Hi Fi News August 2016

‘Headphone design has improved almost beyond recognition’ There is something of a good, old-fashioned ‘Space Race’ going on in the headphone scene at the moment. Fuelled by the huge expansion in on-the-hoof headphone usage, the technology behind everything from the smallest ear-buds to the grandest of ‘ear speaker’ headgear has improved almost beyond recognition in the past few years. The sort of lightweight but very rigid diaphragm materials we’ve seen developed for high-end loudspeakers are now commonplace in full-range headphone drivers – including polymer/titanium mixes. This new generation of drive units allows manufacturers to extend the frequency response of their headphones while better controlling resonances and other unwanted aspects of their behaviour. These are the traditional dynamic headphones, but the breed of planar magnetic types has also evolved significantly with the likes of…

ARC’s Foundation AUDIO RESEARCH ANNOUNCES A TRIO OF SEPARATES TO FORM NEW ENTRY-LEVEL RANGE Inspired by its aspirational Reference series and developed by the same engineering team, Audio Research’s new Foundation series of tube electronics aims to set audiophiles’ pulses racing without entirely breaking the bank. The first three components come with remote control and include the LS28 line stage preamplifier, the PH9 phono stage and the DAC9 digital-to-analogue converter, all built into matching chassis and offered in both black and natural anodised finishes. All three products are based around 6H30 triodes – four in the hybrid J-FET/ tube preamplifier circuit, three in the phono stage and a pair in the outboard, 384kHz PCM/DSDcompatible USB DAC. The PH9 phono stage offers +58dB gain with five loading options (100ohm-47kohm), making it suitable for medium/high output…

Latest from the UK’s only high-end hi-fishow B&W’s redesign and relaunch of its entire 800 Diamond series is arguably the biggest ‘loudspeaker event’ of 2016. Visitors will be able to compare and contrast across B&W’s entire range – including the supreme 800 D3 Audio Research’s comprehensive Foundation Series of source components and amplifiers [see p14] promises to thrill visitors with more than a flavour of its trademark ‘Reference Series sound’. You’ll be sorely tempted... Eagerly anticipated, and soon to feature in an exclusiveHi-FiNewsreview, the massive (400W/8ohm) Mark Levinson No536 monoblock power amps will also be strutting their prodigious stuff alongside JBL’s iconic Everest speakers at The Hi-FiShowLive Tube amplifiers do not come much more traditional or beautifully engineered than this TA-300B-based power amp from Luxman. Inspired by its 1984 MB-300, this new iteration –…

How the tenor has changed at the semi-annual Tonbridge Audio Jumble! It may have been hinted at before, but now the return of the LP has paid off with a flood of visitors and a general lowering of the average age. People were looking for cartridges, tonearms, decks and both new and used vinyl, and it’s safe to say that the knock-on effect of this included a heady dose of upgradeitis for the rest of their systems. Hot items include SME tonearms, cartridges in as-new nick, turntables above dreck level but not necessarily into four figures, classic headphones and the ‘usual suspects’. For those seeking the latter, Radfords were scarce while LS3/5A prices have shot up to astronomical levels thanks to online collectors paying up to £10,000. So remember that the…

The term ‘computer music’ is hardly new. Since the first MP3 players appeared back at the turn of the century, it’s been possible to store your music collection on a computer, then transfer it to a portable player to enjoy wherever you are. The technology has moved on a bit since then: the first players had a storage capacity of 32MB – that’s MB, not GB! – which was enough to store just half a dozen tracks using heavy MP3 compression. MYTHS AND LEGENDS These days Apple’s top iPod has a capacity of 128GB, and there have in the past been models offering even more – not to mention that it’s now possible to have home storage of many Terabytes! Not only that, but a whole new raft of portable devices have become…

AUDIO FILE Three-and-a-half way floorstanding loudspeaker Made by: Sonus faber SpA (Fine Sounds Group), Italy Supplied by: Absolute Sounds Ltd Telephone: 0208 971 3909 Web: www.sonusfaber.comwww.absolutesounds.com Price: £30,000 The latest addition to the Italian company’s Homage series, the Il Cremonese is a newly shaped rhomboidal diamond floorstander that will cost you less than a third of the price of its massive Aida model. Like its predecessors, the speaker is a beautiful piece of functional art with the sumptuous looks Sonus faber is now famous for. The cabinet is made of triple-layer walls of variable thickness and finished in lacquered walnut wood. I have had the pleasure to live with both the red-stained and natural walnut versions and I would be hard pressed to choose between them, although the latter more closely resembles the colour of the violin the…