Dynaudio Contour 30i loudspeaker $9500 Review
September 22, 2024 Comments Off on Dynaudio Contour 30i loudspeaker $9500 Review
https://www.stereophile.com/content/dynaudio-contour-30i-loudspeaker
The Contours sounded impeccably well-designed, built to exacting standards. You can hear this in a few ways: its symmetrical, single-voice cohesion; its colorful transparency; its authentic-seeming tonality; its dynamic ambience; its orderly and clean disposition. It was, in many ways, reminiscent of my time in Denmark.
After that first five-second high had leveled off into a sustained phase of euphoric well-being, I thought, This is why better sound is worth it. Because it proved again that the farther we can hear into the performance, the more it has the power to touch us. That’s the fundamental premise on which our hobby is built. It would also seem to have been the fundamental premise on which the 30i was built.

Monitor Audio Gold 300 6G Loudspeaker $5599 Review
September 20, 2024 Comments Off on Monitor Audio Gold 300 6G Loudspeaker $5599 Review
The Monitor Audio Gold 300 6G is a most capable, highly refined loudspeaker. It is neutral and transparent, revealing the subtlest recorded detail (and any upstream change to equipment and interconnects). It is fast and dynamic, and it is honest, adding neither warmth nor color to recordings. Given its neutrality and transparency, the Gold 300 6G would be a good match to a ruler-flat front end. I’d be reluctant to pair it with brighter components, though. All told, the Monitor Audio Gold 300 6G is a high-performance loudspeaker that lives up to its gold-standard pedigree.

PS Audio FR10 Loudspeaker Review
September 18, 2024 Comments Off on PS Audio FR10 Loudspeaker Review
B&W 702 S3 Signature £7000 Review
September 15, 2024 Comments Off on B&W 702 S3 Signature £7000 Review
https://www.hifinews.com/content/bw-702-s3-signature
Switch to ‘The Smoke’, however, and the performance was more about unpicking the track’s many layers. There was a great sense of resolution noticeable in small details, such as Yorke’s voice reverberating into space and in the intricacies of the bass playing that carries this song.
Gritty guitars? On ‘Thin Thing’ these were enjoyably crunchy – perhaps a strange adjective but one that fits perfectly with Greenwood’s particular mix of distortion pedals. The speakers impressed here with their drive and power, but their strongest moments were with the more dreamlike tracks on this album where they showed off an ability to envelop, seeming to discover new details even in familiar songs.

Burmester B38 Review
September 13, 2024 Comments Off on Burmester B38 Review
https://www.hifinews.com/content/burmester-b38
Listening to the B38, I was reminded of that famous commercial from Heineken about refreshing the parts that other beers cannot reach. The impact of this speaker’s 32cm woofer – unusually large for even a floorstander at this price – is immediately noticeable, delivering a bass performance with real extension, plus grip and control. Coupled to succinct, clean highs from the AMT tweeter, the resulting sound has plenty of dynamism, and the voicing shows no desire to add extra warmth to what’s already on the track. There’s energy and liveliness; a direct feel to the sound that’s simpatico with the loudspeaker’s physical style.
It’s a performance that worked wonders with Daft Punk’s ‘Da Funk’ [Homework; Parlophone CDV 2821], which begins with a deep, propulsive electronic bassline and rat-a-tat percussion underpinned by a thudding kick drum. Each element landed with rapid attack and decay, the space between beats making it easy to latch on to its nightclub groove. Furthermore, even at a listening level that could be described as anti-social, the B38 didn’t lose its clean, composed nature.


SW1X Lady Pearl Horn Loudspeaker First Impressions
September 13, 2024 Comments Off on SW1X Lady Pearl Horn Loudspeaker First Impressions
Wilson Audio WAMM Master Chronosonic Review
September 12, 2024 Comments Off on Wilson Audio WAMM Master Chronosonic Review
WAMM is my Mount Everest of loudspeakers, capable of presenting an entire symphonic orchestra or an acoustic singer / songwriter on stage right in one’s listening room. I often couldn’t believe what I was hearing when listening to music I know very well. The separation of musicians and instruments was likely the most amazing aspect of what I heard. It was the exact opposite of an entire orchestra that emanates from two loudspeakers. The WAMM’s presentation made Stravinsky Conducts Le Sacre du Printemps (Columbia Symphony Orchestra) sound like there was a loudspeaker for each musician on stage. The separation was mind blowing, and the entire performance retained amazing delicacy, transients, and musical engagement like I’d never experience.
I didn’t set out to write about this listening experience, but the more I listened to the WAMM Master Chronosonic the more I thought I had to at least share a little bit of what I heard with everyone who may never get the opportunity. Only 70 pairs of WAMM Master Chronosonic loudspeakers will ever be built, and the cost is certainly prohibitive for most people, including myself. I have to thank The Audio Salon in Santa Monica, CA for enabling this bucket list audio experience. The WAMM Master Chronosonic checks an item off my bucket list, and checks absolutely every sonic box imaginable for those of us who love music.

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