Robert Deutsch

When it comes to amplifiers, ya gotcher tubes, yer solid-states, and yer hybrids. Although amplifier manufacturers would have you believe otherwise, the majority of designs within each category are variations on a few fairly-well-known themes. Everyone agrees that the power supply is extremely important. Most designers try to obtain the amplifier's desired frequency response and distortion characteristics with a minimum of negative feedback. It's also agreed—at least among designers of solid-state amps—that the ability to drive a variety of speakers, including those that present a low-impedance and/or reactive load, is an important priority.

After I'd concluded my critical listening sessions with the PS Audio Stellar M700s that I review elsewhere in this issue, I got a call from Dave Morrison of IsoAcoustics, in Markham, Ontario, makers of the Gaia loudspeaker isolation feet. He told me that they had a new product, the Orea, that applies to audio electronics—preamps, power amps, DACs—the isolation technology used in the Gaia.

Although PS Audio's Stellar M700 monoblock power amplifier ($2998/pair) is a brand-new design from a team led by engineer Darren Myers, it draws on the company's extensive experience with class-D amplification. Sam Tellig and Kalman Rubinson reviewed PSA's HCA-2 power amp in, respectively, the October and December 2002 issues, and I reviewed their GCC-100 integrated amp in January 2006. The Stellar M700's input stage is the latest version of PS Audio's Gain Cell, which they describe as a "proprietary, fully differential, zero feedback, discrete, class-A MOSFET circuit.

If you do a Google search for "loudspeaker" combined with "full-range," "line source," "one-way," and "modular," you'll get results that match some, but not all, of the characteristics of the Ruel Audio R7. The Audience ClearAudient 16+16 comes the closest, with 16 drivers firing forward and 16 to the back, but its small full-range drivers are supplemented with eight 6x9" passive radiators, and it does not have modular construction. Plus, it appears not to be in production. For that matter, Google misses Ruel, but it has been granted a provisional patent.

The Toronto Audio Video Entertainment Show (TAVES) has changed its venue. The show that now bills itself "North America's ULTIMATE Technology & Hi-Fi Show" has moved from the suburban Sheraton/Best Western location of the past two years to the Toronto Congress Centre, near the airport.

Why the move? Suave Kajko, President of TAVES, cites several reasons: the venue wanted to literally double the price for the large rooms; the Best Western hotel was the source of many complaints from exhibitors, and, in any case, is scheduled for demolition, and the show was bursting at the seams in terms of space (they didn't have enough space for booth exhibitors).

IsoAcoustics Inc. has its head office in Ontario and its manufacturing facilities in China, and is headed by Dave Morrison, who for 20 years has been involved in designing radio and television studios for the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation. The IsoAcoustics products are the result of this experience. Although relatively new on the consumer-audio market, IsoAcoustics' speaker-isolation products have gained wide acceptance in pro audio; their client list of recording and mastering studios includes Blackbird (Nashville), Mastering Palace (NYC), Flux (NYC), United Recording (LA), the Boston Symphony Orchestra, Skywalker Ranch, and Abbey Road.

One never knows, do one? Within the past year, I've had six preamplifiers in my system for critical evaluation, reviewing four of them and using another two as references. I was getting pretty tired of listening for sonic differences among preamps, and I told JA that I'd prefer my next reviewing assignment to be something different, like a speaker or a power amp. He agreed, but said he'd first like me to review just one more preamp, the Perfectionist Audio CPR/TIPS, which had been waiting patiently in the review queue in Santa Fe. Well, one more wouldn't hurt. Sounded kind of interesting, anyway: a preamp with a battery-operated power supply!