drove in as needed to lay down their tracks. All the classic elements are here in abundance: Chunky guitars glowing like huge orange embers, Ralph Molina’s laid-back, open drumming, and the loose chorus of falsetto backup voices dropping in and out like acolytes at the procession. In a promo video for the sessions, you can see them rolling analog tape and running Pro Tools. However those elements came together, this is an exquisite-sounding album, with clarity and depth, despite the huge distorted guitars saturating most tracks. Molina’s drums never sounded better, and Neil’s guitar is often spread across the whole soundstage for added epicness. Neil Young is known for his advocacy of good sound, and he certainly achieves it here. This isn’t their best work, but if it weren’t for the age in Neil’s voice and the blunt messaging in the lyrics, it could pass for a minor ’70s-era classic. The best Neil Young anything in years. Decades, even. —Jon Iverson

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DR. JOHN & THE WDR BIG BAND

KINKY FRIEDMAN

Big Band Voodoo

Resurrection

Orange Music 762183509823 (CD). 2019. Stanley Chaisson, Mac Rebbenack, prods.; Lenny Delbert, eng.

Echo Hill Records 888295936538 (CD). 2019. Larry Campbell, prod.; Justin Guip, eng.

PERFORMANCE SONICS

Audiophile Essentials

EDITOR CD PACKAGE shop.stereophile.com

stereophile.com

January 2020

When Mac Rebennack, aka Dr. John, passed during the grim New Orleans summer of 2019, he left behind multiple treasure chests of live and studio recordings owned by various managers and producers. We are likely to see many of these recordings emerge as the dust settles. The ﬁrst two, released by Stanley Chaisson, offer sessions from the mid-1990s, including this one, a studio session in Germany with the Westdeutscher Rundfunk (WDR) Big Band. On Big Band Voodoo, Dr. John hits the studio in Cologne, Germany, with a band known for precision and versatility. The recording is superb, and Lenny Delbert’s remaster beautifully captures the nuance of Rebennack’s singing and the subtleties of his piano playing. On “Blue Skies,” Mac sings easy and his piano ﬂoats along with subtle accompaniment from brass and reeds. The WDR Big Band’s forte is swing, and they surround Dr. John with a surging chariot of sound that recalls the great Count Basie bands of the 1950s. “C.J.’s Blues,” Rebennack’s tribute to New Orleans musician Cousin Joe, is so Basie-esque, you’re waiting for the trick note at the end. “Indian Red” starts things off in progress, and the band builds to some nice, traditional collective improvisation. Rebennack is at his best cushioned by John Clayton’s gorgeous arrangements on ballads such as “New York City Blues” and “There Must Be a Better World Somewhere.” Rebennack is known for his funk and Gris-Gris music, but his sensitive handling of material from the Great American Songbook makes this an important addition to his catalog. —John Swenson

PERFORMANCE SONICS

We’ve been down a long road since “coffee with a friend was still a dime,” as Kinky Friedman sang on the title track of his debut album, Sold American, back in 1973. He was part of the generation of Texas singer-songwriters who challenged the Nashville-based country music establishment before alt-country and Americana existed. Back then, he played the satiric court jester, as on songs like “They Ain’t Makin’ Jews Like Jesus Anymore,” in which the narrator beats up a white racist, and “Ride ’Em Jewboy,” which isn’t what it sounds like but, rather, a tribute to Holocaust victims. It has been reported that for years during his incarceration, Nelson Mandela ended each day listening to that song. Friedman repays the compliment on Resurrection’s ﬁrst track, “Mandela’s Blues,” about a man who “lost everything a man can lose” but not his thirst for freedom. Friedman’s wit and broad humor are the stuff of oddball political candidates, which he has been, but his songwriting has always had an open-road romantic streak that puts him in the company of Willie Nelson, Billy Joe Shaver, and Kris Kristofferson. Resurrection is a songwriter’s album, a collection of stories and fables that reference the vistas Friedman glimpses over his shoulder as he rides out of town. His voice has turned dusty and leathery over the years, adding authenticity to the stories he tells. (Willie) Nelson helps out on the choruses. Friedman co-writes, with Doc Elliot, songs about a loner hitting the road out of “Greater Cincinnati” and on “Blind Kinky Friedman.” The sentimental Kinky even has a song about his dear departed dog. Another offers tribute to the Statue of Liberty. —John Swenson 133

