Innholdsfortegnelse for August 2016 i Hi-Fi Choice

● If you’re in the market for a high-end cartridge, Audio-Technica’s AT-ART1000 at £4,100 could be for you. The hand-crafted design places the moving coil directly on top of the stylus tip, meaning that signal transmission from the stylus diamond to the moving coil are direct rather than transmitted along the length of the solid boron cantilever. Eight turns of 20um-diameter PCOCC wire create coils of 0.9mm diameter. It achieves a claimed output of 0.2mV by placing the coil in the minuscule 0.6mm gap of a powerful magnetic circuit, while the structure that supports the magnetic circuit and suspension system is designed to minimise vibrations. To hear this unique cartridge at selected retailers visit: eu.audio-technica.com…

THE TERM ‘POCKET rocket’ used to refer to the sort of souped-up car boasting bolt-on gifts from Halfords that’s lusted after by young men. Now, in a more literal sense, it’s a fitting description for the latest batch of hi-res portable digital audio players – DAPs for short – currently available. As yet, DAPs are a far from standardised but nonetheless inevitable phenomenon – highfunctioning hybrids shaped by market forces and can-do tech that blend all the raw music-on-the-move desirability of the Walkman legacy with varying degrees of smartphone carry over, cutting-edge DAC design and enhanced headphone-driving power. As such, the eternal attraction of pocketable portability has been bulk loaded to the point where a current £500 DAP will, for some headphone devotees, be the only piece of hi-fi they’ll…

DETAILS PRODUCT Technics SU-C550 ORIGIN Japan/Malaysia TYPE CD & networked music system WEIGHT 3.9kg DIMENSIONS (WxHxD) 360 x 91 x 249mm FEATURES ● Quoted power: 2x 40W (into 4ohm) ● CD/USB and Network Audio streaming ● Speaker optimisation software DISTRIBUTOR Panasonic UK TELEPHONE 0333 2228777 WEBSITE technics.com/uk In case you haven’t noticed, Technics is back with a vengeance and while most of the focus has been on the resurrection of its SL-1200 turntable, it has also been busy fleshing out other parts of its lineup. All-in-one systems are a key category for many manufacturers, so it is logical for Technics to turn its attention to this area with what it calls a ‘premium all-in-one hi-fi system’. There are two system options – the SU-C550 (reviewed here) comes without speakers, and…

DETAILS PRODUCT Rega Planar 2 ORIGIN UK TYPE Belt-drive turntable WEIGHT 5.5kg DIMENSIONS (WxHxD) 447 x 117 x 360mm FEATURES ● 33 &45rpm ● Optiwhite glass platter ● RB220 tonearm ● 24V synchronous motor DISTRIBUTOR Rega Research Ltd TELEPHONE 01702 333071 WEBSITE rega.co.uk In his younger days, Roy Gandy had the vision of designing a turntable that was better made and more reliable than the ones he had been selling as a part-time audio equipment retailer. This vision became a reality in 1973 when he formed a partnership with a colleague, Tony Relph, and registered the company name ‘Rega’, formed from the first two letters of their respective surnames. This partnership did not survive for long and Tony eventually left. However, the company continued to evolve with Roy at the…

Flip over the 1976 Pan edition of Walter Tevis’ 1963 novel The Man Who Fell To Earth (pictured below), re-released to tie in with the film of the same name by Nicolas Roeg that featured the Thin White Duke in his first major movie, and you’ll find the following tantalising statements: music by David Bowie; album available on RCA. After scratching your head and attempting to recall the cover of the release, and before you head to Discogs to fill that hole in your record collection, the disappointing news is that it doesn’t exist – not as a legitimate release, and certainly not as was originally intended. “The Man Who Fell To Earth is a powerful love story; a cosmic mystery; a spectacular fantasy; a shocking, mind-stretching experience in sight,…

