Audiophilepure

https://pt.audio/2026/04/25/starke-sound-brev-sw15-subwoofer-review

The question becomes this: are these state-of-the-art speakers systems finally getting it right? Have I been listening for the wrong thing? I thought about this during my first listening sessions with the Starke Sound SW15. Will the SW15 get it right/wrong? Or will the SW15 get it wrong/right? Well, the Starke Sound SW15 fell into the later camp, with the second drum beat deeper and more impressive. I thought I had an answer to this–has my view of the Yulunga Test changed because I’m using more grounding and noise suppression and power conditioning and that lower noise floor is the reason for the changing perspective? That was easy to find out, of course, by unplugging all those devices and listening again. Despite the fact that my entire system dropped down a notch of three in overall sound quality without this gear in the chain, the Starke Sound SW15 still delivered more impact on that second beat, and until I figure this out completely I’m going to move onto the next demo track, which is the title track from Radiohead’s Kid A.

There’s no doubt this is heavy electronica, but there are some synthesizer bass passages that just seem to dive underneath your floorboards and surface right underneath your listening chair like Esther Williams. The test, however is this: are those beats pronounced and full, or are they down a few dB? If your speaker doesn’t hit at least 50 Hz, those beats might actually disappear. It’s also common for a lesser transducer to make those beats sound slightly distorted and sloppy. With the Starke Sound SW15 and the Acoras, those notes are deep and round and full and clear. I’ve heard a little more decay with far more costly speaker systems, and perhaps more of those subtle textures and shadings that I look for in the Yulunga Test, but this is the first time I’m compelled to remind everyone of the price here.

https://pt.audio/2026/02/13/equitech-model-2rq-tvti-balanced-power-system-review/

I realize it’s hard to discuss the importance of power management–so many audiophiles I know use nothing at all and they’re perfectly happy. But once you experience your hi-fi through a balanced power system, it’s very hard to return to the way things once were. (That goes for adequate grounding as well.) The Equi=Tech made that painfully aware once I took it out of the system. Can I survive with my normal complement of earthing devices and noise suppression and power conditioning? I can, but with one caveat: the Equi=Tech seemed to supplant many of those products in one box. I can describe that as downright economical, in fact. The comparisons between the Model 2RQ and nothing at all, however, were shockingly obvious, more than any other single power management device I’ve used in the past.

It’s rather industrial looking, downright utilitarian, especially when compared to other power management devices that are built to look like $50K power amplifiers, but that suggests the seriousness of this product and that it’s manufactured for people who know when something works and when it’s not pulling its own weight. (Besides, I still put my power management products behind the rack, so who cares.) My conclusion is that I’ve yet to try another power management product that gets the job done in such a convincing manner. Plus, it’s not ridiculously priced compared to some of the high-end competition out there.

https://www.audiophilia.com/reviews/2026/3/28/ella-fitzgerald-sings-the-rodgers-and-hart-song-bookverve-acoustic-sounds-series-vinyl-reissue-2026

And when she phrases masterpieces like “Have You Met Miss Jones?”, “The Lady Is a Tramp”, “Spring Is Here”, “It Never Entered My Mind”, “My Romance”, and my personal favourite, “I Could Write a Book”, it’s breathtakingly musical. Check the track listing for your own favourites.

Buddy Bregman did the arrangements, and they fit the songs perfectly. They’re not Riddle-style swingers, but they match Ella’s style and sentiment beautifully. The personnel reads like a who’s who of L.A. studio royalty, including Harry “Sweets” Edison, Maynard Ferguson, and Pete Candoli on trumpets; Benny Carter and Ben Webster on saxes; and a rhythm section featuring Herb Ellis (guitar), Ray Brown (bass), and Alvin Stoller (drums), plus a full string section.

https://www.analogplanet.com/content/wilson-benesch-greenwich-turntable

As for the OMEGA Direct Drive motor, it was developed specifically for the GMT platform by way of a collaborative research programme involving Wilson Benesch engineers and academic partners from Sheffield Hallam University. The OMEGA employs a slot-less synchronous motor with a circumjacent radial force architecture, said to eliminate cogging and reduce torque ripple to “extremely” low levels. Its design is intended to deliver “smooth, stable” platter rotation without the noise and vibration associated with conventional belt, idler, or traditional direct-drive systems.

The 15in (diameter) motor incorporates 21 precision-wound coils and 14 NdFeB magnets, arranged to create a uniform magnetic field that governs rotor synchronicity without requiring complex speed compensation. A magnetic counterforce system reduces the effective dynamic mass acting on the Angstrom bearing. This is said to ensure Hertzian contact forces will remain “within safe limits” while allowing efficient energy transfer from the motor to the platter and surrounding structure.

The Piccolo Zero head-amp is designed to increase gain from a low output moving coil cartridge and feed its output signal into a phono stage that is intended to be paired with a cartridge that has an output level in the range of 3 to 5 mV, which is what you have with a typical moving magnet cartridge. This is the type of cartridge the Cornet MM is designed for, so to use a low output moving coil cartridge you need a step up device, whether it be a head amp like the Piccolo, a step up transformer, or a trans-impedance device like the Piccolo Zero. A standard head amp or a step up transformer requires matching between the cartridge’s internal impedance and its resistive load. Without getting into deep math, a trans-impedance head amp is a 0 ohm load circuit that operates a cartridge in current mode and does not rely on external resistive load. This design is best suited for cartridges with lower internal impedance, with single digit impedance levels being more desirable. Internal impedance times the cartridge output voltage equals output gain of the cartridge/head-amp combination. As an example an Ortofon X40 cartridge has an internal resistance of 4 ohms and .4 mV output voltage and is a solid choice over a Denon DL103 which has a 40 ohm internal resistance and .25 mV output voltage. While a trans-impedance head amplifier has a smaller pool of cartridges that are compatible with it, there are benefits beyond negating the process of getting the correct resistive load for the cartridge and phono circuit. One event that is not often discussed is dynamic braking. Dynamic braking stiffens the cartridge assembly at higher frequencies and the result is the diamond maintains improved contact with groove walls and results in less tracking errors.

When designing a speaker with a strong focus on coherence, the assumption might be that the best position for the woofer would be as close to the midrange as possible. However, as Ivo explained, the speakers behave much more predictably across a wide range of rooms when the woofer is positioned near the floor. This is because room modes become twice as severe with equal wall distances, and if a woofer is placed at the top (where the midrange and treble need to be to produce the proper stage height), it’s also almost halfway up the room’s height. Thus, it would excite far more severe room modes in that position than if it were vertically asymmetrical. Careful attention was paid to the crossover and the speaker’s phase behavior. To time-align the drivers relative to the listening position, the midrange and tweeter are positioned farther back than the woofer. To accommodate various seating heights and listening distances, the rear spike is height-adjustable.

According to Aequo Audio, the Ensium’s maximum linear output is higher than that of a typical dual-10-inch closed-cabinet speaker or even a triple-9-inch ported speaker, and in practice, more comparable to a closed-cabinet speaker with three 10-inch bass drivers. While it’s tempting to take such claims with a grain of salt, I can confirm that the bass does actually dive right down into what’s normally considered subwoofer territory with utter authority. The Ensium is specified at an absolutely ludicrous 16 Hz – 45 kHz (-3 dB in-room response), with a nominal impedance of 8 ohms.