MANUFACTURERS’ COMMENTS Grado GS3000e Editor (and Herb): Thanks for including our GS3000e in your article “Herb Reichert’s lust for power leads to sonic Euphoria.” We are also glad to have impressed you enough for you to give the GS3000e a “Highly Recommended” rating. It’s always nice knowing our hard work is appreciated. We were happy to hear all the special cables we made for you performed as expected and were of the length you requested; we just might have to add them to our product line. We totally enjoyed your visit to the Grado facility and the opportunity to have you meet the whole Grado family. You’re welcome back anytime. John Grado Grado Labs

Krell K-300i Editor: Thank you, Stereophile, and especially to Jason Victor Serinus, for the informative, detailed review of the Krell K-300i! Also, thank you John Atkinson for the as-usual thorough measurements and observations. We would like to thank David Goodman, our Director of Product Development, who has been with Krell for over 32 years, and the entire Krell design team for their efforts and innovative design implementation within the new K-300i. Krell’s proprietary I-Bias technology, as well as the new, recently incorporated XD upgrades, have enabled our ampliﬁcation products, across the board, to deliver what we refer to as the “New Krell Sound.” We are pleased that Jason heard what we strive to deliver with the “New Krell Sound”: a natural, detailed, organic presentation that brings immersive musical experiences to the listener. Thank you, Jason, John, and Stereophile, we very much appreciate your efforts! Walter Schoﬁeld, COO Krell Industries

Feliks Euforia Editor: On behalf of Upscale Distribution and Feliks Audio, I would like to thank Herb Reichert and Stereophile for the thoughtful and exciting review of our headphone ampliﬁer, the Euforia. 134

I’m especially happy because Herb Reichert is high on my Cool-guy list. He understands not just ingenious circuit topology but value in a product, two things that the Euforia excels in. When he states that it’s “one of the best amps I’ve used this year,” I couldn’t agree more. Especially with his beloved Focal headphones. I suspect the Feliks line of OTL headphone amplifiers are the most popular tube amps on the market for Focal owners. While I personally love the Crossfeed circuitry, it’s not for everybody. My ears are sensitive, and headphones can at times give me listening fatigue. I find it useful with some recordings that I find to be aggressive, especially on super-fast headphones. Even if it’s only 10% of the time, it’s been super helpful to me. Thanks again to Herb, a real enthusiast who knows his stuff. I would also like to thank Lukasz Feliks for building such a great, imaginative company. We are thrilled to represent them in North America. Kevin Deal Upscale Distribution

Elac Carina BS243.4 Editor: Thanks once again for writing a review of one of my speakers and mentioning (again) my skill at combining the functions of speaker and sex toy. I thought by concentrating on just the one aspect this time, (the sound in case you need to ask), I could at least share this review in polite company, but thanks to Herb’s good memory that hope has been dashed. C’est la vie. I guess I can always use the currently popular marker pen to edit those parts out. ;-) Interestingly Herb’s comment about tonality remaining consistent outside of the sweet spot seems at odds with John’s comment from his measurements. However, if one looks at his 30° averaged response compared to the on axis response they are near identical to beyond 15kHz. If he had averaged over a 60° window he would have also seen only small differences. It’s when you go beyond that the output drops. The tweeter maintains little change over the listening area but then drops off quickly outside of that. This, for me, is a good thing. Thanks for the electric grin inducing

ANY CLOD CAN HAVE THE FACTS; HAVING OPINIONS IS AN ART

THIS ISSUE :

Representatives of Grado Labs, Feliks Audio, Krell, Elac, and Benchmark comment on our reviews of their products.

review.

