Arcam Solo Music
I am an Anglophile
and a Brit-fi guy. I just am. Back in 1982 I really wanted a wood-cased A&R Cambridge A60 to drive my Rogers LS3/5a speakers. But I couldn't afford its modest price. Somewhere around then, this venerable UK company simplified their name to Arcam.
AudioQuest's New Niagara 5000
Virtually identical in appearance to the Niagara 7000the only outward differences are two little lights and one buttonAudioQuest's new 38-lb Niagara 5000 ($4000) "Low-Z Power/Noise-Dissipation System"(shown sitting atop the Niagara 7000) is one-half the price and 50 lbs lighter than its big brother.
Auris Audio
Based in Belgrade, Serbia, Auris Audio's motto is "Back to Nature"a nod to their extensive use of natural materials such as wood and leather. They offer quite a wide range of products: DACs, preamps, power amps, headphone amps, and speakers
Auris Wows HR in LV
Amplification is usually just a green circuit board in a metal box. (Yawn, snooze.) Even at the highest prices, you still get green boardsbut now those green boards are hiding their greenness in very expensive boxes
Avantgarde Zero TA
The new Avantgarde Zero TA is described as a semiactive horn system, with no crossover in the midrange signal path, and a DSP-controlled 10-band parametric subwoofer
Balanced Audio Technology's VK-56SE Amplifier
"We do have a new BAT amplifier," replied MoFi Distribution's Managing Director, Norbert Schmied, to my standard room-entry inquiry. I had drifted into the MoFi room, which was busier than most exhibit rooms at the Venetian Hotel
Bel Canto REF600M Monoblocks
It looks pro-school Paul Newman racing-driver cool, especially in black. It puts out 300W into 8 ohms and 600W into 4 ohms, and can deliver a peak output current of 27A. Did I mention each amp weighs only 15.4 pounds? (I could carry both channels home on the subway.)
Burmester 911 Amplifier and Artnovion Acoustic Panels
Robb Niemann, the CEO of Rutherford Audio, North American distributor for Burmester, had new product and new corporate news to share
Burmester Phase 3
For those of you who like all of your functions tucked away in a single shiny box, Burmester has a product for you. The main all-in-one 161 Receiver is based on the company's Music Server 151 and the system also includes the B15 speakers (not shown) and the handy empty case that sits below the active electronics. Burmester says the empty case with fold down front door (shown below) is part of the product since their customers don't like clutter and prefer to store extraneous stuff like AppleTV boxes and game consoles out of the way. I realize that probably sounds a bit pretentious to some, but it makes sense to me, since I tend to go out of my way to hide wires and power supplies.
Caged Cash
How does that saying go? What stays in Vegas
never gets back to Brooklyn? What happens in Vegas
gets blabbered in Stereophile?