The Gearhead

Martin Logan Theos Electrostatic Hybrid Speakers I’m not a “sweet spot” audiophile at home. That’s not to say I don’t appreciate dialed-in, sweet spot listening. Head in a vise is how you might describe listening to my stand-up desk audio system here at TMR. My DIY speakers are immensely accurate, and I get a lot of information about different brands of equipment by keeping my head still and focusing. But at home with my two-year-old, wife and coyote dog I am either cooking dinner, cleaning something or playing with dolls. Which means that if I want to enjoy my carefully crafted reference system, it’s going to be off-axis. I’m just not at a point in my life where I can have a devoted room for audio and chunks of devoted audio time for listening. Some of you may be like me, and are on the search for something that sounds good everywhere. My solution is crossoverless full range speakers in giant back-loaded horn cabinets. Music sounds musical and fun from all over the house,

Aesthetix Atlas Tube Hybrid Power Amplifier I don’t know if it’s just me, but when I see a serial number on a amplifier or speaker that is less than 5 digits, I start to feel like I have a special audiophile experience in store. Such was the case today with an Aesthetix Atlas stereo amplifier, serial no. 4176. Now I know that serials often depict the month and year of manufacture, the revision number and other things. I know it’s not perfectly sensible of a feeling. But I still have it. Massive, sparse and straight-to-the-point back panels like the Atlas lend seriousness to my observations and especially when the sparse features are individually well-chosen, like seeing those Cards binding posts on the back. I get those feelings when I encounter a big Ayre amplifier or PS Audio’s BHK series, which actually has a few things in common with this Aesthetix. I have a wonderful supply of binaural reference recordings, and I go straight to them when I test an uber high end piec

PSB Imagine T3 Floorstanding Speakers One of the things I’m after in audio is what I call “image lock.” I’ve always found a direct correlation between a system’s ability to sound real, and its high performance on any music not recorded to sound real. So besides basking in a stereo image when the music is recorded for stereo, speakers that have good image lock tend to also show up big for pop, jazz, R&B, etc. Image lock isn’t just about the high end and tweeter dispersion. As the late, great Arnie Nudell thought, and many others beside him, a speaker’s ability to reproduce mid bass correctly was a major determiner of its sense of realism. He also believed in excellent high frequency dispersion and rear-firing tweeters, but his focus on the mid bass — and specifically his use of one driver ( for that sole purpose — reinforced for me the importance of it in the scheme of things. When I’m recording, I think about things like that. If I’m opposed to using EQ, which I of

Lexicon 212 Stereo Power Amplifier I find the Lexicon 212 stereo amplifier to be cute and to pack a wallop. Yes, 120 watts per channel isn’t exactly a bruiser, but it’s a zippy amp with musicality for days. The bottom end has that elusive nice mix of dry and wet, like an A/B amp over 50 damping factor or a Class D amp under 600. I could figure out or look up the damping factor for this little guy, but I won’t because I don’t care. It sounds realistic, teetering over the edge of fun. I kind of snooze when I hear any amp that can’t spread out the soundstage realistically, and keep instruments where they are. That is a system trait, partly influenced by the room and the speakers, but the amp plays a decent role too, I’ve found. The best amps I hear instantly have that separation and space around instruments. But not all of them are as fun on the bottom as this guy. The Lexicon 212 should be relatively affordable for its sound, so it could be worth a try for someone who

Dynaudio Focus 160 Bookshelf Speakers There’s a new kind of electronic music thriving in its own subgenre these days, one that I enjoy very much. It’s a mix of bebop, jazz, soul and blues in a punchy, creative electronic mix. I’m really not sure what to call it, and attempts I’ve seen so far don’t really capture the spirit of this music, in my opinion. Occasionally, lyrics and a singer are involved, but for the most part it’s an instrumental affair. And a good part of the instrumentation is electronically generated, though much less of it than other electronic genres. Samples are big, binaural recorded samples are bigger, and often real drums, real organ or piano make a notable appearance. See what you think and let me know if you come up with any good terms for this genre. Members include a French multi instrumentalist called Anomalie , a French saxophone and piano player named FKJ (stands for French Kiwi Juice), a Canadian boy/girl duo called Tennyson (my favorite),

Hey! I know you’re busy, but I’ve got a fun story to share. Settle in for this one and you’ll learn a little about the behind-the-scenes excitement that happens daily at The Music Room. This story played out over two days, and it’s one that I think showcases everything we’re trying to do and everything you can expect as part of the buying process here at the Music Room. This is a story about quality control, and the care and high standards you can expect from us. We recently received a set of Magnepan 3.6Rs from a favorite consignment customer of ours. If you’re not familiar, this model of planar floorstanding speakers from Magnepan stand about 6 feet tall, and have separate sections of the speaker designated for separate frequencies. These are managed by an external crossover box connected to each. If you read my blog post about the Magnepan 3.7s, you know I just love how these speakers sound as you go larger in the line. The big ones like 3.7 and 3.6R really deliver the meat and fles