When I venture out down the road to post a letter or buy a newspaper, most of the people I pass – children on their way to school, cyclists on their way to work and joggers on their way to becoming more healthy – are listening to music. It seems that more than ever we do not want to be parted from our music no matter what we are doing. I guess this all started in June 1940 during World War II when the BBC General Forces Programme broadcast Music While You Work twice daily in the UK. The belief was that the productivity of workers could be raised by playing a non-stop medley of popular music during the working day. The programme turned out to be so popular that…

Many of the dealers we visit are focussed primarily towards the high end. The reasoning for this approach is logical given that the more affordable end of the market is well served by many of the national chains and that the more specific services that they offer are better geared towards the more rarefied end of the market. Valid though these arguments might be, it is always pleasing to find a dealer that feels a little differently and focuses on the more affordable end of the market. Audible Fidelity is a fine example of a dealer that maintains a keen interest in more sensibly priced systems. It is now in its sixth year of trading and offers systems from £400 upwards. The portfolio is built around well-known brands and the…

Just like his former outfit, Tangerine Dream, a move to Virgin and its Caroline imprint saw the gradual smoothing out of Schultze’s sound as creaky synthesisers gave way to slicker and more sophisticated models. He originally started out as a drummer, playing with legendary, unrecorded trio Psy Free, Edgar Froese’s Tangerine Dream on debut album Electronic Meditation, as well as Ash Ra Tempel and The Cosmic Jokers. His solo career as an experimental electronic musician began in 1971 with Irrlicht, the first of many albums. Blackdance (1974) is the first of two Schulze solo LPs on Caroline. His third solo LP, the follow up to the weightless, epic double album Cyborg, was released on the Brain label in Germany and licenced to Branson’s imprint in the UK. The record blends…

What’s the Welsh capital ever done for music? The city where the record shop was born has retained its reputation as a vinyl hotspot, writes Jamie Carter How many cities can claim to have the world’s first record shop? Originally opened in 1894 in Cardiff’s Queen’s Arcade, Spillers Records has been the focus of pilgrimages by music fans for years. Although it was wax phonograph cylinders back then, it has seen a lot of change in the Welsh capital. Perhaps it’s because Cardiff has been listening to music from around the world for so long, the city’s many singers and bands have always been too varied to create any kind of coherent scene devoted to any particular musical style. That’s not to say that Cardiff, and the surrounding valleys that…

Over the years, the BBC has done arguably more that any other broadcaster to push the boundaries of audio performance. Perhaps the best known fruit of its labour comes in the small but perfectly formed cabinet of the LS3/5A studio monitor loudspeaker. Originally produced for outside broadcast vans, it went on to become commercially available and is rightly recognised as something of a classic. Perhaps not so well known, but equally important in the grand scheme of things were BBC sound engineers Lee Taylor and Mallory Nicholls. When they decided to go out on their own and form a company with a monicker that was a coming together of their first names, few would have dared predict just how far the pair would go. Jump forward to the current day,…

PRICE: £599-£1,799 AVAILABLE: NOW CONTACT: 056 02054669 WEB: DECENTAUDIO.CO.UK IF THE SCANSONIC name seems vaguely familiar it's because the brand has an illustrious history, being deeply rooted in Danish loudspeaker design and engineering. Scansonic goes back some 45 years to when it was introduced as the name on a then-new line of loudspeakers from famous Danish drive-unit manufacturer ScanSpeak. Now owned by Dantax, the same parent company as Raidho, the brand’s loudspeakers are designed by the creator of the renowned Raidho range, acoustic designer Michael Børresen. As a result, Scansonic has plenty in common with the respected Raidho family DNA and pedigree, but at a fraction of the cost. The new active M BTL-series comprises a standmount and two floorstanders equipped with wired analogue, digital and wireless aptX Bluetooth connectivity.…