Andrew Jones, VP Engineering Elac Americas

Benchmark LA4 Editor: The volume control is the weakest link in most audio systems. With most volume controls, noise, distortion, and L/R balance deteriorate as the volume is turned down. This loss of performance can be substantial but it is rarely documented in a product’s specifications. Performance is usually measured at the volume setting that produces the best specifications. Needless to say, this optimum volume setting is rarely the setting that you are using in your living room. We set out to build a volume control that would maintain peak performance over a very wide range of settings. Benchmark’s solution is very similar to the solution that you will find in the Audio Precision AP2722 and APx555 test stations that John Atkinson uses when measuring product performance. Like these test stations, we use actively buffered relay-switched resistor ladder networks that are constructed from high-precision (0.1% and 0.01%) metal film resistors. Relay volume controls are not new to hi-fi, but the Benchmark solution is very different than prior solutions. One unique feature is the precision makebefore-break relay timing that prevents clicks in the audio. The Benchmark control is also actively buffered. In contrast, most relay volume controls are passive (there are no buffers at the inputs or outputs). A passive architecture may seem like a good idea, but one side effect is that the impedance changes with volume. This change can create changes in the frequency response. Passive designs usually have an excessively high output impedance and/or an excessively low input impedance. Active buffering solves these problems. Active buffering also allows the use of very low impedances in the resistor ladder network. By lowering the impedance, we can reduce the thermal (Johnson) noise produced by the resistors. Over most of the volume range, this reduction in noise makes our active control quieter than passive designs. John Siau, VP Benchmark Media Systems, Inc. January 2020

stereophile.com

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STEREOPHILE

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20, 21

Alta Audio Aqua Acoustic Quality Audio Art Cable

Elusive Disc

24, 25, 126

Excel Audio

Focal Naim America

Back Cover

Gauder Akustik

Goebel High End

106

129

GoldenEar Gryphon Audio

AudioQuest

117, 119, 121

Avantgarde

Hammertone Audio

Axiss Audio

Harbeth

Marantz

Tekton

Martin Logan

Ultra Systems

136

131

Upscale Audio

Upscale Distribution

MBL Mcintosh Labs Music Direct

61 29, 36, 37, 124

12, 13

Nordost

Ortofon

102, 130

40, 41

136

Wadax

104

Wireworld

108

PS Audio

Bel Canto

Joseph Audio

123

Revel

10, 114

Rogue Audio

Kemela Contemporary Audio 137

Sonus Faber

Kimber Kable

Spendor Audio

Clearaudio

100

Kirmuss Audio

Synergistic Research

118

Crystal Cable

139

Legacy Audio

T+A Elecktroakustik

David Lewis Audio

110

Lumin

Tannoy

EISA

135

Magico

Technics

January 2020

VooDoo

116

Vitus Audio

Jadis Electronics

stereophile.com

PrimaLuna

136

Chord Electronics

Vienna Acoustics

8, 9

BEK HiďŹ

72, 73

Paradigm

Cable Company

Vandersteen Audio

High End by Oz

KEF

136

122

106

Used Cable

OSD Audio

AXPONA

Bending Wave

120 2

Von Schweikert

Wynn Audio

YG Acoustics

The Ad Index is provided as a courtesy. The publisher is not liable for incorrect information or excluded listings. Advertisers should contact their sales representative to correct or update a listing.

137

MY BACK PAGES

GOOD AND BAD, I DEFINE THESE TERMS QUITE CLEAR... —BOB DYLAN

BY CARL THOMAS HRICZAK

THIS ISSUE :

A remarkable gift sets one family on their path to musical fulﬁllment.

t’s 9:45 on a mid-September weeknight in Greater Toronto. Having spent the evening reveling in the glory of her 9th birthday—candles blown out, presents open, pleasantly full of Wegmans’ Ultimate Chocolate Cake—Our Birthday Girl has one additional request:

