HOT REVIEWS: The BC Acoustique A-3 speaker, an amazing tube amp from Audio Space, a ...

84 Pages·2007·11.7 MB·English

HOT REVIEWS: The BC Acoustique A-3
speaker, an amazing tube amp from Audio
Space, a triumphant return of the Sugden
A21 amp, and Bryston’s first CD player
WE ALSO COMPARE: Sony’s latest Blu-ray
unit against what may have been the
world’s best DVD player
PLUS: The missing link to connect your
computer to your stereo system, the black
art of soundproofing, and tenors that
No. 82 recording made famous
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ASW Speakers
Atlas
Audioprism
Sonneteer
Bard Audio
QED
Now available at Bay Bloor
Radio, Toronto, [phone]
Target
Vandersteen
Roksan Kandy LIII
McCormack
“The Kandy has always been good.
Harmonix
It just got a whole lot better.
Nothing can match the Kandy MKIII's WBT
transparent midrange performance”
Reimyo
What Hi-Fi?, Five-star rating
Apollo
GutWire
Audioprism
FIM Accessories
is back!
Goldring
Milty
Discwasher
Perfect Sound
Nitty Gritty
Xindek
Gradient Speakers
The Power Foundation III is now available!
LAST record care
Audioprism, you’ve been away too long.
WATTGate
Justice Audio
Audiophile CDs
J 111 Zenway Blvd., Unit 9
U
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T WOODBRIDGE, ON L4H 3H9
I Audiophile LPs
C
E Tel. : [phone] • Fax : [phone]
AUDIO www.justiceaudio.com DVD and SACD
[email protected]
Cinema
Sony Does High Definition 27
How good is the new-generation Sony Blu-Ray
player? And how well does it play DVDs?
The Listening Room
The Audio Space Reference 3.1 30
Issue No. 82 A tube amp that looks like the state of the art. We
lend it an ear.
Sugden A21A 34
Its ancestor was once featured on our cover. That
classic British class A integrated amp is back…
The Bryston BCD1 Player 38
The company is known for rock solid electronics,
but it knows a thing or two about digital
The Blue Circle Thingee 41
What is it? One word: USB.
The BC Acoustique A3 43
We’ve been looking at these French speakers for
years. Years!
Two more London Phono Cartridges 47
We actually bought the Reference model. Can the
Jubilee and Super Gold compare?
The Q Subwoofer 50
Small, potent, and remote-controlled
Two line filters 52
The Audioprism Power Foundation III, and the
Cover story: That three-way speaker is the PowerBIS
astonishing BC Acoustique A3, reviewed in this
issue. In the background, autumn treetops pose Interconnects: a Blind Test 55
without their leaves in the street just behind Château Three cables, not named in advance
Hi-Fi.
Software
From Enrico to Luciano 65
Acoustics
by Reine Lessard
The Black Magic of Soundproofing 18 The tenors that the record made famous
by Paul Bergman
Want to keep sound out? Want to keep sound in? Software Reviews 72
We can’t promise it will be easy. by Reine Lessard and Gerard Rejskind
Feature Departments
Flashback: the Age of the Catalog 23 Editorial 4
Remember when Radio Shack was somewhere you Feedback 7
bought from by mail? Free Advice 8
Gossip & News 77
State of the Art 82
ULTRA HIGH FIDELITY Magazine 3
UHF Magazine No. 82 was published in December, 2007.
All contents are copyright 2007 by Broadcast Canada. They Editorial
may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form, or by any
means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying,
recording, or any information storage or retrieval system,
without written permission from the publisher.
A final flashback
EDITORIAL & SUBSCRIPTION OFFICE: As the year of our 25th anniversary comes to an end, we publish a fourth
Broadcast Canada Flashback article, a piece of pure nostalgia.
Box 65085, Place Longueuil At least it will be for older audiophiles, ones who came
LONGUEUIL, Québec, Canada J4K 5J4 of age in the day when there were catalogs as thick as
Tel.: [phone] FAX: [phone]
those of Sears or Simpson’s, but loaded with hi-fi gear
E-mail: [email protected]
rather than lingerie and refrigerators. For younger
World Wide Web: www.uhfmag.com
audiophiles, it will be a revelation. We got our hands
PUBLISHER & EDITOR: Gerard Rejskind on some literature of years ago, and frankly we had a
good time with it. I think you will too.
ASSOCIATE EDITOR: Reine Lessard And with that, UHF moves into its 26th year of existence.
I remain excited over the years to come.
EDITORIAL: Paul Bergman, Reine Lessard, Albert Simon
Soundproofing
PRODUCT PHOTOGRAPHY: Albert Simon
Paul Bergman continues his popular series on acoustics for the home with
ADVERTISING SALES: his seventh instalment. I anticipate that this one will raise as much interest
Alberta & BC: Derek Coates [phone] as all of the previous instalments combined, because it is on the subject of
Other: Gerard Rejskind [phone] soundproofing.
