Following my first three episodes from this year's event, these wrap-up event episodes bring you my final three sets of coverage, each addressing three remarkable rooms. Can you say World Premieres? In this episode, I explore the world premiere of the Kronos Discover Phono stage, the Göble Divin Comtesse loudspeakers, and Alon Wolf's Magico S5... Read More »
While AXPONA represents the largest hi-fi show in the US, High End Munich, held each May at Munich's monstrous Order Center, is the largest, most well-attended audio show on planet Earth! With the first of my episodes from this year's event, episode 175, I've included a virtual walk from the stairway in front of the... Read More »
David W. Robinson and Greg Weaver: Audio buds from way-back! Long Valley, NJ, 2023. (photograph by Bill Parish) I make no excuses for being able to listen to my music daily on a synergistic two-channel audio system that I've assembled over the decades, one that costs more than three times what I paid for my... Read More »
New from the audio analyst© for re-publication in Positive Feedback – Virtual AXPONA 2024 If you've never been to an audio show, especially one as large and comprehensive as the foremost, most successful show in the continental US, AXPONA, which is an acronym made from Audio eXPO NOrth America, held annually at the Renaissance Schaumburg... Read More »
With this episode of the audio analyst©, "Episode 167: Southwest Audio Fest 2024-Best Rooms - High End by Oz," I’m highlighting the remarkable sonic achievements of Room 1401 at that show. It was sponsored by 3mA, a Houston retail establishment, United Home Audio, and High End by Oz. This is the first of several in-room... Read More »
My fascination with and appreciation of Beethoven's work began even before my relatively formal introduction to his vast body of work and influence on Western music which came in junior high school, where I not only had Miss Bloom's music class once a week throughout the 7th, 8th, and 9th grades, but also sat in... Read More »
Among the more popular topics receiving vigorous traction on social media and public forums are discussions about the derisive and conflicting beliefs and approaches on how to clean and maintain our record collections. For those of us old-school audiophiles, aging stalwarts who have NEVER not known the benefits and caveats of vinyl playback, such processes... Read More »
Just How Close to World-Class Performance Can You Get for $3950? Perspective Before I acquaint you with what an emphatically notable performer the Hana Umami Red Moving Coil phono cartridge represents in today's blustering moving coil cartridge roster, permit me a brief foray into the background of the phono cartridge. There are two primary types... Read More »
As part of Positive Feedback's "New Old Stock" [NOS] series of reprints, Greg Weaver's article from 1997 is presented as a significant article worthy of renewed presentation here. This article was originally written in 1988 and appeared in Volume 1, Issue 2, of the audio analyst©, Winter 1989. It was updated and re-published in Volume... Read More »
Greg Weaver checking out...Greg Weaver! AXPONA 2023 was as stirring a success as portended! Here is a link to my promotional episode highlighting the then upcoming 2023 Audio eXPo North America event. https://youtu.be/39Xda-_nCao Now that it is in the books, I can't believe how many of you stopped me in the halls to say hello... Read More »
David W. Robinson, Editor-in-Chief of Positive Feedback, with Greg Weaver of the audio analyst and a Senior Associate Editor at Positive Feedback in New Jersey for the GTT Audio Vivid Audio launch event. (Photograph by Bill Parish; image processing by David W. Robinson.) The first weekend in March saw a substantial press event hosted by GTT Audio... Read More »
Classy Operation A class-D amplifier, or switching amplifier, all too often mistakenly referred to as a "digital" amplifier, differs from the much more traditional and popular linear amplifier classes. In a switching amplifier, its transistors, usually MOSFETs (Metal–Oxide–Semiconductor Field-Effect Transistors), rather than directly providing gain to the sourced signal, operate as electronic switches. The audio... Read More »
David Crosby, If I Could Only Remember My Name. Mobile Fidelity Sound Lab, MFSL 2-496, Original Master Recording, Gain 2™ Ultra Analog, 2 x 12" 45 RPM SuperVinyl™ 180g LPs, Numbered Limited Edition, Numbered, Reissue, Remastered, Gatefold, 2022 First up...the spring 2022 Mobile Fidelity Sound Lab, 2 X 45 RPM, limited, numbered remastered reissue on... Read More »
Some viewers of our first conversation on my YouTube channel, the audio analyst© "Episode 89: Andreas Koch and Digital Recording" (https://youtu.be/eH-WW5s3NBM), which dropped on September 25th of this year, suggested that the information he shared was not only utterly fascinating, but was actually revelatory. With that in mind, Andreas was kind enough to join me... Read More »
Greg Weaver of the audio analyst and I have been working to extend our readers/viewers understanding of DSD at all levels, including the use of DSD256 in the production of LPs, such as Mobile Fidelity has been doing for a number of years now. Other companies like ABKCO have done the same in projects like... Read More »
The ocean swells of the recent controversy about Mobile Fidelity and its unannounced (until now) use of DSD256 continue to roil, whether useful or not. Greg Weaver and I had a long conversation about this, provenance, processing, and the (to my mind) vital role that DSD256 has to play in the future of analog LP... Read More »
James Gang, Bang, SD 7037, ATCO Records, 1973 By the end of the 1960s, following the emergence of such dynamic UK-based trios as Cream and the Jimi Hendrix Experience, one of the brightest trios to appear on the subsequent American scene was the James Gang. Though founded by drummer Jim Fox in 1966 with fellow... Read More »
I can’t imagine that there are too many readers of this journal who will not be familiar with, or at least aware of, the renowned 1981 landmark guitar trio release, Friday Night in San Francisco. Treasured by music lovers and audiophiles alike, jazz author and critic Walter Kolosky has proclaimed it “…the most influential of... Read More »
Three weeks ago, I had the pleasure of introducing you to the two new KRONOS Resonance Suppression tonearms, the Kronoscope RS and the Discovery RS. In that episode's interview with Louis Desjardins, recorded in his factory in Montreal, he indicated that he would be sending me one of the new Discovery RS arms to install... Read More »