“Can we please play ‘Happy Birthday Polka’?!” Emily’s referring to a 10" 78rpm recording by Tex Williams, on a redlabel Capitol I brought home for $1, mainly for the near-mint outer sleeve it came in. The first time I played it, she was sitting on her bean bag chair, counting the change from a jar of coins over and over and making notes and drawings on her sketch pad. As the stylus settled into the surprisingly noise-free disc—it looks worse than it sounds—a descending passage from the flutes was joined by fiddle and (early) electric guitar in what could pass for postmodern Boccherini. Williams then crooned: “Happy Birthday! This is your day / but we have all the fun! / Gather ’round the piano / And let’s harmonize a tune . . .” Emily jumped up and started dancing: “I love this song!” She’s a Weird Al Yankovic devotee, and if this record isn’t a direct ancestor to the great Alfred’s output, I don’t know what is. The sound is A-plus, too. To watch Emily derive so much joy from a 78 is to return to my own audio-loving roots. It’s history repeating itself—in a good way, for once. When I was her age, I was blessed to have audio experiences that shaped me into the audiophile music aficionado I am today. Equipment my family couldn’t otherwise afford was given to us—by none other than family friend and noted pianist Glenn Gould. I have no memories of Glenn: He passed away when I was 10 months old. Yet the sound system he left us led to my lifelong obsession with music, sound, and circuitry. Our Marantz 2230 receiver has been functioning 138

ﬂawlessly every day since 1973; I no longer use it for ampliﬁcation, but it remains my daily-driver FM tuner. Imagine that: In my 37 years, every day, save for travel, I have listened to WNED-FM through the 2230. I refer to it as my older sibling: If gear could talk, oh! the stories that receiver could tell . . .

Around 1995, I began to get serious about high ﬁdelity. I began picking up and thumbing through and eventually buying copies of Stereophile. And in December 1996, I read Michael Fremer’s review of the Rega Planar 3 turntable. I hungered for better LP sound. I saw the price: $695. I could and I would afford that. I had my goal. I saved every paperroute penny from then to the summer of ’97, and by mid-July, I was the proud owner of a Planar 3, complete with a Grado Reference Platinum cartridge. But it didn’t begin well. The tech, if you want to call him that, badly misaligned the cartridge. I was almost in tears when I heard how much worse it sounded compared to the demo. The shop offered to loan me a DB Systems protractor, and days later I was tracking distortion-free. I didn’t know

about VTA and SRA yet, and there was a height mismatch, with the stylus raking at about 87 degrees. Still, it was so much better than the aging table it replaced that I enjoyed the combo until 2002. Then, after reading Art Dudley’s never-ending ode to the Denon DL103 cartridge, I put one on the Rega, and it’s been my go-to since. After raising the arm with Rega’s 4mm spacer, the SRA is spot on. I’d venture to say that if someone were to design a turntable around the Denon and not the other way around, the result would be a Planar 3. It’s another of those matches made in heaven. Incidentally, it’s historically significant to own a Rega Planar 3 in Buffalo-Niagara: The glass platter was pioneered in Buffalo by the Kurtzmann piano company. A phonograph designed by them in 1920 featured a platter nearly identical to the one Roy Gandy uses. It only played vertically modulated records and had a “permanent” sapphire stylus, as well as a see-through case with a top plate made of glass. The equipment I can afford these days is not that of sonic platitudes. I cherish every piece I can bring to (or order from) my home, even if none of it reaches as high as Class B. No matter. We are enjoying our music with great detail and a decent amount of tone and touch. Perhaps someday our financial fortunes will improve and we can go for the Clearaudio Goldfinger cartridge, or maybe a Lyra Atlas or Ortofon MC Anna. Until then, it’s a delight to read about these divine creations, and to feel comradeship with the staff of a publication that has a cherished place in our hearts and home. My equipment may not be exciting, but what we do with it every day is exciting. Here, hope abounds. Q Carl Thomas Hriczak is a freelance photographer and private music educator. He photographs people and teaches piano in the binational Buffalo Niagara region. January 2020

stereophile.com

CARL THOMAS HRICZAK

Keeping the audiophile faith

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