Audiophilepure

https://www.stereophile.com/content/marten-mingus-septet-statement-edition-loudspeaker

See open.qobuz.com/playlist/21395182. I listened to several tracks including “Bass at 100 M.P.H.” by Bassotronics and “Chameleon” by Trentemøller. Tom’s playlist lets you sample many different kinds of bass in different kinds of music. Musicians include The Chieftains with Sinead O’Connor, Rage Against the Machine, Bob Marley & the Wailers, Aretha Franklin, and the Rolling Stones.Footnote 4: Fun story. Akbar Kahn founded the Ali Akbar College of Music in San Francisco in 1967 and became an important fixture in the San Francisco cultural scene. In 1974, Zakir Hussain (the leader on Making Music, who at the time was living in Mickey Hart’s Marin County barn) met up for dinner with John McLaughlin at Ali Akbar Kahn’s San Francisco home. They brought their instruments. McLaughlin later said that after five minutes, it seemed like they’d been playing together for decades. It was the core of what would soon become the band Shakti, which fused the music of northern and southern India with Jazz.

https://www.audiophilia.com/reviews/2026/2/28/allnic-audio-asra-rhpa-7500-headphone-amplifier

Returning to civility, I spent some time streaming the Tatrai Quartet’s legendary Haydn cycle on Hungaroton. I focused on “The Lark” from the 1986 set Six String Quartets, Op. 64 (Hungaroton, 1986), which I also have on CD. String quartets can be a litmus test for a hi-fi system. Four string players in a room, simple recording with nowhere to hide. These Tatrai recordings sound fine with the PS Audio Stellar Strata Mk2, but came to life with the Allnic. While soundstage depth was similarly wide, depth expanded dramatically with the Allnic. The real magic was in the timbre. Closing my eyes, the realism was beyond what I’ve experienced with solid-state amplification. 

Many of my listening impressions of the RHPA-7500 were consistent for both headphone and speaker listening. One example I particularly appreciated was that turning up the volume resulted in the musical presentation becoming larger rather than just feeling louder. Not only is this phenomenon enjoyable in itself, but it is an illustration of how the Allnic is just as easy to listen to at higher levels as it is at moderate levels. And considering I was not using efficient speakers, it indicated to me modest power rating of 10-20 watts goes a long way. 

https://www.soundstageultra.com/index.php/equipment-menu/1308-pmc-mb2-se-loudspeaker

While Rob, Ron, and I were setting up the M66, I made the mistake of fumbling with my phone as it was feeding a Rush song—I think it was “The Spirit of Radio”—to the M66 via Qobuz Connect. Somehow I made the M66 crank up to full volume. That’s 700 hard-core, solid-state watts. I almost shat myself. It was insanely loud, the loudest thing ever. Jet-engine-at-close-range, air-raid-siren loud. The right woofer bonked into its stops with a sharp crack. It only took a couple of seconds for me to fumble the volume back down, but I thought for sure I’d destroyed the MB2s.

I thought back to something Doug Schneider had told me. PMC co-founder Peter Thomas had worked in the BBC’s R&D department, and one of his duties was to evaluate all of the professional monitors on the market. This involved testing many to the point of destruction to find their limits. If indeed I had smoked the MB2s, I hoped Peter and his son Oliver Thomas, who’s co-CEO along with Tom Loader (son of PMC’s other co-founder, Adrian Loader), would cut me some slack . . .

https://www.audiophilia.com/reviews/2025/3/3/infigo-1

We do not have to deal with such complex issues when emailing a simple PDF document. But imagine that if, in real-time, as the PDF document file travels to you bit-by-bit, you had to read it immediately sentence by sentence; then, you would need the arriving order of the sentences/words to be correct; the order of the incoming bits would be crucial.

With that in mind, I present here a review of a unique, high-end music server: the Infigo Audio IS-1 Streamer Cryogen version (USD 8750). It is the higher end of two IS-1 models, the other is called the Signature (USD 6250) (no Roon, less functionality than the Cryo). The Cryogen model has a Roon Core, 2TB of internal SSD for a music library, and a cryogen-treated USB output port, among other things.

https://www.enjoythemusic.com/magazine/equipment/0900/md811.htm

One of the joys of life is to experience a soundstage through the fish-eye lens of a superb SE triode amp. The MD-811 certainly didn’t disappoint in this regard. Space expanded to fill the front of the listening room. It felt just like cinemascope did when I first experienced it at the movies as a small child. The Gestalt of being there is greatly enhanced by a solidly constructed soundstage, as it takes less imagination to make out the recording’s acoustic and in a real sense allows you to participate more intimately in the original event. Image outlines were palpably fleshed out with a satisfying 3-D perspective. No cardboard cutouts here. This was indeed imaging at its best.

The fit and finish of the WAVAC product lineup are superlative, as their designs simply qualify as beautiful artistic creations – a blend of modern and retro styling. In the case of the MD-811 you clearly have an integrated amplifier that I can confidently recommend: an absolutely gorgeous package that not only looks and feels divine, but also sounds great.

https://www.enjoythemusic.com/diy/0415/Bottlehead_Quicksand_Battery_Powered_Amplifier_Kit.htm

This has been a tough review to write and I’ve taken my time doing so. Bottlehead’s Quicksand is a unique product, superior to the low-end pre-manufactured Class D amplifiers I’ve worked with, but not competitive with (much more expensive) amplifiers that it was compared to. For a beginning DIYer, it’s a great amp, with good clarity, dynamics, and smooth sound, and an easy build. This amp is perfect for a higher-end portable setup, or for use with desktop speakers, or any time when low power requirements are needed and portability is important. There is plenty of room for modification, and I could see some users bringing up the quality level with tweaks to the headphone output configuration, power supply, and possible swapping out the input caps (though the compact size of the stock caps is helpful to keep noise down, on a Class D board). At the price point, the Quicksand is a good value, and is a very stylish way to run a portable or other system. The ratings below are on an absolute scale, so please remember that they are in the context of a very inexpensive amplifier as compared to cost-no-object designs.