Audiophilepure

https://www.soundstagehifi.com/index.php/reference-components/1865-recommended-reference-component-dali-epikore-11-loudspeaker

Jason’s lavish praise for the Epikore 11 culminates on a humorous note at the end: “The Epikore 11 is so highly recommended it’s just not funny.” No other DALI speaker has been reviewed quite as enthusiastically as the Epikore 11, which easily earned it our Reviewers’ Choice award. Other DALI speakers have earned this award in the past, but the Epikore 11 is the first to also receive our Recommended Reference Component award.

I have used the Hifiman Serenade in multiple setups in my office as well as in my living room setup. I have mostly used it with R2R technology DACs such as the Musician Audio Pegasus and Aquarius. I mostly used the balanced inputs on the back, in combination with both the single-ended as well as balanced outputs of this amplifier. Unless specifically mentioned, the in and out connections used for this review are the balanced ones.

I have used a whole series of easy and hard to drive headphones with different driver types. The most used headphones are the Hifiman HE-1000, the Susvara, the HD 800S, the RAAL 1995 Immanis, the ZMF Caldera Closed, the DCA’s, the JPSLabs Diana MR and the original Audeze LCD-2.1 which I just refurbished. We’ll get into the synergy with these headphones later in this article, but it’s safe to say that the Prelude can drive all of these with ease.

I have had the pleasure of testing some of their cartridges over the past and having known Hiroshi Ishihara for many years. He always strives for perfection when it comes to the products he takes under his wing.

The Umami Blue cartridge sits in an interesting price range between the lower and higher-end Hana cartridge models, but as you have already read in the music section, this splendid Hana cartridge delivers the music in abundance and more importantly, like all Hana cartridges, with the punch well above its given price.