Allaerts MC2 Finish Gold phono cartridge
These are great times for analog, and I'm happy to have played a small part in the revival, but recently the demand for some products has outstripped supply; getting review samples has been next to impossible. I've requested an Audio Research PH7 phono preamplifier for literally years now, but ARC can't build them fast enough, so they don't need a review. The more they sell, the greater the buzz, and the greater the buzz, the more e-mails I get from readers asking for a review. It's not nice to not be needed.
Analog Corner # 305: Degritter record cleaner & Aidas Gala Gold LE cartridge
Cavitation revolutionized record cleaning more than a decade ago, when Reiner Gläss's Audiodesksysteme introduced its original fully automatic machine. Mr. Gläss's innovative machine, which automatically spun the record in ultrasonically cavitated water, then dried it with fans, at first was plagued with reliability issues, and because it is sealed, it was not easy to repair.
Analog Corner #206: Travels, Musical Fidelity M1ViNL phono preamplifier, Clearaudio Goldfinger Statement phono cartridge
I recently spent a week traveling—it was good to get out of the basement! First up, toward the end of May, was an event at the Audio Alternative, in Fort Collins, Colorado. Owner Rick Duplisea is a vinyl fanatic and Linnie whose store—actually, his sprawling home—is packed with gear and LPs. His record collection beats mine.
Analog Corner #212: Analog Comparisons, New Phono Products from Zesto & Miyajima
How was last fall for you? Mine was crazy. I traveled much of October: the Rocky Mountain Audio Fest one weekend, emceeing Chad Kassem's Blues Masters at the Crossroads Blues Festival the next, and the week after that, appearing at two Audio Advice stores, in Raleigh and Charlotte, North Carolina. From there I traveled to Los Angeles to attend a 30th-anniversary celebration for Tron at Grauman's Chinese Theatre.
Analog Corner #214: The Ortofon MC Anna Phono Cartridge
Ortofon's limited-edition MC A90 was the first phono cartridge made with selective laser melting (SLM). Using this technique, metallic powder is fused to build up, layer by layer, a specific shape. SLM allows the creation of complex constructions impossible to fabricate from a block of wood or metal using traditional machining techniques.
Analog Corner #219: DSA Phono II preamplifier, Stein Music and Miyajima phono cartridges
Shortly after the July 2013 issue of Stereophile hit the newsstands, I received an e-mail from audio restoration expert Doug Pomeroy, who specializes in the digital preservation of disc pressing metal parts, acetates, and 78s . . . His and my opinions about digital sound couldn't be more divergent.
Analog Corner #224: Lyra Etna MC phono cartridge
Is the high-performance audio industry stagnating? Are designers simply repackaging the past? Cynics claim so, but to me it seems that making that case gets harder by the day, as a parade of veterans continue to produce their best work.
Analog Corner #230: Transfiguration Proteus MC phono cartridge
I've lost track of how many Transfiguration cartridges I've reviewed over the years. In all that time I've never met their designer, Immutable Music's Seiji Yoshioka, but every year he sends me an exceptionally tasteful holiday greeting card. I've never reciprocated. The truth isn't always pretty.
The Transfiguration cartridges I've reviewed, too, have always conveyed a midrange musical truth that hasn't been flashy or pretty. But it's always been honest and convincing, particularly of the reality of voices. If you said that the Transfigurations lacked character, you wouldn't be wrongunless you intended it as a criticism.
Analog Corner #232: HiFiction Simplicity II tonearm, Miyajima Labs Madake phono cartridge, Rogers High Fidelity PA-1A phono preamplifier
In my January 2014 column, I reviewed HiFiction's Thales TTT-Compact turntable and Simplicity tangential-tracking pivoted tonearm, an intriguing combo from Micha Huber, a talented Swiss watchmaker turned turntable designer.
The TTT-Compact's particulars, including its battery-powered motor and exceptional ease of setup, are described in detail in that review, which includes a link to a useful animation that shows how the design, as Huber says, "reduces the perfectly tangential tracking to pivot points, while the pick-up cartridge is taken and aligned on the Thales' Circle."
Suffice it to say that while the HiFiction tonearm is named Simplicity, its design is anything but.
Analog Corner #235: Kiseki & Lamm
At the 2011 Consumer Electronics Show, Herman van den Dungen handed me a surprise: a brand new Kiseki Blue cartridge manufactured from new-old-stock parts. It wasn't mine to take homeonly to look at, to prove it was real.
Herman van den Dungen may not be a household name even for audiophiles, but his products are: his PrimaLuna electronics are exported from the Netherlands to the US and distributed by tube connoisseur and collector Kevin Deal for PrimaLuna USA.
In the 1980s, Kiseki was legendary among audiophiles, even if their cartridges' prices were beyond the reach of most. But the brand's history is less well knownand younger analog devotees may not have heard of Kiseki at all.