Brutus Awards 2019 - Positive Feedback

Port and a Cigar at Night on a Deck. Happy Valley, OR, 2019

And now, on to the final chapter of my Positive Feedback Brutus Awards for 2019.

Clarus Concerto AC Power Conditioner and Clarus Aqua High Current Power Cable

A relative latecomer for 2019 Brutus Award consideration was the combination of the Clarus Concerto and the Clarus Aqua on the power conditioning and power cabling side of things. Given the number of sources and components that we have here, in four different listening areas, a superior AC power conditioner/distributor is always welcome. Thus, when Clarus Cables got in touch with me about their Concerto, to be accompanied by their Clarus Aqua AC Power Cable, I was quite willing to give it a go.

The Clarus Concerto/Clarus Aqua (top right corner) in action with a variety of high-end power cables for a real workout. From bottom center and working our way up, JENA Labs (Yellow), Furutech, Synergistic Research, JENA Labs (Green), Synergistic Research, Skogrand, and Clarus Crimson.

I can cut to the chase: I have spent the past several months listening to the Concerto/Clarus Aqua in our reference office/desktop system. In that time, it has proven itself to be a fine performer, definitely at the general level of quality as our other reference products in this category: Synergistic Research (which is currently setting the bar), Furutech, Kubala-Sosna, Walker Audio, and JENA Labs.

And that's all I needed to confirm. Concerto/Aqua are riding well in very high company.

Therefore, here are couple of 2019 Brutus Award for Clarus Cables.

Furutech/ADL STRATOS DAC

Furutech NCF Booster Cable Isolation & Management System

Furutech destat III LP Demagnetizer

Well, here's no less than a threesome for Furutech.

First up, their Alpha Design Labs (ADL) STRATOS comes up in the mix again here at PF River-City-and-up-the-hill.

The Furutech/Alpha Design Labs STRATOS DAC (image courtesy of Furutech)

It was time for a revisit.

I had occasion early in 2019 to put the STRATOS online with our new Dell Precision T7920 Workstation, a real fire-breather for all of the work that I have to do here. But it also has to act as home base for JRiver's Media Center 25 (and now 26), not to mention a number of other audio-related tasks with our various DACs and streamers online at PF Center.

The Furutech ADL/STRATOS is a compact, powerful DAC with an excellent set of features and a very attractive price point of $1399. (You can read the general product description and specifications HERE.) It supports DSD out to DSD256 in native mode, and PCM out to 384kHz/24-32 bit. No MQA, though, and no streaming.

But it does have headphone amp and phono amp capabilities, which add noticeably to its charm. If you're running tight on space/budget, there's an awful lot here to like.

The sound is really quite good. Nicely dynamic, excellent detail, and solid harmonic integration, all of which is quite gratifying in such a compact and affordable package. In many weeks of listening, I was reminded of how pleasant it was to have the STRATOS in the loop again in our office system…enough to give it one of my Brutus Awards here in 2019.

The Furutech NCF Booster System upon arrival in PFville

Speaking of handy and dandy, the Furutech NCF Booster system combines advanced materials science and its application to high-end audio with an extremely intelligent, flexible method of organizing your cables. There are a number of configurations, holders, and extensions that you can purchase to address the requirements of your home system. I've tried a handful of these, and appreciate the superior configurability of Furutech's solutions. When you're handling a ton of audio review projects, it really helps to get this level of improvement without having to compromise on the physical setup and routing of your cables.

A Furutech NCF Booster in action with one of our integrated amps in our office reference system. It's resting on a Walker Audio Prologue Amp Stand in Maple.

It is quite clarifying to the sound any time that I'm able to put Furutech NCF Boosters into the mix with our various cables here. There's a smudging and fuzzing of the music…something that you don't realize if you don't know the difference…when cables are simply laying on the floor. When the NCF Boosters are used, I immediately hear an improvement, with the sound becoming more focused and transparent.

The latest generation of NCF Booster products have really impressed me this year, and so I've given Furutech another Brutus Award here in 2019.

The Furutech destat III: light, powerful, quick, and easy to use (image courtesy of Furutech)

Finally, the Furutech destat III arrived in 2019. This is an old friend; the destat series has been here in its generations for many years now. I've been using the Furutech destat III on a lot of LPs this year, plus some of my turntable setups (platters and tonearms). SACDs, too. (This is in addition to other degaussing/demagging gear that we have here, of course.) It is powered by four AA batteries residing in the handle.

Furutech has increased the power of the ionic static-removal charges in the III, which is able to zap the stat in a mere 15-second cycle. No need to manually hold a switch and count; hitting the activation button fires up the fan and ionic generators automatically. An indicator light comes on as evidence of operation. At the end of the application, the destat III shuts off. Nice.

The unit is portable and quite comfortable in the hand. Sonics are improved by lifting the haze and shimmer that a static charge can introduce to high-end audio playback.

No doubt about it: the Furutech destat III is the best destat yet in Furutech's long history of anti-static product development.

So here's one of my 2019 Brutus Awards in recognition of continued progress at Furutech. Keep up the great work!