Danish audio brand Copland has been absent from these pages in terms of new product launches for some time, but now it’s back with its long-awaited DAC 215 USB DAC/headphone preamp fed by a pair of ECC88 tubes. Described as a “Universal high-resolution DAC, preamplifier and headphone amplifier” it can be used as a headphone amp, preamp or as a pure DAC – the choice is yours. The Copland DAC 215 looks set to be bang on trend with its retro styling thanks to the rotary front panel controls for the volume level and input selection, and the faint glow of the valves from the headphone amp output section lurking behind the slatted grille will undoubtedly enhance any likely old-school feel for potential purchasers. But at the heart of the…

Originally unveiled at the High End Show in Munich back in May, NAD announces two additions to its prestigious Masters Series line. First up, the M32 Direct Digital Amplifier (pictured below) claims 2x 150W power output and is a true digital amp, and not just Class D. Computer controlled, it amplifies entirely in the digital domain and only converts audio signals to analogue at the speaker terminals to give the shortest signal path possible. It’s fitted with a movingmagnet phono input as well as digital inputs in the form of coaxial, optical, AES/EBU, USB type A and type B and an asynchronous USB 2.0 computer input. There’s also a dedicated headphone amp, twin sets of speaker outputs for bi-wiring and a subwoofer out with a configurable digital crossover. It can…

DETAILS PRODUCT Roksan blak ORIGIN UK TYPE Integrated amplifier with DSD-capable DAC WEIGHT 13kg DIMENSIONS (WxHxD) 440 x 140 x 305mm FEATURES ● Quoted power: 150W RMS (8ohm) ● Inputs: 1x MM phono; 3x RCA line; 1x balanced XLR; 1x USB ● AptX Bluetooth DISTRIBUTOR Henley Designs Ltd. TELEPHONE 01235 511166 WEBSITE henleydesigns.co.uk There’s something very reassuring about a high-end integrated amplifier. While stacks of black boxes might have been the done thing in the early eighties, in today’s world, the trend is to downsize, but music fans don’t want to hear any less of their beloved recordings. The so-called ‘super-integrated’ breed ticks all these boxes; it’s big but not too big, and promises a sound to rival some more expensive pre/power amplifier combinations. Roksan, lest we forget, has always…

EMERGING MARKET SECTORS are always fascinating to watch and what strikes me about this representative sample is that the portable hi-res digital audio player is in the rudest of health. These are all fine DAPs, capable of sound quality (teamed with talented headphones) most smartphone users wouldn’t believe. Likewise, all make a great fist as a source in my revealing reference system, and even with prices stretching to £750 in this group, the value on offer is undeniable. Sony’s early exit in the final reckoning has little to do with its excellent sound or the appealing simplicity of its interface. But it doesn’t look or feel quite as premium or as versatile as its rivals here. Given its hot rod dual-DAC spec, I’d have expected the Audio-Opus to finish higher,…

Having just reached the big five-o, I suddenly find myself deep in thought. Whereas in my earlier life, I was – largely – hedonistic and fancy-free, now my thoughts turn to the ‘good old days’ in an alarmingly nostalgic way. Now it seems, I am forced to contemplate my own past, to wallow in what went before like some kind of historical comfort blanket that’s reassuringly fluffy and warm. If you’ve reached my age, surely you know what I mean? I haven’t quite got to the point when I say, “in my day…” when I’m talking to younger people yet, but that gruesome moment is now surely soon upon me. Suddenly, there seems to be a mighty chasm between now and then. Just 10 years ago I celebrated my birthday…

Why is pop music so uni-lingual? And why does that language have to be English? I’m prompted to ask by a new initiative led by the singer-songwriter Emmy the Great. Born in Hong Kong to a British father and a Chinese mother but now based in New York, over the course of the last few years she has recorded three acclaimed albums of rather fine, indie-tinged folk-pop songs, all written and sung in English. But last month she questioned the English language’s domination of pop music by releasing two videos of Constantly, the first single from her new album Second Love. In one she sings in English – and in the other she sings in Mandarin. It’s the first time she’s translated one of her songs into the language she…