PS Audio 4.6 Preamplifier with External PSU I wore a lot of hats over two and a half years as the retail sales manager of PS Audio, but one of my absolute favorite jobs there was to take visiting customers around for a tour. We started each journey at the “museum,” right by the door leading into PS Audio. An old gramophone and Paul and Stan’s first phono preamps occupy the first area, highlighting PS’ humble beginnings. The next shelf shows PS Audio stretching its legs into the power amplifier market, and the next beyond it features external power supplies and preamps, and the beginnings of source offerings like the first Data Link DAC and hot-rodded Phillips CD players. Of all of the PS Audio components in years past — there are a massive number, as PS have been in business a healthy 44 years — there are two that I heard more about from customers than any others: the 4.6 preamplifier and the V (5). What I heard was that these preamplifiers were not only relevant today,

Yesterday I was regaling the TMR guys about my days in Boulder building bikes and selling them on Craigslist. I had chanced upon a new movement toward cycling minimalism — the recent “fixie” and single speed revolution — and found myself collecting used frames and building new, desirable rides from old and forgotten bicycles. I sold about 50 over a year and a half before the major bicycle manufacturers got wise and started offering the cooler (and less costly for them) rides at better prices. All this led to my statement that one should never buy new outdoor gear of any kind in Boulder. So many people, I explained, have plenty of cash but little time to perfect the myriad activities you get into when you move here. Invariably, barely-used, high quality stuff is cycled through a network of second hand gear stores. Second hand resale stores run the gamut in terms of quality and reliability. The gear store I like the most in Boulder carries that distinction beca

Magnepan 3.7 Planar Magnetic Speakers I get to do all kinds of crazy things here that no one in their right mind would try at home. For example, right now, I’m listening to a stereo recording I made of a flamenco concert I recently put on, and I’m listening in the nearfield, via a 6-foot-tall pair of Magnepan 3.7s. That’s right, I’m listening to a human-sized par of planar speakers, nearfield. And they’re integrated with a servo subwoofer that is placed fairly well. Anyone shopping for “Maggies” is not looking for a set of desktop monitors, I assure you. I might be the only one around listening to em like this, and it’s fun. Sounds pretty damn good, actually! Most speakers need a little room around them to sound good, but if you know anything about Maggies, it’s often the room that hinders their full potential. In the case of these, they were previously installed in a small listening space, and it makes sense that their former owner would be looking for a different appr

Vincent SA-31 Stereo Line Preamplifier Clean. Musical. Real. Fun. Is there more to say? Do you want a preamplifier that adds to the sound, one that makes up for an issue elsewhere in the system? Or do you have your system dialed in so much, that what you really want is a preamplifier that stays out of the way besides supporting wide bandwidth and big dynamics? I could see this lovely Vincent preamplifier taking a place on the desk of a mastering engineer. I could see this quietly staying out of the way in a flashy system with beautiful tube amps as the main event. But the owner of that system would know why the Vincent is there. A very magical, if unassuming piece, this one. The more I listen to my testing setup with this in line, the more I want to listen. Over time I’ve grown to trust that intuition, and when I feel it, I pull out the notepad and start writing. That’s what caused this blog post — I just quickly fell in love with a foxy preamp named Vincent. And the love

Conrad Johnson PV5 Tube Preamplifier Imagine coming across this in a Craigslist or Audiogon ad: “Tube preamplifier for sale, used briefly 15 years ago.” Yowza! If you have any knowledge of tube amps or experience with them, you know there’s a lot to be worried about in that short sentence. Of the many reasons to be browsing The Music Room’s wide-ranging and gem-filled catalog, the fact that we thoroughly check out and test every piece of gear is up there with the best reasons to do business with us. Take this lovely vintage Conrad Johnson preamplifier I’m testing, for example. The above sentence came in the seller’s description, so I was justifiably suspicious when firing this up. Besides tube life, I’m thinking about capacitor values drifting when 15 years of storage is in play. Capacitors need to be used in order to maintain their precise values, although old caps can be “brought back to life” if they’re not too far drifted, simply by playing music through them for