The last time Paul wrote about this tricky subject was in issue No. 63. By
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Stonehouse Publications
Reading Room on the UHF Web site (www.uhfmag.com/ReadingRoom.html).
85 Chambers Drive, Unit 2, AJAX, Ont. L1Z 1E2
And you know what? Although pretty much all of our site gets a lot of traffic,
Tel.: [phone] or [phone]
one of the most requested pages is precisely the soundproofing article from
SINGLE COPY PRICE: $6.49 in Canada, $7.69 (US) in the issue No. 63. Each month, it continues to draw thousands of visitors. What’s
United States, $10.75 (CAN) elsewhere, including air mail. more, most of those visitors don’t come from our Reading Room index or
In Canada sales taxes are extra. Electronic edition: C$4.30, from our home page. They are sent to that article directly from Google,
all taxes included
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Though some of them may actually be audiophiles, my guess is that most
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ELECTRONIC EDITION: www.magzee.com In Canada everyone talks about the days when a Canadian dollar
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ISSN 0847-1851
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passive storage device. This device can
Feedback then be read without the intervention of
noisy middlemen such as laser pickups or
hard drive readers.
Box 65085, Place Longueuil Taking this hypothesis down the
Longueuil, Québec, Canada J4K 5J4 road a bit, we read our CDs, SACDs,
DVD-As, etc. onto our hard drives. We
[email protected]
then output them in a desired format
(SACD, please, but hey, CD doesn’t
Thank you for a great read and factual latest, but I have always had a hankering have to sound bad) onto a memory stick
information. I would still be listening to to know how the old favorite compares. holding up to 2 Gb. We insert the stick
crap, (or not listening), had it not been Your article will give me a pretty good directly into a configured DAC with
for your recommendations (Bryston idea, I’m sure. Thank you very much built-in song selection software that
B-60, Reference 3A, Shure, etc.). I hope indeed for it. outputs onto the DAC controller via a
you never let your standards lapse, and Toby Earp short-range, two-way radio connection.
I’ll still be reading you 20 years from MONTRÉAL, QC Glorious music, with no malignant
now. mechanical or electrical or magnetic
Long live UHF! Having just read your latest take on influences affecting it, pours out of the
John Pylypchuk iPods and high fidelity (State of the Art, DAC’s analog output. Or we might be
THUNDER BAY, ON UHF No. 81), I’d like to see you run using a Bryston preamp with built-in
some tests pitting iPod Nanos against DAC and USB port…
In reading your headphone review hard disc iPods inserted into docking The biggest loser in this scenario is
(in UHF No. 81), I appreciated its range stations with internal DACs or attached the maker of CD/SACD players. The
from high reference to low portable. I’m to a DAC via USB port, and then the biggest winner is the maker of DACs
curious about the Koss update, about the winner against a good CD player. All configured for USB and memory stick
adage “don’t-make-’em-like-they-used- testing would be done with CD files, so acceptance.
to,” of classic durability vs. new-tech the data from one CD is used by each Imagine being able to buy your music
comfort, especially for something which player. on a chip. How easy to store! One CD
gets handled as much. Why? jewel case can probably hold at least 10
I have the AKG 240M and the To determine whether or not there 4-gig memory sticks, if you chose to go
Yamaha HP-1, and had been considering is a difference in sound output quality the physical memory route. Of course,
a lightweight pair beside my computer, between the two iPod product types, given that 4 Gb of memory stick is
along lines of cheap, popular choices: and between them and a quality CD now around $100, you may choose to
Sennheiser HD 202 or Grado SR60. player — your reference. I feel there will store your music on a hard drive, and
I also enjoyed the piece on Piaf, and be, and it is the low-storage Nano that download to a Nano or a memory stick
the Software series overall. will win. your selections for the day. Imagine that
Which is to say, I can’t afford to even Hypothesis: the biggest enemy of along with CD-quality sound, you can
read about state-of-the-art price tag digital reproduction is noise caused or download SACD data…
products, never mind buy them. Hope- increased by moving parts (hard drives However, while iPods and memory
fully I can justify to myself renewal of or CD/data drives), imparting mechani- sticks aren’t cheap, eliminating the disc-
subscription in that regard — not that cal vibration and extra electrical and reading component of a player is a huge
you should deny your more affluent magnetic fields generated by the same. saving. Not only that, but you also elimi-
readers. Removing all mechanical moving parts nate the vibration concerns that cause
James Tay and extraneous electrical/magnetic quality CD players to be heavily — and
TORONTO, ON influences from the data reading and very expensively — built. The result is a
processing chain gives the simplest, digital data reading device that is cheaper
Congratulations on your new London shortest and cleanest path from data to build not only due to fewer parts, but
cartridge (An Old Cartridge is New Again, to analogue output. In theory, directly also due to decreased vibration concerns.
