Sound + Image January - February 2022

EDLINES It’s time for our annual festival of all things audio and AV, the Sound+Image Awards special issue; cue fireworks, dancing, hugging in the street, etc. Here we celebrate all the finest gear currently available to Australia in categories from teeny tiny earbuds up to unliftably-large amps and loudspeakers. We recognise also the best installations and home cinemas of the year. We announce the result of our poll for Retailer of the Year (p98), and present our annual Lifetime Achievement Award (p91). My congratulations to all the winners herein — 2022 winners, you’ll note, since this is our first issue of 2022, as well as our last of 2021. So I can also be among the first to welcome you to the new beginning of 2022, a year that we should…

Smart new NADs Two new NAD amplifiers bring their streaming smarts in different ways. They’re all to the fore in the C 700 BluOS Streaming Amplifier (above), with its modern design and five-inch colour display that shows album artwork, track status, and system settings. It uses HybridDigital UcD Amplification to deliver 2 x 80W of continuous power, and thanks to the built-in BluOS platform it has everything needed to play music by just adding speakers, with the app’s interface accessing music from dozens of different streaming services, internet radio, or music stored on a drive connected to the C 700’s USB port. Along with AirPlay2, aptX HD Bluetooth, Spotify Connect and Tidal Connect, there are two analogue inputs, coaxial and optical digital and a handy HDMI ARC input. Price is $2599. The…

The P452 is March Audio’s first Purifi-based stereo amplifier. This elegant product is milled from solid aluminium with a tough anodized treatment. Exceptional fit, finish and build quality. Featuring the new Purifi 1ET400A technology and Bruno Putzeys’ development of his previous Hypex Ncore designs, the P452 delivers extraordinary low noise and distortion with further improved refinement in subjective audio quality. This class-leading technical performance delivers a neutral but captivating musical sound to suit the finest partnering equipment. Fully 2-ohm capable with ultra low output impedance, the P452 can deliver up to 450 watts and 25 amps, ensuring tremendous grip and drive even with the most challenging of speaker loads. The OPA1612 differential input buffer has been designed to extract the maximum performance from the 1ET400A module. Very low noise LT3045/94 voltage regulators also…

For 33 years now, since 1989 A.D., the Sound+Image Awards have celebrated the very best in audio and AV, recognising the products which have wowed us over the previous 12 months of our magazines Sound+Image, Australian Hi-Fi, Best Buys Audio & AV, and Audio Esoterica, and which represent our recommendations of the very best products available in Australia today in every audio and AV category — from teeny-tiny true wireless buds up to unliftably large amplification. Under normal circumstances we’d be inviting the great and the good of the Australian hi-fi industry to a glitzy Presentation Dinner like the one pictured above, where our Editor would hand out the healing crystal Awards trophies to those responsible for creating and distributing these wonders of our age. But alas, no shindigs quite yet. Instead…

Our very first winner, then, epitomises our search for value in all award categories low or high, although it is perhaps a surprise in being neither brand-new nor, really, pushing the limits of technology. It is the $399 entry-level vinyl-spinner from Music Hall, the long-established turntable brand under Roy Hall, which is no stranger to our awards. But whereas many of Mr Hall’s designs are tweaked and upgraded versions of Pro-Ject turntables, through his relationship with Heinz Lichtenegger, this entry-level US-1 is clearly not, and many readers will no doubt immediately recognise the heritage of the classic Technics SL1200 DJ deck here. But it is not a clone (it’s belt-drive, not direct drive, for a start), and as for its design similarities, well, Panasonic originally stopped making Technics turntables in 2010…

A new entry to the list of cost-effective and high-value turntables from Audio-Technica, the AT-LPW50BP offers a package which should equally satisfy audio lovers returning to the vinyl fold as well as those getting their first deck and wanting something swish-looking, yet easy to use. Priced at a very reasonable $699, it leverages the company’s cartridge expertise, coming with a preinstalled AT-VM95E moving-magnet cartridge on its straight-line carbon-fibre statically-balanced tonearm — this is a cartridge with an elliptical stylus released only a few years ago, but an evolution of (and replacement for) the AT-95E with newly-designed aluminium cantilevers and re-designed coils for higher output. The AT-LPW50BP has an in-built phono stage so will work with any amp, but otherwise focuses its funds firmly on sound quality, being a no-frills belt-driven deck designed…