After operating a discount and import vinyl mail-order company, a small record shop in bohemian Notting Hill Gate and a larger enterprise on bustling Oxford Street, as well as a recording studio, hippie entrepreneur Richard Branson co-founded the Virgin Records label in 1972. Setting out its stall with the defiantly uncommercial Mike Oldfield LP Tubular Bells, Virgin undeniably hit the ground running. And with a shrewd businessman at the helm, expansion was inevitable and Caroline was launched as a subsidiary soon after. Confusingly, it enjoyed a twin existence as Virgin’s export wing as well as a record label. This dual structure is perhaps best reflected in Caroline’s distinctive logo – a variation on its parent company’s Gemini design by artist Roger Dean, of high-period Yes record sleeve fame. Branson may…

One of the most unusual and sought-after releases on the Caroline imprint came from poet and multimedia artist June Campbell Cramer – described by The Independent as “a great British eccentric and cosmic prankster” – under the fabulously mysterious title Lady June’s Linguistic Leprosy, helped out by some of her famous bohemian friends. Joining the dots between avant-garde composition, performance poetry and psychedelic rock, the 1974 LP was produced by David Vorhaus of White Noise – also counting the BBC Radiophonic Workshop’s Delia Derbyshire as a member – and features Brian Eno, drummer Pip Pyle (Gong; Hatfield and the North) and Kevin Ayers, who also composed much of the music. Recorded in the front room of Cramer’s Maida Vale flat for £400, it’s the relaxed and home-recorded nature of these…

Bob Dylan Fallen Angels IF BOB DYLAN once upon a time took pride in never repeating himself, it would perhaps be unreasonable to expect him still to be pushing the boundaries at 75 years old. Fallen Angels is unashamedly a sequel to 2015’s Shadows In The Night, on which Dylan pretended that he had never existed by covering songs from a pre-rock’n’roll era, a time before he changed the nature of popular songwriting forever with the likes of Mr Tambourine Man and Like A Rolling Stone. The aging-rocker-does-the-Great-American-Songbook format has become something of a convention in recent years. Rod Stewart has produced several volumes in the genre which have sold millions, but left critics unmoved. But Dylan is diff erent and if he were to sing the self-assembly instructions to…

New kid on the block Hifiman has only been in the headphone game since 2007 and yet it is able to pump out high-quality products like a seasoned pro. Taking its tech cues from planar magnetic models from higher up in its range, the HE400S redefines what’s possible from so-called budget planar cans. At 350g, it’s not exactly the lightest planar magnetic design on the market, but importantly it’s sensitive enough to be driven by a smartphone without the added muscle of a headphone amplifier. An open-back design, its jumbo ear cups permit a decent surface area for the planar membranes within and, lined with removable velour-covered memory foam, it sits very snuggly on the head. Sound quality The HE400S is an open-back design with a bright and airy sound.…

CONTACT DETAILS Kellys Records, The Balcony, Central Market, Cardiff CF10 2AU 029 20 377355 kellysrecords.com S pillers might be the world’s oldest record shop, but nearby Kellys is much more of a Mecca for serious collectors. “We’ve got about 25,000 records here, but it’s just a fraction of what we have – our warehouse has 100,000 records,” says Allan Parkins, the enthusiastic owner of Cardiff’s best vintage record shop. The store itself is strung out along the upper balcony of Cardiff’s evocative Victorian-era Central Market, with crates of highly collectible records displayed outside. Local heroes the Manic Street Preachers have posed for publicity photos in front of its iconic 100ft row of crates, and visitors continue that tradition every day. The shop itself – founded in 1969 – is crammed…