Scansonic M5 Bookshelf Speakers I never know what component is going to find excellent synergy with my testing setup, but I usually do what I can to make sure I’m giving each piece a chance to shine. I know some speakers aren’t best when powered with Class D amplification, but my Class D amp has a Class A input stage, which helps tame a little of that Class D-ness. Ideally, of course, well-designed speakers should be happy with any kind of amp. But still, I hear a lot of of variation from speaker to speaker as I connect them to my test rig. And, indicating I probably have a decent system set up here, well-reviewed speakers generally sound really good right off the bat. Thinking about Wilson, Sonus Faber, Dynaudio, Aerial Acoustics, etc. The successes usually make sense, either reinforced by good reviews, or, more generally, because of the price of the speaker or component I’m attaching. Much of the pricing in audio really does correlate with level of excellence. So I wa

Stax SR Lambda Electrostatic Headphones and SRM-1/Mk-2 Amplifier I’ll try to make this one short, because I’ve been listening to these crazy old Stax headphones for too long already. I wouldn’t say I just did a full come-to-Jesus conversion, but it was a top of the mountain experience at least. I love the speed of electrostatics, and the palpable texture they can help overlay onto a traditionally rich sounding recording. But, I'll admit I’ve had a bit of a bias against electrostatic headphones. One of my favorite aural memories is of hearing a well-mixed, full band playing over the control room output on the mixing board from my days as an engineer. After that moment in time, few headphones playback experiences of the same music were even close to as exciting and emotional and detailed. Having heard several electrostat ‘phones in recent years at Can Jam and Ear Gear Expo, I’ve grown to expect shimmering highs, but very little bass from these high voltage pieces.

Musical Fidelity Nu Vista Vinyl Reference Phono Stage You won’t see me writing much about phono stages and turntables in these blog pages sadly, because a reference phono testing setup is a delicate and expensive thing to maintain, and sometimes a downright pain in the ass. I’ve got a job to do here, so I can’t be fiddling with cart loading while I listen for subtle changes or, gosh, bursting at the seams as we are I can’t even picture a testing space big enough to allow for pleasant and informative listening. I won’t harp on it too much today, but my view is that a reasonable effort to base a system around digital yields just as good a music experience as a herculean effort undertaken for vinyl. It’s just where we are in the state of the digital art. It is not, however, any sort of dig at a playback method that has been refined and perfected over time. When I test a phono preamplifier, instead of using a turntable to generate a signal, I have a cheap, clever little box t

Wilson Sophia 3 Floorstanding Speakers It takes all of about one second for all three of the TMR testers to recognize royalty in our midst. At second two, test stations are abandoned and by second three, there’s a circle around these titanium grey (we also have them in black) Wilson Sophia 3 speakers, and we’re all marveling at the sound. And this rarified level of sonic resolution is remarkable when you look at these beauties. It’s not always the case that form matches up with the technical and scientific merits of high-functioning speakers. Like my Master & Dynamic MH40 headphones, these have the looks and the sound. I know what to feed precision audio tools like this, so I fired up Jacob Szekely Trio’s eponymous debut album on Tidal. And the jaws, they were dropped. Even powered from a PS Audio Stellar S300, the Sophia 3s are straight jaw-removers. On the Trio’s “Diana’s Lullaby,” TMR sales rep Nick had to remark on the mid bass that seemed to jump off of the

First Watt J2 Stereo Power Amplifier OK, at this point I’m starting to realize that I will fall in love with 100% of the First Watt amplifiers and preamps that come through The Music Room. So much so that it has me diving on a box marked Pass Labs or First Watt so my coworkers don’t grab it first. Oh, this is a competition, make no mistake about it. We see some of the coolest audio gear of the last 30 years roll through here, but often it’s the luck of the draw when it comes to who listens to what. Today must be my lucky day. I’m listening again to a First Watt, this time the J2. A different amplifier completely from the F4, the J2 has all of that same First Watt goodness: the speed, the detail, the pleasing character, the honesty. This one is perhaps a simpler circuit than the F4, featuring modern high power JFET transistors made available because of the electric car industry. As Nelson explains in the manual’s forward, this builds on a previously used approach of sing

Ayon CD-3sx Tube CD Player / DAC / Preamplifier All-in-one. Do-it-all. This much hyphenated concept is often met with disdain in our field. Not always, though. Integrated, full featured single boxes these days can really kick — see Devialet for evidence. But most of the time, we accept trade-offs in return for extra features and easier setup. And if we’re the cranky audiophile type, trade-offs are for suckers. Well here’s one device I found that actually does it all with as few trade-offs as I’ve ever witnessed, the Ayon CD-3sx. If you’re like me and consider CDs a reference in this streaming age, something like this can revolutionize your life. Because as great as CDs are, they are never going to be the only source nowadays. I’m trying to think about what caused me to open the notepad here and start typing. The reason in my mind has to be the output stage, which Ayon clearly slaved over. Before you even get into features like the “direct amp” setting which sees a short

