AURENDER A10 STREAMER/SERVER $5,500 REVIEW
January 16, 2018 Comments Off on AURENDER A10 STREAMER/SERVER $5,500 REVIEW
“The A10 is a sophisticated product that makes enjoying music simple. It is a true reference level piece. For the Headphone Aficionado, it may be the missing piece to a system that is reference but does not require a desk full of gear and a tangle of expensive cables. The A10 performed beautifully with open and closed cans, Planar Magnetic, Dynamic, whatever I paired with it and for you two-channel speaker users it also worked perfectly as a Pre-amp with my amp and speakers. It has an excellent DAC. It can replace several items in your system in one beautiful box. What’s not to like? Highly Recommended!”

Questyle Audio CMA400i DAC with Headphone AMP Review
January 15, 2018 Comments Off on Questyle Audio CMA400i DAC with Headphone AMP Review
“The Questyle Audio CMA400i is a modestly priced powerhouse of a device that will take you far with your headphone dreams. It will also play well with others in your system as a standalone DAC—playing all types of digital files—and as a preamplifier. I’ve heard other superb headphone amplifiers (tube and solid state) costing more from Woo Audio [WA7 Firefly] and costing far more, the Cypher Labs Prautes, and while the Questyle can’t quite match the Prautes for luxurious musical delivery, it’s pretty damn close. And it comes with other tricks, too. Highly recommended. ”


Wilson Audio Alexia Series 2 Loudspeakers $57,900 Review
January 14, 2018 Comments Off on Wilson Audio Alexia Series 2 Loudspeakers $57,900 Review
“I have a theory that we audiophiles love soundstaging and dimension so much because we are innately such visual creatures with a cultivated vocabulary for measuring and pointing in space. If you want to appreciate how adept is the human hearing system at sonic location, listen to the Alexia Series 2. There’s a lot to be said for proper timing and wave form preservation but talk stops when the Alexia’s play. Thanks to keen driver positioning and improved coherence, dimensional performers appeared before me in aural space with a newly heard definition; soloists more often appeared in bas-relief than as cardboard cutouts. From cavernous symphonic halls to intimate churches to near dead recording studios, venue context became easily heard. Everything was more transparent. I experienced genuine improvement in midrange and low frequency attack and decay. Notes stopped. New notes began.”

ACOUSTIC RESEARCH AR-M2 REVIEW
January 13, 2018 Comments Off on ACOUSTIC RESEARCH AR-M2 REVIEW
“The use of a Class A headphone amplifier means the player has some serious power to give and is capable of driving about anything you are able to throw at it, however, this comes at a cost meaning the noise floor isn’t pitch black with sensitive earphones.”

Vivid Audio Giya G1 Spirit loudspeaker Review
January 13, 2018 Comments Off on Vivid Audio Giya G1 Spirit loudspeaker Review
“After all that, in the weeks following O’Hanlon’s visit, I continued to fine-tune the Spirits’ positions and toe-in angles. Bass was the way I like it. Tonality was spot-on and very realistic, but I was looking for the optimal balance between razor-sharp depiction and soundstage size and depth. My quest ended with a magnificently big sound but not the tightest imaging. Instruments and voices still hung in space as they should, but each was more rounded and slightly more diffuse than the images produced by my MartinLogans electrostatics. This was not necessarily a bad thing.”
Read more at https://www.stereophile.com/content/vivid-audio-giya-g1-spirit-loudspeaker-page-2#ZRVRMvT9aZu4KfVy.99

TAD ME1 Loudspeaker $12,495 Review
January 12, 2018 Comments Off on TAD ME1 Loudspeaker $12,495 Review
“The ME1 has very few obvious drawbacks, and its shortcomings are mostly attributable to the limits of its modest dimensions. However, its top-end still retains some residual dryness, and can’t quite summon up the same velvety harmonics of the CR1 or the barn-storming macro-dynamics of the CE1. In spite of the stellar imaging I’ve written about, soundstage width and depth were only adequate in my smallish listening space. But I’d imagine better results could be had in larger rooms. Finally I can understand how some listeners might not cotton to the sharp specificity of a concentric driver. The precision with which it draws boundaries around images seems natural to me, but it may seem mechanical to others.”

Aurum Cantus V30 M Review
January 12, 2018 Comments Off on Aurum Cantus V30 M Review
“I started this review by mentioning that affordable products usually do not have high end allure, but Aurum Cantus takes a good stab at rewriting these rules. The V30Ms are beautifully sculpted and truly luxurious looking speakers indeed. They sound solid and assured, yet highly refined. Star of the show for me is the ribbon tweeter which sounds delicate and airy and well resolved. Surprising too is the amount of bass that these standmounts produce and inbetween is a warm and relaxed midrange. The V30M’s sound much larger than they are, and can play really loud too.”

Audeze LCDi4 In-Ear Monitors $2495 Review
January 11, 2018 Comments Off on Audeze LCDi4 In-Ear Monitors $2495 Review
“The LCDi4 delivers high-performance audiophile-grade sound you can take anywhere, and with its friendly 105dB sensitivity can be driven (to reasonable levels) by anything from a lowly smartphone on up to a top-tier headphone amp. In short, it’s hard to imagine a more satisfying and habit-forming in-ear experience.”

Bryston 3B, 4B and 14B “Cubed” power amplifiers Review
January 11, 2018 Comments Off on Bryston 3B, 4B and 14B “Cubed” power amplifiers Review
“The 4B Cubed is more sonorous and tonally fuller than the old 3B ST, with a richer timbre. It is also more relaxed and has a more bloomy midrange, which makes it very forgiving in spite of its high resolution. The 4B Cubed might seem like overkill but it makes the Centaurs’ relatively humble woofer produce deeper bass than ever before. Importantly, although the Centaurs are really revealing in the treble, they portrayed nothing but pure, sweet treble from the 4B Cubed.”

Pass Labs XA25 amplifier $4,900 Review
January 10, 2018 Comments Off on Pass Labs XA25 amplifier $4,900 Review
“Priced at $4,900 or £4,000, the XA25 is the most affordable of Pass Labs’ power amps. If you’re an audiophile looking for your next amp, is 25 watts enough? Sure, it’s easy to err on the side of more watts, but what will you be missing in terms of clarity? Sometimes less turns out to be more. ”

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