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When I was a Kid Hi-Fi Crazy many years ago, "specs" were really important to me and to all of my Kid Hi-Fi Crazy friends. Being kids, we naturally had no money, and couldn't afford to buy anything—or at least not anything that wasn't either a kit or second-hand. Even so, we were all very... Read More »

A friend of mine was looking at these Sophia Electric vacuum tubes, and she told me "They're so pretty, they look like works of art."  These Sophia Electric vacuum tubes really are works of vacuum tube art. The Sophia Electric 45 mesh plate triode (above) and Aqua 274B rectifier (below) vacuum tubes are not only... Read More »

Clark Johnsen  New Old Stock - Articles from Our Days in Print The topic of acoustic polarity, also known as Absolute Polarity, has cropped up again recently. No surprise—since 1962 it's lingered in the professional literature, where most researchers claim that polarity matters greatly. But today, who cares? For that sorry state of affairs, you... Read More »

Edward Pong Edward Pong is the owner of UltraAnalogue Recordings. Those in the high-end reel-to-reel community will need no introduction to Ed; his stellar RTR recordings are magnificent, and really embody the sorts of audio virtues that audiophiles can appreciate all day long. As a very long-time RTR lover myself, I asked Ed to write... Read More »

The lapping of the bay, the wind through fallen tree. Birds of the sea and the land. It is all music gifted to us by nature. We use our nature to make music, and we cannot forget that nature exists within us all. I recognize the face in the mirror despite the grey flecks in... Read More »

Part 1: TECHNOLOGY In the 1990s, the music industry moved from reel-to-reel recorders, both analog and digital, to DAW recording systems, i.e. computer workstations. The Alesis ELECTRONICS ADAT digital multi-track tape recorders represent a turning point in this history. Digital Sound Recording—an audio preservation method in which the audio signals are converted into a series... Read More »

Norman Varney of AV RoomService Ltd. has joined Positive Feedback as a Senior Technical Editor as of Issue 113. His expertise in his field of audio acoustics and experience in the field makes him a helpful voice in our creative community for the audio arts. As has been our wont from the beginning of PF,... Read More »

If you stop to think about it, you'll see that all of everything about our hobby—the music we love, the gear we give so much of our wealth and interest to, and the rooms we listen in—is about vibration. The recorded music we listen to is a vibration in the air caused by the vibration... Read More »

Norman Varney of AV RoomService Ltd. has joined Positive Feedback as a Senior Technical Editor as of Issue 113. His expertise in his field of audio acoustics and experience in the field makes him a helpful voice in our creative community for the audio arts. As has been our wont from the beginning of PF,... Read More »

If you're a serious audiophile, one of the things you can be certain of is that you're eventually going to have a problem. If you're lucky, it might just be that something in your system breaks or, like tubes and some other kinds of electrical or mechanical parts, eventually wears out. If you're less lucky,... Read More »

Roger Skoff writes about what might be the future of our hobby So what do you do when there's nothing to do? That's what a whole lot of us have had to figure out over most of the last year. Without restaurants, the movies, sports, concerts or other live music, without parties, the gym, or... Read More »

Or, why recordings don't always sound the same. We listen to music in various conditions, sometimes loud, sometimes quietly. However, in order to hear what is really there, we have to take into account, how it was mixed and mastered. I don't know if you pay attention to the fact that a given album sounds... Read More »

  Is He Rip, a Penny, or Moby Dick? Like the proverbial "bad penny," I keep turning up. I think our PF world could suffer another grizzled audio old-timer, so I've decided to make an inauspicious return to the fold. My reasons are many—some high-minded and altruistic, some low-minded and selfish. You needn't know which... Read More »

I have three great products to bring to your attention at the end of 2020. Listen up! Amazing Vacuum Tube Alert: GE 6189 (12AU7) JAN NOS The military/industrial NOS GE 6189 tube is a premium quality 12AU7 tube with an added internal helical wire that strengthens the grid structure and dampens vibration and noise. This... Read More »

This curious tale of low-end wires in a very high-end system to be filed in the "Things I Can't Explain" folder, is directed at keen observers with highly resolving, neutral systems. Not everyone will relate. Back in 2011, when I had installed the YG Acoustics Anat Studio speakers, my dealer gave me a spiel about... Read More »

Roger Skoff writes about audiophiles and double-blind testing. Yup, I was on Facebook, browsing one of the audiophile groups (you'll probably know which one from what I'm about to tell you) when I came across a slugfest between a long-time reviewer friend of mine and several "rationalist" "audiophiles" (Yeah, both of those terms are in... Read More »

It is the story of birth of digital audio, as well as a journey through the 1970s and 1980s, the best period in the history of digital recorders, and finally the story of their unique representatives; reel-to-tape recorders from Mitsubishi. (Part 1 can be found HERE) DIGITAL SOUND RECORDING method of preserving sound in which... Read More »

Roger Skoff writes about how systems really work, and why that can be a problem Roger Skoff (photograph and image processing by David W. Robinson) Many years ago, upon learning that my sister had no home music source other than her television set and a table radio, I decided to buy her a stereo system.... Read More »

One of the audiophile "tweaks" most often criticized on the internet and in back-room bull sessions is the use of cable lifters to improve system sound. In fact, other than cables, themselves, which are a perennial source of audiophile controversy, there's hardly anything I can think of that gets more consistently negative commentary, with or... Read More »