Blogging on Audio
The SoundStage! Network’s multi-author blog about hi-fi, home theater, and more.
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- Written by Howard Kneller Howard Kneller
- Parent Category: BloggingOnAudio BloggingOnAudio
- Created: 30 January 2019 30 January 2019
A Visit to Devialet's New York City Flagship Store
Tony West of Adirondack Audio and Video joined me on my latest audio excursion, this time to visit Devialet’s flagship store in New York City’s SoHo neighborhood. Our goal was to audition the company’s main product lines -- the Phantom Reactor and Phantom Premier series of wireless speakers, as well as the Expert Pro all-in-one amplifiers. Now one of four Devialet stores in the city, the flagship is only steps from the company’s New York office space, but a long distance from its headquarters, located in Paris, France.
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- Written by Howard Kneller Howard Kneller
- Parent Category: BloggingOnAudio BloggingOnAudio
- Created: 05 January 2019 05 January 2019
A Day at DeVore Fidelity
I recently wrote about a listening party that I attended at DeVore Fidelity’s “Monkeyhaus” factory and listening room, located in New York’s Brooklyn Navy Yard, for two independent, audiophile-approved jazz record labels: Newvelle Records and Greenleaf Music. When I headed back to that haus for a more in-depth investigation of DeVore and its self-described “top banana,” John DeVore, I was determined to uncover any monkey business that had gone undetected during the first go-round.
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- Written by Howard Kneller Howard Kneller
- Parent Category: BloggingOnAudio BloggingOnAudio
- Created: 17 December 2018 17 December 2018
Newvelle Records and Greenleaf Music Attend Listening Party at DeVore Fidelity's Monkeyhaus
On December 7, 2018, I traveled to DeVore Fidelity’s “Monkeyhaus” factory and listening room, located in New York’s Brooklyn Navy Yard, to attend a party hosted by DeVore for two independent audiophile-approved jazz record labels: Newvelle Records and Greenleaf Music. According to the invite, the party offered “high-end pizza, wine and spirits, and a special selection of vinyl on some very beautiful speakers.” Present were John DeVore, the company’s chief designer and owner, and many of his employees, distributors, and other partners, as well as the founders of these two labels and many of their recording artists.
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- Written by Howard Kneller Howard Kneller
- Parent Category: BloggingOnAudio BloggingOnAudio
- Created: 11 December 2018 11 December 2018
Gershman Acoustics and Michael Arthur -- Speakers and Art at Adirondack Audio & Video
On December 6, 2018, audiophiles and hipsters gathered to attend a 1970s-themed audition of Gershman Acoustics’ Posh flagship speaker ($129,000 USD per pair) combined with an exhibition of the work of renowned artist Michael Arthur at Adirondack Audio & Video’s HiFi Loft, owned in part by Jason Tavares and located in the fashionable Williamsburg section of Brooklyn, New York. The evening featured the playback of two iconic ’70s LPs: Marvin Gaye’s What’s Going On and Sly & The Family Stone’s There’s a Riot Goin’ On.
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- Written by Howard Kneller Howard Kneller
- Parent Category: BloggingOnAudio BloggingOnAudio
- Created: 01 November 2018 01 November 2018
VPI House Grand Opening and Launch of the 40th-Anniversary HW-40 Turntable
On October 21, 2018, I travelled to Matawan, New Jersey, to attend the grand opening of VPI House, a showroom built by VPI Industries, which manufactures turntables and related analog products. According to Mat Weisfeld, VPI’s president and the son of its founder and owner, Harry Weisfeld, the showroom was built for customers, dealers, and (luckily) reviewers to listen to music in a comfortable, home-like setting. The event also marked the introduction of VPI’s HW-40 direct-drive turntable ($15,000 USD), the “HW” and “40” portions of which celebrate Harry Weisfeld and his 40 years in the audio business.
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- Written by Doug Schneider Doug Schneider
- Parent Category: BloggingOnAudio BloggingOnAudio
- Created: 13 September 2018 13 September 2018
The Best of Both Worlds? Holter's Clear and Compelling Case for Hegel's SoundEngine Technology
Hegel Music Systems’ founder, Bent Holter, has such a deep knowledge of electronics that when he speaks on the topic, it’s easy for him to get so in-depth so quickly that what he says flies right over most people’s heads. I’ve seen it happen to others, and I’ve experienced it myself -- eyes glaze over.
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- Written by Garrett Hongo Garrett Hongo
- Parent Category: BloggingOnAudio BloggingOnAudio
- Created: 07 August 2018 07 August 2018
On the Road at Mobile Fidelity Sound Lab
In early April I drove up from an artist retreat south of San Francisco, where I’d been staying for a month, to Sebastopol, which is in Sonoma County, California, where Mobile Fidelity Sound Lab (MFSL) is located. Mobile Fidelity specializes in remastering new LP records from the original master tapes and has been doing so since 1977.
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- Written by Howard Kneller Howard Kneller
- Parent Category: BloggingOnAudio BloggingOnAudio
- Created: 06 June 2018 06 June 2018
Howard's Trip to Tokyo to Visit Esoteric
My visit to Esoteric’s Tokyo, Japan, headquarters and factory in January of this year not only promised to be interesting; it also offered a temporary respite from the harsh US Northeast winter. With Tokyo’s high temperatures logging in at a relatively balmy 45 to 60 degrees Fahrenheit, I left my winter coat at home.
