Thursday May 21 2009. Munich High-End Show. Thorens is delighted to announce that the results of over 18 months of research and development have come to fruition in the shape of the new Thorens TD 309 Tri-Balance turntable. The TD 309 will be available from September 2009 in a choice of Black or Red. [nggallery…
Author: Steve
Ovator S-600 High-End Loudspeaker
Thursday 21 May 2009. Munich High End Show. Naim Audio today launches the Ovator S-600 high-end floor-standing loudspeaker. The Ovator S-600 is a technically advanced loudspeaker system targeted at the music lover. The S-600 has taken three years to bring to market. Naim has a history of designing and manufacturing loudspeakers that deliver the maximum…
Neat Acoustics launch Elite SX in Munich
Munich High End Show, 21 May 2009. Neat Acoustics is pleased announce the launch of the ELITE SX. The ELITE SX is a worthy successor to the ELITE SE. The ELITE SX continues the Neat tradition of delivering serious audio performance from discreet and attractive enclosures, by means of unorthodox thinking and the ingenious implementation…
SuperShield – Chord’s new budget HDMI cable available now
Chord’s new and extremely pretty SuperShield HDMI is available now. It’s targeted at the entry-level end of the specialist market where the performance:price ratio is absolutely critical. But entry-level at Chord is just an expression that means a greater challenge The SuperShield is HDMI 1.3b certified. It uses 26awg oxygen free copper conductors for high…
SuperShield – New budget HDMI cable from Chord
Chord’s new and extremely pretty SuperShield HDMI is available now and will cost £49.95 for a 1 metre, £69.95 for a 3 metre and £89.95 for a 5 metre cable. It’s targeted at the entry-level end of the specialist market where the performance:price ratio is absolutely critical. [nggallery id=23] Click on one of the images…
My sentiments entirely
Very interested to read on Amarra’s website and I paraphrase ‘it’s easy to make music sound good on a computer but hard to make it sound fabulous’. I think they have been listening to my conversations.
Next week I’m in Munich for the High End show and by coincidence will be sharing a booth (or to be more exact one of my clients Thorens is sharing a booth themed Sources of the future as it’s vinyl and streaming with Higoto who are Germany’s streaming experts.
The demos will be of Thoren’s new Tri-Balance turntable, the Logitech Transporter and a Macbook running iTunes with the Amarra software into a Weiss DAC.
Enthusiasm, Over Selling or Spam?
Mid April I bought a few downloaded tracks from BlueCoast Records. They were hi-res recordings and not to bad at all.
Since then the guys at Blue Coast have not left me alone. Every few days I get another email trying to flog me some more.
Don’t you just love iTunes not
Nearly every application on this planet is easier to reinstall without losing stuff than iTunes.
ASIO v K Mixer v Kernel Streaming
Computer audio seems to generate emotions when discussing what products to use that really are odd. Ideally one would take a computer, connect a good DAC and play one’s favourite music using one’s favourite app.
If only it were that simple. The more I experiment the more I realise that CA is absolutely similar to analog audio or indeed any audio when taken seriously. Every change is audible.
Of course, just because a change is audible doesn’t mean it matters.
The expression bandied about on forums about Computer Audio is bit transparent. The theory is simple: it’s getting the bits from the Hard Drive out of the computer without them being manipulated/changed in any way.
I’ve tried many music playing apps and they all seem to sound subtly different. Even different releases of iTunes are reported to sort different. Life is far to short to bother to try different releases. As they say tried it once and didn’t like it.
For convenience for quick playback I tend to use VLC www.videolan.org. It seems to play almost everything audio and video and can even stream stuff over my network. It works well for Radio Paradise too.
Times Online reports younger music fans deaf
Jonathan Berger, Professor of Music at Stanford University, California has theorised that young people are getting used to the sound of MP3s to the point where they are beginning to prefer the sound . For the past eight years his students have taken part in an experiment in which they listen to songs in a variety of different forms, including MP3s. “I found not only that MP3s were not thought of as low quality, but over time there was a rise in preference for MP3s,” Professor Berger said.