Ryan Speakers S840 Loudspeakers $9995 Review
February 10, 2019 Comments Off on Ryan Speakers S840 Loudspeakers $9995 Review
“I’m not sure if you noticed (from the photos or not) that the speakers are also tilted back. This, according to Todd, was for perfect time alignment of the drivers. Since smaller drivers are in effect faster, they are positioned further back than the woofers. I thought this was just for looks! Ends up it, too has a specific purpose.
The rear of the speaker has 4 binding posts, which offers great versatility if one would were to bi-wire, or even bi-amp these speakers. I love when manufacturers offer such flexibility. I took full advantage, too, and tried both bi-wire, single wire (with jumpers), as well as bi-amping. Every time it offered better sound. If you are interested in reading up on the benefits of bi-wiring, there are plenty of articles online that you can use at your leisure. I can say that without a doubt—there is a minor sound quality increase when wiring the S840 in this fashion. There appears to be a better distinction of the highs versus the lows. The best thing is, you can graduate to this eventually with these speakers being so versatile. I also opted to bi-amp using identical amplifiers which even then took it to a whole new level. These speakers are quite efficient however so bi-amping is definitely not necessary, but if you, for example, prefer tube sound on the highs and solid state on the lows, you can satiate that desire quite easily here.”
Roon Launches Biggest Update Yet
February 9, 2019 Comments Off on Roon Launches Biggest Update Yet
“The software update also provides access to Qobuz’s entire music catalog, including uncompressed high-resolution tracks, and integrates that content with Roon’s metadata for an enhanced listening experience. Users can seamlessly sync Roon and Qobuz collections to replace “lossy” content with lossless versions from Qobuz.
Finally, the Version 1.6 update gives Roon a “fresh new look” and makes the software “easier and more fun to use than ever.”In addition to showing a high-resolution image of the selected artist, the Now Playing screen displays lyrics in real-time along with streaming resolution, credits, biographical information on the artist, and even a review.”
GOLD NOTE PIANOSA TURNTABLE WITH B-5.1 TONEARM
February 9, 2019 Comments Off on GOLD NOTE PIANOSA TURNTABLE WITH B-5.1 TONEARM
“I did find myself more drawn to the classical and jazz ends of my record collection and possibly slightly further from the selection of angular, spiky sounding music from the 1980s. I don’t play records by The Fall that often anymore, but I suddenly felt the need to play ‘Hip Priest’ from Hex Enduction Hour[Kamera] to get that full-on post-punk weirdness, and it showed what the Pianosa does well, and not so well. The random twists and turns of Mark E Smith’s drawl demand endless dynamic range (he often sounded like someone having a psychotic episode being thrown down a fire escape) and the Pianosa does surprisingly well in that respect, but it simply cannot paint the sheer bleakness required. Instead, the Pianosa finds the nice sounds and the happy place where possible, and with The Fall, there is no happy place.”
SVS SB-2000 Subwoofer Review
February 9, 2019 Comments Off on SVS SB-2000 Subwoofer Review
“So, why does SVS make both sealed and ported versions and which should you choose? I’m sure I will get lots of comments on this, but in my opinion if you are creating a surround sound system predominantly for gaming, movies, and TV watching, you might prefer the punchier punch and thumpier thump of a ported enclosure, but if you prioritize music over explosions and bullets and such, one might prefer the slightly “tighter” sounding sealed version. This is not to say a ported enclosure can’t faithfully reproduce music and a sealed box can’t provide an impactful surround sound theater experience–just that these are the main sonic differences between the two and in the specific case of the PB-2000 and SB-2000, there is the size and weight difference noted above as well. For the two room sizes I auditioned these in, I slightly preferred the SB-2000, and while I didn’t have two of them to try, I have every reason to believe spreading out the coverage with two SB-2000 would be absolutely amazing. In case you were wondering, my main home theater is 30 feet by 26 feet with 14-foot ceilings, and my secondary room is 14 feet by 12 feet, with 12-foot ceilings.”
HIFIMAN R2R2000 HD STREAMING DAC $2,500 REVIEW
February 8, 2019 Comments Off on HIFIMAN R2R2000 HD STREAMING DAC $2,500 REVIEW
“Getting away from a generic Android operating system is a real plus. The player responds to touch faster than the Android based players I’ve used. This was surely more expensive to offer, but I think the performance dividends are obvious when you use it.
At $2500, buyers should expect a lot, and sound-wise it is all there. Is it 2.5 times as good as a $1000 DAP? Probably not. But if you want to squeeze the last ounce of performance out of a portable player, and you want a beautiful compact design, you’d do well to consider the HiFiMAN R2R2000.”
Sonos Amp Streaming Amplifier $599 Review
February 8, 2019 Comments Off on Sonos Amp Streaming Amplifier $599 Review
“While the new Sonos Amp doesn’t include wire strippers or a microwave oven (it does come with those cool thumbscrew banana plugs, though), it most certainly is the Swiss Army knife-equivalent in the Sonos product line. I couldn’t test all of the possible configurations, but one thing I discovered immediately was that, for two-channel audio, the Sonos Amp is definitely a ballsy powerhouse. It had more than enough “oomph” to convey the strong bass lines in both Benny Blanco’s “Eastside (with Halsey & Khalid)” and Charlie Puth’s “The Way I Am” without losing any punch. At the same time, the vocals and guitar interplay in the unadorned, acoustic version of Lotte’s “Auf beiden Beinen (Akustik Version)” showed the Amp’s delicate side. I heard a total absence of coloration, along with a beautiful sense of space, on both the melodic, laid back “The Windmills of Your Mind” by Triple Standard and the more boisterous, live version of “Juste One P’tite Nuite” by Canadian band Les Colocs.”