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- Written by Howard Kneller Howard Kneller
- Parent Category: BloggingOnAudio BloggingOnAudio
- Created: 03 June 2018 03 June 2018
BACCH-SP at the Hi-Fi Sales "Bringing It All Together" Manufacturers' Event
I traveled several hours on a rainy May afternoon to the Cherry Hill, New Jersey, showroom of Hi-Fi Sales for its “Bringing It All Together” manufacturers’ event. Scheduled to attend were Gary Ko, president and CEO of Genesis Advanced Technologies; Robert Pleyer, sales director of Rogers High Fidelity; Princeton University professor Edgar Choueiri, the founder of Theoretica Applied Physics; and the father-son team of Harry Weisfeld and Mat Weisfeld, the founder/owner and president, respectively, of VPI Industries.
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- Written by Roger Kanno Roger Kanno
- Parent Category: BloggingOnAudio BloggingOnAudio
- Created: 04 April 2018 04 April 2018
Roger's Montreal Moon 888 Adventure
In his February 2017 SoundStage! Hi-Fi editorial, “The Best of the Worst CES in Decades: 2017,” Doug Schneider named Simaudio’s Moon 888 mono power amplifier one of the best new products of CES 2017 -- and it’s easy to see why. Weighing in at more than 250 pounds and rated by the manufacturer to deliver 888W into 8 ohms or 1776W into 4 ohms, this massive $59,444 USD behemoth monoblock ($118,888/pair) is an all-out assault on the state-of-the-art in amplifier design. It also just happens to be one of the most gorgeous solid-state amplifiers that I have ever seen, with a shining machined-aluminum faceplate offset by the matte-black, cast-aluminum heatsinks and a swooping top cover with an inset Moon logo.
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- Written by Howard Kneller Howard Kneller
- Parent Category: BloggingOnAudio BloggingOnAudio
- Created: 18 December 2017 18 December 2017
YG Acoustics Sonja 2.2 at GTT Audio
It was only a matter of time before some of the technologies behind YG Acoustics’ two-tower Sonja XV (extreme version) flagship speaker system ($265,900 USD/pr.) trickled down to one of the company’s lower-priced model lines. That’s exactly what has happened with the new Sonja 2.2 speaker ($76,800/pr.), which YG introduced to the press in early December at Bill Parish’s GTT Audio & Video, located in Long Valley, New Jersey. I was fortunate to be treated to my own private listening session during what has become an annual pilgrimage to GTT in order to hear YG’s newest speaker design.
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- Written by Doug Schneider Doug Schneider
- Parent Category: BloggingOnAudio BloggingOnAudio
- Created: 05 October 2016 05 October 2016
Pre-Tokyo Surprise -- Devialet's Gold Phantoms and Dialog Arrive
A few days before I boarded the first of two planes that would take me to Tokyo, Japan, to cover TIAS 2016, the UPS deliverywoman arrived at my door with two big brown boxes and one smaller one. The country of origin was marked clearly on all three: France. Only one company sends us products directly from there -- Devialet.
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- Written by Howard Kneller Howard Kneller
- Parent Category: BloggingOnAudio BloggingOnAudio
- Created: 12 September 2016 12 September 2016
YG Acoustics' New Two-Tower Masterpiece: The Sonja XV
When YG Acoustics unveils a flagship loudspeaker, the press comes running, and that is exactly what happened last week at GTT Audio & Video, one of YG’s largest dealers, located in Long Valley, New Jersey. This new speaker is the $265,000 USD (per pair) Sonja XV (eXtreme Version), a 15-year-anniversary model consisting of two towers -- one main tower and one woofer tower. A new ultra-high-end addition to the company’s Sonja line of speakers, the XV incorporates YG’s latest technologies. YG’s president, Yoav Geva, says that the XV is the closest that the company has ever come to the natural sound of a live performance.
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- Written by Hans Wetzel Hans Wetzel
- Parent Category: BloggingOnAudio BloggingOnAudio
- Created: 15 July 2016 15 July 2016
Bowers & Wilkins’s 50th Anniversary: The 800 D3
There’s no question about it: it’s kind of lame to call the presser for a new loudspeaker an “event.” A plywood box with some extruded-aluminum and fancy drivers doesn’t get the blood flowing quite like the introduction of automotive stalwarts, such as Ferrari’s V8-powered sports car models, Porsche’s iconic 911, or BMW’s benchmark-setting M3. But in the case of the Bowers & Wilkins 800 D3, the newest flagship of the company’s legendary 800-series, the “event” moniker strikes me as warranted.
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- Written by Doug Schneider Doug Schneider
- Parent Category: BloggingOnAudio BloggingOnAudio
- Created: 08 June 2016 08 June 2016
Paul Barton's RoomFeel Explanation and Experiment
On May 20, Lenbrook Industries brought a group of journalists to Ottawa, Canada, so PSB’s Paul Barton could show them the acoustics lab at Canada’s National Research Council (NRC) and explain what RoomFeel technology is and how it applies to headphones he develops there. Barton has been going to NRC since 1973, the longest of any speaker designer.
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