Innholdsfortegnelse for May - June 2017 i Australian HiFi

I bought a pair of ear-buds the other day. They sounded awful. I guess I shouldn’t have been surprised, because I paid only $12 for them. At this point you’d be justified in wondering why the editor of a prestigious specialist audio magazine would be buying a pair of $12 ear-buds. It’s not a long story. I was heading to Melbourne and on the way to the airport realised that I had left my noise-cancelling headphones at home. This was bad enough, because I like using noise-cancelling to cut out the noise during flight, even for a hop as short as Sydney–Melbourne. But the other problem was that I was conducting an interview, and needed headphones to monitor the sound, then help with transcription on the flight back. As I…

British manufacturer Sugden has released a monobloc Class-A power amplifier to mark its 50th anniversary. Dubbed the ‘Grande’, the new amplifier uses pure Class-A circuitry in floating bridged mode. ‘The amplifier circuit is best described as an instrumentation-quality, Class-A, floating bridge design that’s d.c.-coupled with current feedback and includes full output stage protection,’ said George Neophytou, of Neophonics, which distributes Sugden in Australia. Each Sugden Grande has a custom-designed 430W mains transformer with four separate windings and the power supplies to the floating bridge output stage are smoothed by two specially-developed audio-grade capacitors, having a combined capacitance of 40,000µF. The output stage uses 12 output devices, each with a current rating of 17-amps for a claimed power output of 100-watts into 8 and 190-watts into 4 .The amplifier’s input stage…

Convoy International has been appointed as the sole Australian distributor for IsoAcoustics isolation products. ‘IsoAcoustics has been supplying its patented designs to the professional audio and consumer markets since 2012, during which time it has amassed an impressive number of industry awards and accolades for its ability to deliver dramatically improved sonic performance and its exceptional build quality,’ said Geoff Matthews, Managing Director of Convoy International. ‘When we first experienced how IsoAcoustics isolators could transform the performance of our favourite speakers, we could hardly believe our ears,’ he said. ‘We’re truly delighted to be offering this exceptional product range to the Australian market.’ Convoy will be offering two core ranges of IsoAcoustics isolation stands, known as the ‘Aperta’ Series and the ‘Gaia’ Series. The Gaia isolators are machined isolation feet,…

Benchmark has released its new DAC3 digital-to-analogue converter, which features ESS Technologies’ ES9028PRO converter chip, which offers active THD compensation. The new DAC3 builds on the previous DAC2. It maintains the same form factor and feature set as the DAC2, but adds the higher performance available from the new ES9028PRO D/A converter and also adds the following improvements: active 2nd harmonic compensation; active 3rd harmonic compensation; lower THD+N; lower passband ripple; improved frequency response; faster PLL lock times; and faster switching between input signals. The DAC3’s circuitry uses an advanced high-headroom digital filter design and a high-sample-rate asynchronous USB audio interface. All inputs are fully isolated from interface jitter by Benchmark’s latest ‘UltraLock3’ jitter attenuation system. Internal digital processing and conversion is 32-bits and this processing includes 3.5dB of headroom…

Marten’s Mingus Quintet speakers are now available at Melbourne’s newest hi-fi store, Sound Gallery. Sound Gallery might be new, but most audiophiles will recognise its owner, John Ong. The Marten Mingus Quintet is three-way, five-driver bass reflex design that uses three 178mm aluminium-sandwich coned bass drivers, a 127mm ceramic-dome midrange driver and a 20mm diamond dome tweeter. The midrange dome driver and tweeter in the Mingus Quintet are identical to those used in Marten’s flagship speaker, the Coltrane. The crossover, which is connected to the drivers using cabling from Swedish manufacturer Jorma Design, is a first-order type to ensure phase coherence with nominal crossover frequencies at 137Hz and 4kHz. As with all Marten speakers, the Mingus Quintets are designed and manufactured in Sweden. ‘The Mingus Quintet bridges Marten’s Heritage and…

They’re back—HiFI Man’s award-winning Edition X headphones been revamped in a ‘Version 2’, with the delightful side-effect of the Version 2 model being rather lower in price than the original. We had initially been told the changes were primarily aesthetic, but in fact they’re also ergonomic, with a more versatile headband for a better fit, thicker earpads with a much more pronounced angle front to back, a switch to polyester from velour (still with pleather) for the part which touches your head, and entirely new cables—where these were previously braided, the new cables seem almost medical in their translucent white (see accompanying photographs), so that you half expect a stethoscope to be on the end, instead of the 2.5mm microjack plugs that connect into each headshell. The first cable is…

The filters available for use vary depending on the conversion mode you choose (oversampling or not) and the input signal Qestyle is a newcomer to high-end audio, having been established only five years ago in Shenzhen, China, to build products based around a current mode circuit its founder Jason Wang (Wang Fengshuo) started developing while he was an electrical engineering student at university and only completed after graduation. The first product to use this concept was the CMA800 headphone amplifier, the forerunner of the CMA800Rs used in this Questyle Reference Golden Edition System. Why two headphone amplifiers? According to Wang, his thinking process was: ‘top power amplifiers are often designed as monoblocs to improve performance, so why not do the same for a headphone amplifier?’ Why not indeed? THE EQUIPMENT…

