Herb Reichert

Digital Processor Reviews Gramophone Dreams

Gramophone Dreams #60: Denafrips Terminator Plus, Denafrips Gaia, HoloAudio Spring 3

Herb Reichert May 03, 2022

The week before Christmas, I invited my artist friend Joe to visit my studio to see my 2021 paintings. To spice the invitation, I told Joe that while he was looking he could audition the newest flagship DAC from Denafrips, the Terminator Plus.

My Back Pages

Magic Picture Shows

Herb Reichert Apr 06, 2022

Axiomatically, audiophile audio is about quality of reproduced sound. Experientially thoughfor me at leastit's about visions in the mind's eye. The older I get, the more attentively I listen to recordings, the more importance I assign to the myriad moving pictures I see between my speakers.

Gramophone Dreams Stand Loudspeaker Reviews

Gramophone Dreams #59: the Ojas System, EJ Jordan Marlow loudspeaker

Herb Reichert Mar 22, 2022

Look closely at the audio system in the photo. It belongs to my friend, and fellow audio seeker, Devon Turnbull (aka Ojas). Notice every object in the room, particularly the arrangement of amplifiers, and turntables, and that awesome herd of cartridges on the table in front of the listening chair.

Stand Loudspeaker Reviews

Vivid Kaya S12 loudspeaker

Herb Reichert Mar 15, 2022

Back when Steve Urkel (in the sitcom Family Matters, portrayed by Jaleel White) was showing everybody the best way to dress (and do property damage), my friend Ken Kessler, the high-level audio scribe at Hi-Fi News & Record Review, explained to me the secret of how to write a proper audio review: "Herb, the secret of writing an effective review is not to lose the reader in the middle." I took that to mean, put all the technological meatand some tawdry storiesin the product description. Then sneak some spicy double entendre into the setup part.

Unfortunately, that strategy hasn't worked for me.

Gramophone Dreams Headphone Reviews

Gramophone Dreams #58: Stax SR-X9000 headphones, EAR Phono Classic, Bob's Devices Sky 20 SUT

Herb Reichert Mar 02, 2022

A month ago, I ran into my Russian neighbor in the hall. As usual, he asked me what I was reviewing. (Vladimir likes to come over and listen, then find fault with everything I play.) When I told Vlad I had Stax's new top-of-the-line earspeaker, the SR-X9000, he lit up and exclaimed, "I need to hear it," adding that he has been a lifelong Stax fanatic and owns at least five different models, "dating way back."

Gramophone Dreams Headphone Reviews

Gramophone Dreams #57: Ferrum OOR headphone amplifier and HYPSOS power supply

Herb Reichert Feb 01, 2022

I'm deep into audio power amplifiers because they remind me of race car engines. Both power sources are wildly inefficient, converting only a small percentage of their stored energy into work while dissipating the rest as heat and vibration. Mainly though, I love how race car engines sound. How they shake the air. Just like amps and speakers.

Integrated Amp Reviews

Riviera Levante integrated amplifier

Herb Reichert Jan 27, 2022

I remember, around the time I started at Stereophile, telling Art Dudley that I wanted to review "a lot of power amplifiers" because amplifiers are the "blood-pumping heart machines" that "reanimate the artistry" of musicians: Horowitz, Björk, Bill Monroe. Whereupon he looked over his glasses and spied me with bare eyes like a stern parent and said, "Just be sure to not review any amplifiers that weigh more than 65 pounds."

Gramophone Dreams Headphone Reviews

Gramophone Dreams #56: Woo Audio 3ES preamplifier/headphone amplifier and Audeze CRBN electrostatic headphones

Herb Reichert Dec 23, 2021

At noon on a cloudless, ridiculously bright 97° day, John Atkinson and I auditioned Audeze's new-but-not-yet-released CRBN electrostatic headphones. The audition took place at a sneak preview hosted by Audeze's principal, Sankar Thiagasamudram, in a sleeping room at New York's hipster-chic Ace Hotel on 29th Street and Broadway.

Features

The Importance of Tells: Installing a Phono Cartridge By Ear

Herb Reichert Dec 08, 2021

In poker, "tells" are subtle physical or verbal actions that give away the strength of players' hands.

I am not a poker player, but I am an audiophile, and I use a variety of "tells" as my prime tools in critical listening. You know my worn-out line: "You can't hear what you're not listening for."

Digital Processor Reviews Gramophone Dreams

Gramophone Dreams #55: Mola Mola Tambaqui D/A processor

Herb Reichert Dec 02, 2021

Since the plague arrived, several of my closest audio friends have been chattering and bugging me constantly, not about masks, vaccines, Trump, or Biden but about Bruno Putzeys's digital-to-analog converter, the Mola Mola Tambaqui. They've been sending emails and texts like pesky kids:

"Herbie! Have you tried the Mola Mola? Come on man, what's taking you so long? Is Putzeys's DAC better than my MSB? Or the dCS Bartók? Or the HoloAudio May?"