Recommended Reference Component: KEF LS60 Wireless Speaker System
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- Written by SoundStage! Hi-Fi Editors SoundStage! Hi-Fi Editors
- Category: Components Components
- Created: 15 September 2022 15 September 2022
In Gordon Brockhouse’s enthusiastic August 1 review of the KEF LS60 Wireless speaker system on SoundStage! Simplifi, he called it a “landmark product” and wondered if it would “be named a SoundStage! Network Product of the Year,” as its predecessor, KEF’s LS50 minimonitor, was in 2012. Gordon went so far as to say: “Ten years hence, might we think of the LS60 Wireless as audio’s Product of the Decade for the 2020s?” To the best of our knowledge, Gordon has never spoken so highly of a product before.
Recommended Reference Component: Sumiko Oyster Wellfleet Phono Cartridge
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- Written by SoundStage! Hi-Fi Editors SoundStage! Hi-Fi Editors
- Category: Components Components
- Created: 15 August 2022 15 August 2022
Some products that are recognized with a Recommended Reference Component award are expensive; for example, last month’s winner, the Gryphon Audio Designs Apex Stereo amplifier, is priced at $99,000 (all prices in USD). That product can be considered to be a reference component when cost is no object. But a lower-priced product can also receive this award if it is the best—or at least, among the best—for its price. The Sumiko Oyster Wellfleet moving-magnet cartridge, which Thom Moon reviewed for SoundStage! Access last month, is such a product.
Recommended Reference Component: Gryphon Audio Designs Apex Stereo Amplifier
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- Written by SoundStage! Hi-Fi Editors SoundStage! Hi-Fi Editors
- Category: Components Components
- Created: 01 July 2022 01 July 2022
“Fortune favors the bold” is a well-known proverb that could certainly apply to Gryphon Audio Designs, a super-successful Danish hi-fi company known for making bold statements with its products. The industrial design of Gryphon components often makes them look menacing but beautiful; they’re big, well-built, great-sounding, and expensive. The latest example of the company’s bold approach is the Apex Stereo amplifier, which Jeff Fritz reviewed for SoundStage! Ultra in May.
Recommended Reference Component: Simaudio Moon 310LP Phono Preamplifier
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- Written by SoundStage! Hi-Fi Editors SoundStage! Hi-Fi Editors
- Category: Components Components
- Created: 01 June 2022 01 June 2022
Simaudio’s Moon 310LP phono preamplifier has been on the market for more than ten years—it was introduced in 2010 in a smaller case than you see today, then updated in 2016 to its current form with some improvements to the circuitry and a new look. Like all of the Canadian company’s products, the 310LP is made in-house in Boucherville, Quebec.
Recommended Reference Component: Monitor Audio Silver 300 7G Loudspeakers
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- Written by SoundStage! Hi-Fi Editors SoundStage! Hi-Fi Editors
- Category: Components Components
- Created: 01 May 2022 01 May 2022
In March 2022, we presented the Monitor Audio Silver 500 7G loudspeaker with a Recommended Reference Component award. Philip Beaudette had reviewed the speaker on this site the month before, when it received a Reviewers’ Choice award. Dennis Burger reviewed Monitor Audio’s Silver 300 7G, the 500 7G’s little brother, on SoundStage! Access in March 2022, where it too earned a Reviewers’ Choice award. Now, like its sibling, we’re presenting the Silver 300 7G with a Recommended Reference Component award as well, because it performs to an equally high standard.
Recommended Reference Component: Saturn Audio 401 Phono Preamplifier
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- Written by SoundStage! Hi-Fi Editors SoundStage! Hi-Fi Editors
- Category: Components Components
- Created: 01 April 2022 01 April 2022
Canadian manufacturer Saturn Audio was founded in Cambridge, Ontario, in 2017, so it’s a relative newcomer to the hi-fi scene. The 401, which Jason Thorpe reviewed last month, is the only phono preamplifier the company makes. Despite its mere half-decade existence, the company boasts “100 years of professional experience.” This includes the circuit-designing talents of Gilbert Yeung, who founded Blue Circle Audio in the 1990s, and the manufacturing experience of Saturn Audio’s president, René Evans.
Recommended Reference Component: Monitor Audio Silver 500 7G Loudspeakers
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- Written by Philip Beaudette Philip Beaudette
- Category: Components Components
- Created: 01 March 2022 01 March 2022
Last month, we published Philip Beaudette’s review of a pair of Monitor Audio Silver 500 7G loudspeakers on this site. In that article, he declared: “Monitor Audio has been on a roll lately, if the number of its product launches offers any evidence to support such a cliché.” The company’s roster of new products includes the seventh generation of loudspeakers in its Silver Series, with the 500 7G as the flagship model.
Recommended Reference Component: Meze Audio Elite Headphones
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- Written by SoundStage! Hi-Fi Editors SoundStage! Hi-Fi Editors
- Category: Components Components
- Created: 01 February 2022 01 February 2022
In Brent Butterworth’s April 2019 review of the Meze Audio Empyrean headphones on SoundStage! Solo, he declared that they “clearly rank among the very best headphones you can buy.” The Empyreans were—and still are—$2999 (all prices in USD), and because of Brent’s praise, they earned Reviewers’ Choice, Recommended Reference Component, and Product of the Year (2019) awards.
Recommended Reference Component: Focal Celestee Headphones
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- Written by SoundStage! Hi-Fi Editors SoundStage! Hi-Fi Editors
- Category: Components Components
- Created: 01 January 2022 01 January 2022
In Brent Butterworth’s SoundStage! Solo review of the Focal Celestee headphones ($999, all prices in USD), which was published in September 2021, he wrote that the French brand’s headphones are “the opposite of AC/DC albums.” He then explained his reasoning: “AC/DC albums look different but sound the same. Focal headphones look the same but sound different.” Brent knows the Focal line well, because he’s also reviewed the company’s Clear, Elegia, Stellia, and Utopia headphones for Solo.
Recommended Reference Component: PSB Synchrony B600 Loudspeakers
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- Written by SoundStage! Hi-Fi Editors SoundStage! Hi-Fi Editors
- Category: Components Components
- Created: 01 December 2021 01 December 2021
Paul Barton, founder and chief designer of PSB Speakers, has been designing speakers of all shapes and sizes since 1972. That wealth of experience shows in the company’s latest offerings: the Synchrony T600, a floorstander priced at $7999/pair (all prices in USD), and the Synchrony B600, a standmounted design priced at $2499/pair. Optional stands for the B600 are available for $599/pair. Diego Estan reviewed a pair of B600s on this site last month and advised that readers shopping for standmounted speakers “absolutely must audition a pair of PSB Synchrony B600s,” because when they do, they’ll likely “see no reason to keep searching.”