The room response of the Epicentrix Mk2 is very flat, extending from 70Hz to 10kHz (this last the upper graphing limit for this test—measured performance at higher frequencies is shown in Graph 2) within ±3dB. As you can see from the response measured by Newport Test Labs (shown in Graph 1) the speaker’s response is very linear, rising to the 90dBSPL point at around 170Hz after which there’s a very small (–3dB) suck-out centred at 500Hz, which rises to the 90dBSPL line at around 1.5kHz, after which it tracks out to nearly 6kHz before rolling off slightly. The high-frequency response of the Epicentrix Mk2 is shown in Graph 2, the traces for which were obtained via an extremely accurate, high-resolution gating technique that shows the response that would be obtained…

Klipsch has released three powered audio systems that use real wood veneers and tactile spun copper switches and knobs and can play music streamed from any Bluetoothequipped device. ‘The Klipsch Heritage Wireless series of powered audio systems blends the acoustics and classic design legacy of Paul W. Klipsch with the latest technologies available today,’ said Ralph Grundl, of Qualifi, which distributes Klipsch in Australia. The Klipsch One is a 2.1 bi-amplified stereo system that has two 57mm diameter full-range drivers and a 114mm bass driver. It uses Bluetooth 4.0, but also has a 3.5mm analog audio input. The rechargeable battery is claimed to be able to power the unit for up to eight hours. The Klipsch Three is a stereo tabletop system featuring two 57mm full-range drivers and a 133mm…

Audio-Technica has released a new cartridge, the VM510CB, which has a conical stylus and dual magnets. Audio-Technica says the advantage of a conical stylus over the newer, more advanced stylus shapes is that it’s always naturally positioned in the exact centre of the groove, even if the stylus and/or tonearm are slightly misaligned, which will always result in less record wear and almost always in improved performance. Conical styli are also less susceptible to groove damage and thus can usually play worn records more successfully than other stylus shapes. They’re also more tolerant of dust particles, so sound quieter when playing dirty LPs. However they do cause more wear on the groove than more advanced shapes (when those cartridges are correctly mounted) and are thus less well-suited for playing new…

When I was a youngster and an avid reader of Australian Hi-Fi, nearly every amplifier review contained, it seemed, a mini rant on the presence of a particular button fitted to the amp. Now, many years later, I find myself writing mini rants on what is essentially the same subject in most of my reviews of home theatre receivers. That control was the ‘Loudness’ control. These days that control is a great deal more sophisticated, thanks to digital signal processing technology, and goes under various names depending on the brand, such as Audyssey Dynamic EQ, Dolby Volume, YPAO Volume and so on. These do the intended job better than the ‘Loudness’ control and overcome some of the inevitable issues it had. But that kind of misses the point: all of…

Part of the AL32 processing involves up-scaling the original 16-bit 44.1kHz signals up to 32-bit/705.6kHz data Reviewers are supposed to reveal their biases and affiliations right up front. So I should reveal why I have always admired Denon as a company despite the fact that I have only ever owned two Denon products (a DL-103 phono cartridge and a step-up transformer for it) and have absolutely no affiliations with the company or its distributors. One reason for my admiration is that it’s very quietly one of the oldest audio companies in the world, having been established in 1910 to manufacture shellac records and the gramophones to play them. It was so successful at this that US record giant Columbia took a stake in the company in 1927. Denon then produced…

Newport Test Labs measured the frequency response of the Questyle CMA800P as extending from less than 1Hz to 69kHz ±0.5dB and from less than 1Hz to 110kHz –3dB. Across the audio band, the response was 20Hz to 20kHz ±0.1dB. Channel separation was more than 100dB right across the audio band, measuring 116dB at 20Hz and 1kHz and still an excellent 106dB at 20kHz. Channel balance was equally good, with the lab measuring 0.054dB at 1kHz. Distortion was extremely low, as you can see from Graph 2, with a second harmonic at –110dB (0.00031%), and second and third harmonics at around –115dB (0.00017%). A few other harmonics are visible above the noise floor, but they’re all more than 120dB (0.0001%) down. Overall THD+N, as shown in the tabulated results, was measured…

I discovered a major failing of the Torus AVR2 power conditioner the moment I tried to remove it from the double cardboard box in which it was delivered. It’s too heavy! Also, it does not have handles. A product that is this heavy (35kg) and this large (it measures 430mm wide by 200mm high by 490mm deep) really needs to be provided with handles—two as a minimum, and preferably four, so it becomes an easy two-person lift. I guess the only godsend was that I wasn’t reviewing the 20-amp version of the Torus AVR2, which is even bigger and, at 74kg, more than twice the weight! THE EQUIPMENT The Torus AVR2 (the AVR stands for Automatic Voltage Regulator) is a power conditioner that removes voltage spikes and high-frequency noise from…