At TMR headquarters, we take sealed factory packaging very seriously. We consider our description of any item and its flaws (or lack thereof), and also our “A-OK” on the functionality, to be our sacred contract with each and every buyer. So if a component comes through our doors with the factory seal intact, we treat it like gold and never disturb the quality seal that is, in the same way, a contract from the component’s manufacturer with our customer. In case you can’t tell, we take our work seriously, and we care about the things a real audiophile would care about. Since we’re sort of highlighting our unique partnership with PS Audio in this week’s Friday Five, I thought it would be a good chance to share a recent story about how I broke some factory seals, but only at the behest of a potential customer. On the sales order were two new BHK 300 mono amps, and a BHK preamplifier as well, and a request was put in for upgraded tubes. More than a few words have been written in forums ab

YG Acoustics Carmel 2 Floorstanding Speakers There’s nothing like a fresh start with a well-known brand that is cemented in a sound and a look like YG Acoustics and their characteristic metronome-shaped tower speakers. I’ve had a lot of listening experience with the larger speakers offered by YG, from the Sonja 1.2 to the 1.3 to the XV. Imagine my surprise to hear a different speaker entirely in Sonja’s smaller cousin, the Carmel 2. While the sound of the larger YGs strikes me as occasionally larger than life, or as room-dimensions-dependent for the kind of bass they want to make, and as room-treatment and placement-dependent for the handling of the top end. Even amplifier-dependent, if you ask me, on that very present top end. Bi-amplified, with a FET power amp on the bottom and perhaps an EL34 tube amp on the tweeters, the big YGs can shine. But I’m here powering these gorgeous little Carmels with nothing more than a single PS Audio Stellar S300 stereo class-A / class-D a

Little Dot 1+ Tube Headphone Amplifier Smart guys in this audio playback craft tell us that money is best spent first on speakers, as speakers have the potential for adding the most distortion to the eventual sound. Keep talking to those smart guys and they’ll go on to say that a great speaker is one thing, but the speaker choice must go hand in hand with treatment of the room, and with correct placement of the speakers. A nice “gumbo of interactive trade-offs,” of which our zany hobby has many. But how smart is it to spend so much time and money on excellent speakers and room treatments, when the personal audio market is literally brimming with cheap products that sound great. Think of all of the new gadgets Schiit produced in the last 8 years, just to take one company. Today a plucky little tube headphone amplifier came across my desk, and since it sounds fantastic I thought I’d write about it. The Little Dot 1+ is a low priced, simple headphone amplifier featuring 6JI

Audio Research LS16 Preamplifier; No-name Tube Buffer; Eddy Current Balancing Act Preamplifier By this point I have a good grasp on what tubes can add to the sound of a system, and conversely what solid state has to offer. But every now and then I still get struck by the crystalline clarity on the top end when tubes are involved. Something about that sound makes cymbals and stringed instrument plectrum noise just so sweet and attractive. Here at The Music Room, we see everything that’s made for high end audio. And on both ends of the price spectrum, folks are focused on tubes. This little generic, unbranded Chinese tube buffer has a little magic in it, take it from me. For a $69 piece of kit with no name and no information, that seems a little hard to believe. But it’s the tubes, man. Even at $69 and with no info you can’t screw up the magic that tubes bring to the table too badly. Now, describing the bass on this thing, I would call tubby and soft. But that’s why you p

Harbeth Compact 7ES-2 Bookshelf Speakers Year after year, high end show after high end show, hordes of audiophile attendees murmur amongst themselves and and in my experience, ubiquitously express attraction to one brand of loudspeaker above all, quietly. Sure, there are dozens of high end speaker brands to talk about and hundreds of rooms to visit, and the chatter about this Wilson or that Tidal speaker fills the noisy halls of the high end show host hotels. “Did you see those freaking MBLs?!”, etc. But what I’m talking about is the quieter, between-friends chatter. Within those murmurations, year after year I’ve heard near constant mention of one specific British speaker maker: Harbeth. You know what I’m talking about. The VAC room was cool, the Scaena speakers were eye-popping, etc. But did you hear those Harbeths in the Vinnie Rossi room? Holy @#$%! Now, Harbeth is not free from direct praise, by the way. It is quite often mentioned in best-of-show roundups by reviewers