PRICE: £499 AVAILABLE: NOW CONTACT: +49 8142 4208141 WEB: TEAC-AUDIO.EU AS MORE PEOPLE opt for headphones as their choice of transducer for music, there is a growing number of products designed to ensure headgear is giving its best. TEAC has one such portable item, and its HA-P5 headphone amplifier claims to be ultralight, weighing in at just 182g. Circuit design is based on the Tokyo brand’s UD-501 (HFC 375) and HA-501 hi-fi components, and hi-res digital audio signals are routed via a Burr-Brown PCM1795 D/A converter before being passed to a high-power 2x 160mW (at 32ohm) Class A/B amplifier. It has two separate master clocks to handle 44.1kHz and 48kHz digital signals, an arrangement that TEAC says delivers a much more accurate final digital-to-analogue signal conversion. As well as USB…

PRICE: £6,998 EACH AVAILABLE: NOW-AUGUST CONTACT: 0208 9713909 WEB: ABSOLUTESOUNDS.COM IF YOUR ASPIRATIONS extend beyond conventional solid-state hi-fi components but at more real-world prices, then this tube series from the US-based audiophile specialist Audio Research may well grab your attention. The Foundation ‘entry-level’ series is from the same engineering and design team responsible for its aspirational Reference series, and the threestrong range (for now) includes the LS28 line stage preamplifier with four balanced and four single-ended inputs, PH9 phono stage with five different impedance settings for cartridge loading – which can be changed on the fly with the included remote – and the DAC9 384kHz and DSD-compatible digital-to-analogue converter. All three models are built around the same chassis and 6H30 vacuum tubes, with four in the LS28 line stage preamplifier,…

Hi-Fi Choice employs the most rigorous test and measurement regime in the business. Here’s how we do it... HI-RES PORTABLE PLAYERS GROUP TEST THE PROCESS OF reliably auditioning six digital audio players isn’t as straightforward as doing a single standalone review. Each player is connected with its supplied power lead, or if it is hub-powered it’s put into a suitable USB port, and powered continuously to make sure that its built-in rechargeable batteries are at full capacity before any listening takes place. This procedure ensures that all of the models have reasonable use before any listening begins, and they are all kept powered or topped up to maximum charge throughout the comparative listening procedure. The testing period takes place over several days, with all the players given time to warm…

DETAILS PRODUCT Geneva AeroSphère Small ORIGIN Switzerland TYPE Wireless loudspeaker WEIGHT 2kg DIMENSIONS (WxHxD) 232 x 232 x 190mm FEATURES ● 25mm tweeter ● 102mm mid/bass driver ● Wi-fi; AirPlay; DLNA; aptX Bluetooth DISTRIBUTOR Sound Design Distribution TELEPHONE 0843 5236344 WEBSITE genevalab.com When I reviewed the Geneva AeroSphère Large in issue 407, I probably should have explained something inferred by the name. There is an AeroSphère Small, and here it is. Whereas I was seized by the urge to hug the sizeable orb on a shiny pole that is the Large, the half-sized Small is ridiculously cute and makes me want to pat it. Geneva has somehow managed to turn the multi-source, multi-room, wireless speaker initiative commonly represented by mundane plastic boxes into a major charm offensive. Soft-to-the-touch globes with…

We regularly get asked on the Letters pages about the proportion of budget to spend on the various elements of a hi-fi system. I find that people approach a new set up as three major purchases – source, amplification and speakers, with an increasing number acknowledging the importance of power cords, interconnects and speaker cables. Historically there have been three main schools of thought around system building – ‘source-led’, ‘balanced’ or ‘speaker-led’. The ‘source led’ argument is based on the premise that if you don’t start with vital information, retrieved from your music medium of choice, how can it appear later in the signal chain. The ‘balanced’ investment argument suggests that there are few areas of life where focusing too much budget in one specific area produces a great result.…