When Ypsilon amplifier co-founder Demetris Backlavas (pictured above at left with the other co-founder, Theofanis Lagkadinos) met Australian turntable developer Mark Döhmann at CES it ignited a collaborative synergy—and an unbreakable personal bond—and it was analogue guru Michael Fremer who created the audio alchemy because it was he who insisted they meet. At first they thought it was a chance meeting through a mutual friend, nothing special, but looking back they both say that they now realise Michael Fremer was a sorcerer: He knew it would work. ‘The moment Mark and I met, we immediately knew we were on the same page. We were walking the same path in trying to advance audio reproduction closer to that of a real performance.’ Backlavas told me that he and Döhmann spent the…

Cyrus has released an app that allows you to control your Cyrus One amplifier using your phone or tablet. It’s free, but requires a firmware upgrade. The Cyrus One app can be downloaded now from the Apple Store or Google Play. To update the firmware on your Cyrus One, you need only a USB to mini-USB cable, plus software and instructions that you can download from Cyrus’s website. Alternatively, you can take your Cyrus One to any authorised Cyrus retailer and have them update it for you. You can obtain a list of authorised Cyrus retailers from the Australian distributor, Indi Imports. For further information, please contact Indi Imports on (03) 9416 7037 or visit the website at www.indimports.com…

Danish high-end manufacturer Densen has launched its Cast amplifier, which it says will be the first of a string of new products. Densen’s Cast amplifier is the first Densen product to allow streaming and does so by using Google’s ‘Cast’ audio technology. ‘This will allow for the use of Tidal, which has become the de facto standard for premium streaming, but it will also allow for a myriad of other streaming software,’ said Chris Strom, of Radiance Audio Visual, which distributes Densen in Australia. The new Cast amplifier is also one of the smallest products in Densen’s range, being the first product in Densen’s ‘Dino’ range, all of which are half the size of previous Densen products. ‘Densen has for years been working on streaming solutions, during which it realised…

Audio Research has released an update kit for its DAC8 to make it Apple-friendly, and completely compatible with all current Apple operating systems. Available now, the update includes a new board, wires, connectors and internal firmware updates that makes the Audio Research DAC8 compatible with all current Apple operating systems. If you are currently using an older Apple laptop or Mac Mini with your DAC8, this update will be necessary for the DAC8 to work properly with a newer Apple product. If you are interested in having your DAC8 updated to be Apple compatible, please contact your Audio Research dealer or the Australian distributor, Synergy Audio Visual, on (03) 9459 7474 or visit the website at www.synergyaudio.com…

Tara Labs says it has built a cable specifically designed for audiophiles who crave musicality in their audio system’s sound performance. Matthew Bond, the Australian founder of Tara Labs, says: ‘Most audiophiles can be categorised into two main categories—those who crave to hear every detail possible of the musical instruments playing and those who want to close their eyes and imagine they are sitting right in the middle of a live orchestra, while the musicians play music around them. The Muse Series audio cables offer an opportunity for an audiophile to have it all.’ ‘Tara Labs’ 99.999999 per cent pure rectangular solid-core copper conductors are super-annealed, oxygen–free, mono-crystal, and frequency-tuned,’ said Boris Granovsky, of Absolute Hi End, which distributes Tara Labs in Australia. ‘The conductors are hand-polished and coated in…

The real wood veneers on my review sample were perfectly grain-matched and finished with a thin coat of cellulose lacquer for easy care… Harbeth’s well-known M30.1 or, to use its ‘posh’ name, the ‘Harbeth Monitor 3.1 Domestic’ actually has its sonic roots in a commercial studio monitor, the BBC LS5/9, which was designed by engineers at the British Broadcasting Corporation for monitoring the quality of the audio transmitted by the BBC’s radio and television stations. You might well ask why the BBC, with its (then) almost limitless technical resources (and money) at hand, bothered to design small monitor speakers at all. Strangely enough, the issue was the same one that continues to affect most modern consumers: cabinet size. The BBC did design many larger models—one excellent example being the LS5/8…

All measurements made on the DCD-2500NE SACD player were obtained using a standard Philips test CD (SBC-429) so all data was 16-bit/44.1kHz. Using this disc, Newport Test Labs measured distortion at 0dB recorded level, the results of which are shown in Graph 1. You can see that all distortion components are at or more than 100dB down (0.001% THD), so detailing the levels of the individual harmonics is essentially an exercise in technicalities, with the second harmonic coming in at –105dB (0.00056%), the third at –100dB (0.001%), the fourth at –120dB (0.0001%), the fifth at –113dB (0.00022%), the sixth at –135dB (0.00001%) and the seventh at –128dB (0.00003%). Obviously, the results at 0dB were excellent, but musical discs are not recorded at 0dB, because there needs to be some headroom…

So why don’t manufacturers offer correctly-matched centre-channel speakers? Want to know a dirty secret about multi-channel home theatre speaker systems? It’s that most of them are using the wrong centre-channel speaker: one that’s not a tonal match with the front-left and front-right loudspeakers. Let’s look at what’s required in a centre-channel speaker. In an ideal world, that speaker would be a perfect acoustic match for your main front left and right speakers. That is, it must be not only be made by the same manufacturer, but should also use exactly the same drivers as your main front speakers. And for best effect, it should actually have at least one additional driver, meaning that if your main speakers each have a bass/midrange driver and a tweeter, your centre-channel should have two…