Ayre V-6xe 3 Channel Power Amplifier I’m reminded of the magic of those Siltech Empress Double Crown interconnects when I take in the magic of this Ayre V-6xe amplifier from the audio wizards around the corner from TMR. Just as a side note, it never ceases to boggle my mind to know just how many full companies and two-man upstarts in the high end audio industry that reside within a 100-mile circle of Denver, Colorado. Boulder-based Ayre has a hit on its hands with the V-6x, and this one being upgraded to the “xe” designation means it is upgraded to the absolute latest spec by the factory. I’m listening again to my favorite “soundstage” albums — Janos Starker’s Virtuoso Music for Cello, Avishai Cohen’s Adama, Yo-Yo Ma’s brilliant Songs In The Key Of Life — and the Ayre brings that magic thing into the mix like the best gear I’ve come across here at The Music Room. The Magico speaker, the Siltech cables, this Ayre amp…. They’ve all got that elusive quality of magic that you k

Opera Mezza Bookshelf Speakers I’m a pretty lucky audiophile. Not only do I get to play with, listen to and test some of the best audio gear from the last 20 years in my gig here at The Music Room, but I have something other audiophiles simply dream of: a personal recording project where I pay bands to perform in a hall and I record it and get to keep the recordings. Through this project, I am able to create the holy grail of the audiophile world, which is a true reference recording. As a recording and mastering engineer I always searched for “the truth” about how my mixes sounded, usually by playing them over many different systems. As audiophiles we search to find the truth of how our systems sound by playing many different benchmark tracks over it. But when you were there in person at the show, sitting just under the microphones, and you’ve set up a world class signal chain for recording, the resulting recording can be more useful than a boatload of other people’s record

Audio Research Ref 3 Stereo Tube Preamplifier I don’t know how you got into this hobby, but my introduction occurred early in life, through the influence of my grandfather, Dr. James McVay. He didn’t necessarily push me to be interested in his passion for high end audio — he already knew I was interested in my dad’s trade, which is music. He just fueled my excitement on the way music sounded through speakers and a system. He would tell me all kinds of stories about his DIY amplifier and speaker builds, how he turned a corner of his basement into a dance hall and another section of it into a legitimate German rathskeller, how he personally knew Paul Klipsch and how Paul was helping him with the crossover and tweeter horn array for his DIY project. How he was in a constant search for the right place to hide his speakers so he could get a semblance of a soundstage while keeping my decor-conscious grandmother happy. He didn’t talk much about the dizzying array of brands in the

DIY Hifi Supply Chazz2 Mk. II Headphone Amp You can call me a tweaker, and I am, to an extent. But instead of focusing on EMI/RFI rejection or wall-mounting active room treatment devices ALA Bybee, I like to tweak things like cabling and room acoustics. And, I really get a kick when I see a piece of audio equipment that allows actually tweaking of the audio circuit, to taste. Just last week I was listening to an amplifier that allowed me to switch between cap-coupled output and transformer-coupled output. True to most descriptions, I found the transformer coupling to produce a bit softer, rounder bass. There was something exciting about the capacitor-coupled output. I never did find a track I preferred on transformer output, but again — I like having the option to switch. Other onboard circuit tweaks you might see include switching from triode operation to pentode, or switching from push/pull to single ended (thinking of that righteous Mesa Boogie hifi tube amp that came

VAC Avatar SE Stereo Integrated Amplifier Every person who has walked back into the testing area of The Music Room has seen this VAC tube amp sitting on its box and instantly remarked on it. Remarks are either appearance-related (“Holy @#$, look at that gorgeous thing”), or true audiophile interest due to the stellar pedigree of the Valve Amplification Company and their reputation for excellence. You see a few EL34-based hifi tube amplifiers out there, in part because of the tube’s well-known midrange abilities and also in part because it’s one of the most readily-available tubes period. EL34s can be found cheap since they’re being used in a majority of high-power guitar tube amps as well. You’ll see EL34s used as output tubes in single ended triode (SET) setups and push-pull designs and even an OTL (output transformerless) or two. I’ve become familiar with quite a few different EL34-based amps. And this tube and well-designed amps featuring it never cease to amaze me with

Siltech Empress Double Crown Royal Signature IC OK, I get it. In fact, I got it immediately when I pressed play after gently installing the Siltech interconnects into my humble but accurate and musical system here at The Music Room. What’s so amazing about my position here is I can hear equipment and experiment with gear I could never dream to afford. It’s obvious from the outside that some of the most expensive audiophile equipment seems to have a lot invested in the outward appearance. But there’s always that question in my mind when I read about proprietary materials in high end cables or drivers, or some highly-engineered cabinet or driver arrangement — is the science at the richest end of the hobby actually better than that which resides in the range that the majority of us can afford? This morning I have the extreme pleasure of receiving and carefully testing a number of excellent, very high dollar interconnect cables for consignment here at The Music Room. And in the