Although transistors were invented 15 years before the arrival of this amplifier, the industry was still on a learning curve by the time it arrived in 1979. The very early solid-state designs were unreliable, despite this being one of the great promises of the genre – that it was a far more dependable and trustworthy technology than the thermionic valve. Even just five or so years earlier, transistor amplifiers were far less reliable than today, produced much less power and were nowhere near as inexpensive to make. Anyone growing up in the seventies was well aware that watts per channel was a highly valued commodity. Anyone with a 25W amp was regarded with real respect in hi-ficircles, and the 40W A&R Cambridge A60 (selling for £150) was the stuff of…

Australian poet, performance artist and glissando guitarist extraordinaire Daevid Allen had already racked up an impressive CV by the time his debut solo album and classic outing with Gong emerged on Caroline. By the time he co-founded Soft Machine with drummer Robert Wyatt and organist Mike Ratledge in 1966, he had already lived the beatnik life. He’d been resident of the legendary Beat Hotel, in Paris befriending writer William S Burroughs, hanging out with lynchpin of minimalism Terry Riley and immersing himself in the jazz scene, returning to the UK to form his own free music trio. By late 1967, visa issues saw him out of Soft Machine and setting up camp again in the French capital, forming Gong. The Parisian BYG Actuel label issued Gong’s debut album, Magick Brother,…

Given the choice, no selfrespecting hi-fi aficionado would choose to listen to their music through a set of headphones over a decent pair of loudspeakers. But unfortunately, not all of us have the space for pair of floorstanders or share a household with fellow music lovers. Which means that we’re left having to go down the headphone route. In an ideal world, we’d all use electrostatic headphones for what is widely regarded the ultimate in headphone sound quality. But these require external amplification and an understanding bank manager. Happily, there are other options that are more wallet friendly yet still offer the sort of sound performance that discerning audio fans demand. Head of the class Ever since the introduction of the stereo headphone back in the late fifties, there have…

DETAILS PRICE £300 for 2m cables TELEPHONE 01536 762211 WEBSITE divineaudio.co.uk OUR VERDICT AN ENTRY-LEVEL SPEAKER cable, the gZero2 SC employs Keith Louis Eichmann’s gZero architecture, which is an evolution of his previous Ground nulling Circuitry (GnC). The wires in the cable are made from highly annealed, mil-spec Oxygen Free High Conductivity (OFHC) copper and pure silver wire. The hand-wound conductors have been run-in for several days on a cable burner. KL claims that at least 450 hours of burn-in is required, so it is good that this is done at the factory to save you the effort. KL also recommends what he calls a ‘settling time’ of at least 24 hours (preferably 60) each time the cables are first connected to the equipment. They are designed to be connected…

CONTACT DETAILS Spillers Records 27 Morgan Arcade, Cardiff CF10 1AF 029 20 224905 spillersrecords.co.uk It might be the grandfather of record shops, but you wouldn’t know it from Spillers’ immaculate location in the heart of Cardiff’s oldest shopping areas. It’s currently opposite The Plan cafe in Morgan Arcade, one of the finest examples of ornate painted wooden Victorian arcades in Cardiff. It moved across the way a few years ago after re-locating from The Hayes nearby in 2010, but while much smaller than most visitors expect, Spillers manages to squeeze a lot in. Rock, jazz, hip hop, indie – it’s all here – plus local acts get a special boost. There’s a small Welsh section in the window while you can find the odd collectible from the Manics and the…

The Record Shop A ramshackle, almost shedlike building housing CDs, vinyl and tapes, this erratically open treasure-trove is just round the corner from D’Vinyl. If it’s open, 50p records are displayed outside. 029 20453093 Troutmark Books Although mostly a place to browse rare books, there’s a small but impressive collection of used vinyl upstairs. Nearby are sealed copies of vintage Sight & Sound magazines. troutmarkbooks.com Head Records Opposite the Apple Store in the city’s grand new St Davids 2 mall, Head Records is where to go if Spillers doesn’t have that limited edition opaque white vinyl new release you were after. wearehead.com HMV Cardiff The high street chain store selling a selection of the latest releases and DVD box sets has just closed its doors after 30 years in Cardiff’s…