Metaxas Marquis headphone amplifier review
February 8, 2019 Comments Off on Metaxas Marquis headphone amplifier review
“The Marquis provides enough power for full-size cans such as HD800S, which has 300 OHM value. Having only a single ended output should not be a negative matter, since it sounds better than most amplifiers that offer 4 pin XLR balanced outputs
Aforementioned above, the Marquis can be also used as a preamplifier. A set of quality RCA outputs is a good option for audio lovers who also own a stereo system including a power amplifier or active speakers.”
EMM Labs MTRX2 Mono Amplifiers $85,000 Review
February 7, 2019 Comments Off on EMM Labs MTRX2 Mono Amplifiers $85,000 Review
“A recent discovery I’ve made through Tidal is the singer Chlara’s Evo Sessions (24/96 FLAC/MQA, Evolution Media/Tidal). It’s a very spare, pure-sounding recording of, I believe, only acoustic instruments. Chlara does a beautiful job on track 9, Cat Stevens’s “Wild World” — mostly because of her earnest and achingly sweet voice, which is pristinely recorded and placed solidly at center stage. Such a recording shows exactly why the MTRX2 can be considered a gentle giant. Sitting on the floor, a pair of them are imposing — some might even think them brutish because of their big, boxy looks. But powering the Revel Ultima2 Salon2s, they reproduced Chlara’s voice with the utmost delicacy and refinement. The sound had an airy, light quality you wouldn’t necessarily expect from such big solid-state mono amps — at least if you’re an old-school thinker who believes that high power and high refinement can’t coexist. Yet her voice also had a sense of urgency — I could feel even her subtlest inflections of note and word, as if she were singing to me in real life. This was even more apparent with “This Love,” which has a livelier, jazzier feel. I don’t like the song nearly as much as “Wild World,” but the EMMs and Revels reproduced her voice with such immediacy and purity that I could only sit and listen, and not criticize — I was captivated by how realistically and natural Chlara sounded.
Having heard that quality of reproduction of a woman’s voice, I turned to a male singer: Adam Cohen, and his album We Go Home (16/44.1 WAV, Cooking Vinyl). I played the entire album straight through, so engrossed was I with what was coming out of the Salon2s. Immediately afterward, what popped to mind was how well Cohen’s voice had been conveyed — the EMMs’ velvet-smooth sound and sky-high resolution made it sound so authentic. The next thing that came to mind was that I knew, deep down, that it was this sound’s inherent rightness that had compelled me to listen to the entire album and not think of skipping to another track or album. What rightness in music reproduction means exactly is difficult or impossible to put into words. It’s easier to say that it’s something you experience, and that you know it when you hear it — not unlike looking at a great painting and having the image take your breath away, but without being able to explain exactly why.”
Why Sony Is Launching a Hi-Res Streaming Service in Japan
February 7, 2019 Comments Off on Why Sony Is Launching a Hi-Res Streaming Service in Japan
“Sony Music Entertainment Japan — which is under the Sony Corporation umbrella but operates independently from the U.S.-based Sony Music Entertainment — will offer subscriptions to Mora Qualitas for 1,980 Yen ($17.50) a month starting in early 2019 as a streaming component to its existing high-res music download store called Mora. The new service will run off of Rhapsody’s “Powered by Napster” platform, which provides systems, tools and APIs and will deliver lossless music at 24-bit/44.1-96khz (high-resolution) and 16-bit/44.1khz (CD quality). While global industry leader Spotify launched in Japan in 2016, Sony and Rhapsody executives say they expect Mora Qualitas to appeal to a different class of consumer: diehard music fans who want a deeper, richer experience than the norm.”
Focal Elegia $900 Review
February 7, 2019 Comments Off on Focal Elegia $900 Review
“Switching over to the A&K SR15 and its Quad-core CPU, Cirrus Logic Dual-DAC CS43198 and MasterHIFI chipsets the difference between the iPhone and the SR15’s DAC/amp and processing power was immediately laid bare. Bass weight and impact, dynamic response, transient speed, midrange detail, upper frequency extension, decay off notes, spatial separation of instruments – all of these improved by an order of magnitude. Hope’s playing on “Adagio for Violin…” suddenly seemed to come to life with timbral and tonal color through the Elegia where before things lacked similar punch and just as importantly – real depth to the sound stage, shedding it’s 3D compression that was nascent on the iPhone. High-res PCM or DSD (DSD to PCM conversion on-the-fly) files I listened to through the &norma added further to the little DAP’s impact, showing off the Focal’s transparency to source and its ability to easily translate differences in DAC, file type or codec-processing capabilities.
Moving over to the MacBook Air using Roon through the Naim DAC-V1 which is packed with a 40-bit SHARC DSP chipset, single-ended Class-A head amp and 24/384 synchronous USB input, the Elegia took the change-up in stride and gave me even more of what I was hearing through the SR15 with further perceived dynamic range at frequency extremes (coming across as deeper, more fleshed-out bass and more air around instruments and vocals reaching into the upper registers). Through the Naim the Elegia further cemented its ability to deliver emotional playback without a hint of digital artifice: something that became increasingly noticeable as I climbed the price/performance ladder during this review and the headphones delivered exactly what they were being fed from each distinct source. Where the SR15 had a slightly brighter treble-region presentation and leaner, more forward spatial imaging, the V1 added midrange pop and heft.”
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