LATEST ADDITIONS

I'm so glad that Venture of Belgium and Singapore has a new line of cabling, because it gave me an excuse to hear Reference Recordings' "Pie Jesu" from the Rutter Requiem as I've never heard it before. I was blown away by the huge dynamics, room fixture-shaking bass, mind-boggling clarity of the massed voices, and sheer beauty of the sound. Gorgeous.

Crystal Cable, headed by Gabi Rijnveld, has just released a new cable line called Absolute Dream. The core is 100% mono-crystal silver, the braid mono-crystal silver-plated copper and gold-plated silver. Rijnveld (right), pictured with her husband Edwin of Siltech, claims that Absolute Dream is some of the fastest cable on the market.

The Margules electronics and loudspeakers brand, long established in Mexico, is poised to make a big splash in the US. Picked up by Tempo High Fidelity, the same folks who distribute dCS, Verity, and Musical Fidelity, Margules will open ears once people hear their U280SC tube amplifier ($3900). Shown with the company's principal/designer, Julian Margules, the U280SC is a 23-year old design that now uses new transformers and semiconductors. A full class-A design that is claimed to be nearly as efficient as class-A/B—you can touch the tubes—the amp puts out 80Wpc in ultralinear mode (or 160W if two are strapped for mono) and 40Wpc in triode mode. The amp is so versatile that you can even have one channel output ultralinear, and the other triode. No bias adjustment is necessary.

Surprise, surprise, at least for me. Pipeline, RadioShack's high-end cabling line, is manufactured by no less an entity than AudioQuest. Bill Boyer, Sr. VP (left) and Milton Perez, National Sales Manager (right), gave an idea of the price range when they explained that a 4 foot HDMI cable retails for $49.

Nagra of Switzerland debuted its new Jazz preamplifier complete with ACPS II power supply ($12,500). This replacement for the PL-L line level preamplifier, shown with the company's Hi-Fi Director Jean-Pascal Panchard, melds tube technology with an improved circuit design that is said to yield more open and detailed sound. As important, the input and output jacks are now on the back panel instead of the sides! A review of the Jazz is scheduled to appear in the April 2013 issue of Stereophile.

Esoteric unveiled the handsome C-03X stereo linestage preamplifier ($13,500). A fully balanced dual-mono design, it boasts a low-impedance, fast-response power circuit comprised of three transformers. So new that it was only available in static display at CES, it will soon be accompanied by an MM/MC-compatible phono module.

Axiss Audio’s attractive setup at the Venetian highlighted AirTight's huge ATM-3011 monoblock amplifiers ($50,000/pair). The amps were part of a system that included the Focal Scala loudspeakers ($30,000), Transrotor Rondino turntable ($14,000), SME V tonearm ($5,000), AirTight PC-1 moving-coil cartridge ($11,000), AirTight ATC-2 line preamplifier ($11,000), AirTight ATE-2 phono stage ($15,000), and ATH02 step-up transformer ($5,000). The sound was involving and dynamic.