The Latest Features
Klipsch Reference R-820F Loudspeakers
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- Written by Roger Kanno Roger Kanno
- Category: Full-Length Equipment Reviews Full-Length Equipment Reviews
- Created: 15 September 2019 15 September 2019
Note: Measurements taken in the anechoic chamber at Canada's National Research Council can be found through this link.
In over 20 years of writing for the SoundStage! Network websites, I can’t recall our ever having reviewed a Klipsch loudspeaker (we may have -- my memory isn’t what it used to be), unless you count the Heritage Wireless Three, recently reviewed at SoundStage! Simplifi, or the headphone models reviewed on SoundStage! Solo. This is surprising, considering Klipsch’s long, rich history and excellent reputation in high-end audio circles, and their success in the budget market.
EAT3: European Audio Team, Exceptional Audio Tubes, Expensive Audio Tubes
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- Written by Doug Schneider Doug Schneider
- Category: Monthly Column Monthly Column
- Created: 01 September 2019 01 September 2019
This summer I conducted an experiment that I hoped would answer a question that’s been on my mind ever since I heard that European Audio Team (EAT)’s KT88 Diamond vacuum tube would be made widely available in North America through their distributor, Vana Ltd., at the hefty price of $1795 USD for a factory-matched box of four (the KT88 Diamond is not available singly). Would it make sense to replace the eight output tubes in my pair of JE Audio VM60 monoblock amplifiers ($6400/pair when I reviewed them in 2013), whose stock tubes are already of decent quality, with an octet of third-party tubes costing $3590?
Focal Spectral 40th Loudspeakers
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- Written by Diego Estan Diego Estan
- Category: Full-Length Equipment Reviews Full-Length Equipment Reviews
- Created: 01 September 2019 01 September 2019
Note: Measurements taken in the anechoic chamber at Canada's National Research Council can be found through this link.
I’ve long been intrigued by Focal loudspeakers, but while I’d heard them at audio shows, I’d never had a pair in my listening room. My curiosity is always piqued by a speaker maker that manages to produce what is arguably one of the finest speakers in the world, the Grande Utopia EM Evo ($229,000 USD per pair), as well as models that most audio enthusiasts can afford -- not to mention Focal’s lines of headphones, and professional and car-audio products.
Will the CD Make a Comeback?
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- Written by Ken Kessler Ken Kessler
- Category: SoundStage! UK SoundStage! UK
- Created: 01 September 2019 01 September 2019
While I have no idea what the quotidian existence is for my fellow audio scribes, I seem to have a lot of traffic through my listening room. Most obviously, there are visits from manufacturers delivering, installing, and then collecting review equipment, but there’s also a steady flow of “civilians.” That is not a pejorative term; it’s merely my way of identifying people not employed in the hi-fi business who drop by, and that includes a number of friends, audiophiles, or acquaintances eager to hear a high-end system.
Recommended Reference Component: KEF R11 Loudspeakers
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- Written by SoundStage! Hi-Fi Editors SoundStage! Hi-Fi Editors
- Category: Components Components
- Created: 01 September 2019 01 September 2019
KEF’s latest generation of R Series loudspeakers, introduced in 2018, includes four main stereo models: the stand-mounted R3 ($1999.98) and three floorstanders, the R5 ($2799.98), the R7 ($3799.98), and the R11 ($4999.98). (All prices per pair, USD.) Last month, in Diego Estan’s review of the R11 for this site, he declared, “you’d be hard-pressed to find a better speaker at the price.”
EISA’s Best Product 2019-2020 Awards
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- Written by EISA Staff EISA Staff
- Category: General General
- Created: 15 August 2019 15 August 2019
Welcome to our announcement of the Best Product 2019-2020 awards, selected by the Expert Imaging and Sound Association. EISA originated in 1982, when five European photography magazines got together to agree on one make and model of camera as their choice for Best Product for that year. Since then, EISA’s reach has expanded far beyond photography -- it is now an international group of more than 60 print and online publications that variously cover photography, hi-fi, home theater, mobile electronics, and car audio, and that each year presents awards in all of those categories. In 2018, SoundStage! Hi-Fi became the third North American publication to be invited to join EISA, alongside Stereophile and Sound & Vision. (At the end of this article is a link to a YouTube video we produced in which Paul Miller, president of EISA, talks about the organization.)
KEF R11 Loudspeakers
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- Written by Diego Estan Diego Estan
- Category: Full-Length Equipment Reviews Full-Length Equipment Reviews
- Created: 15 August 2019 15 August 2019
Note: Measurements taken in the anechoic chamber at Canada's National Research Council can be found through this link.
I first heard KEF’s R Series R11 speakers, however briefly, when reporting on the Montréal Audio Fest for SoundStage! Access. Show demos being inconsistent at best, I wasn’t sure what to make of the R11s, which sounded a bit bright. Then again, the exhibitor was playing them way too loud -- I wondered what they’d sound like in my own listening room.
Heaven 11: Here Today -- But Here to Stay?
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- Written by Doug Schneider Doug Schneider
- Category: Monthly Column Monthly Column
- Created: 01 August 2019 01 August 2019
Debut
Almost every hi-fi show presents a surprising number of startup companies showing a new product, or even a whole suite of new models. But by the time next year’s show rolls around, most of these companies have gone out of business.
Revel PerformaBe M126Be Loudspeakers
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- Written by Philip Beaudette Philip Beaudette
- Category: Full-Length Equipment Reviews Full-Length Equipment Reviews
- Created: 01 August 2019 01 August 2019
Note: Measurements taken in the anechoic chamber at Canada's National Research Council can be found through this link.
Nearly four years ago, I reviewed Revel’s Performa3 M106 minimonitor ($2000 USD per pair). I was impressed by its nicely balanced, well-controlled, squeaky-clean sound -- traits it shared with every other Revel speaker I’ve heard. More recently, someone at Revel had the idea of putting this model and its bigger brother, the floorstanding Performa3 F208, on steroids. Every component part was redesigned, the prices were doubled, and they were made the first and, so far, only members of a new Revel line, PerformaBe. The results began shipping last year: the PerformaBe M126Be minimonitor ($4000/pair) and the PerformaBe F228Be floorstander ($10,000/pair). When Doug Schneider asked if I wanted to review the M126Be, I acceded to his request without hesitation.
Amazing Values: Audiolab 6000A Integrated Amplifier-DAC and 6000CDT CD Transport
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- Written by Doug Schneider Doug Schneider
- Category: System One System One
- Created: 01 August 2019 01 August 2019
Last March, when I mentioned to some colleagues that the market in integrated amplifiers costing less than $1000 is “owned by a few companies,” I was aware that fewer manufacturers these days focus on low-priced integrateds, and of those that do, only a handful come up among our reviewing team. In our minds, Audiolab wasn’t one of those brands. It should have been.