UHF No. 81). I wish you many happy reading a passive storage device (no Result: very high quality sound at a very
hours with it. moving parts — therefore a data stor- reasonable price.
Many years ago I had a Decca car- age card) gives the greatest possible Having just read a review of the Bel
tridge myself, a London Export model, reduction in malignant influences on Canto DAC, and knowing the industry’s
in a Decca International arm. It did just the reading and processing chain. With high regard for the Benchmark DAC, I
what you say yours does: brought me the advent of the iPod and its various will go out on a limb and predict that in
closer to the music. connection options, we are finally in a five years, $3000 will buy a passive data
Today I am exploring moving coils, position to copy a CD directly (well, onto reader and DAC combination whose
with a Koetsu Rosewood Signature the the computer and then to the iPod) to a sound quality is the equivalent of today’s
ULTRA HIGH FIDELITY Magazine 7
$10,000+ CD/SACD players. In 20 years, the way the solid state iPod Nano does. That’s play music stored on a remote hard disc. We
the CD player as currently known, will the reason battery life drops with lossless or have heard it, but it is only now becoming
be dead. Passive storage devices will uncompressed music — the player needs to available.
rule. return to the hard drive to fill its bucket more
Except for record freaks. There is no often. I read the blog about Pavarotti. I
substitute for good vinyl. At the moment the sonic differences couldn’t agree with you more — most
Denys Beames among iPods don’t depend on storage meth- of the media portraits were indeed
VICTORIA, BC ods, but on the differences in the quality of shallow.
their digital-to-analog converters. Even the However, after scrolling down the
We agree with your predictions, Denys, best iPods have DACs whose performance is page it was my turn to be dismayed that
except that we would move up the timeline. well below that of high end gear. As long as there’s no mention of the passing of the
Though a CD player or other digital player portable players are sold at popular prices, Canadian Opera Company’s Richard
you buy today will be useful for years to that will remain true. At present, even run- Bradshaw.
come, it won’t be 20 years before people stop ning a Squeezebox into a good quality DAC I’m sure there’s little I could tell
buying them. (as we did in UHF No. 80) does not give you about Mr. Bradshaw that you don’t
Where we differ is in the question of the better results than our reference player. already know. But to ask the same ques-
iPod Nano. The present-day Nano can hold tion you ask: did he “popularize” opera?
some 25 complete albums even with lossless You liked the Squeezebox, especially You bet he did and much, much more.
(2:1) compression. Give it four times more with a beefier power supply, when played To my knowledge, not one of the operas
memory, and you’re still at 100 albums, through your Counterpoint DAC. he conducted was recorded, at least not
and if you include high-resolution music So the next logical question is: what professionally, but the maestro’s legacy
(equivalent to SACD or DVD-A) you’re does UHF think of the Slim Devices to his adopted country far surpasses a
looking at maybe 10 albums. Transporter? Here's a WiFi bridge like simple sum of deeds and performances.
Fortunately, reading from a hard drive the Squeezebox, but with a potentially He was a relentless, inspiring leader —
is not as bad as you might suppose. The iPod much better DAC and power supply than like Pavarotti a giant in his own right.
does not in fact read data in real time as a the Squeezebox. The Slim Devices Web Surely a few words from the “UHF
CD player does. It loads data from the hard site ad says, “Transporter is the network pen” were in order.
disc into memory, and plays it from there just music player audiophiles have been wait- Andreja Bozovic
ing for.” TORONTO, ON
Is it? Your readers want to know.
Paul McIntosh We have followed Richard Bradshaw's
CARLISLE, ON remarkable work, including his adept lob-
Canada’s online hi-fi
bying work with great interest, and we have
accessories store
We’d bet on the Linn, actually, but we even marked down some possible dates to grab
have an open mind. opera tickets. He re-established the COC as
From Vancouver to St. John’s,
a major opera company, and he turned into
shipping is always free!
I was wondering if you will be review- reality the long-promised opera house with
ing the Linn Klimax DS in your contin- excellent acoustics. He died far too young.
Visit us now for exclusive specials
ued explorations of computer music. However the COC, as you point out,
and package discounts
Comparing its sound head to head has not recorded. Pavarotti left us recorded
with less costly equipment like the treasures, and recordings is of course what
Benchmark and the Squeezebox would UHF is about.
be interesting.
Keep the good work up, I always I am improving my hi-fi, step by step,
enjoy reading your magazine. by listening, but also taking in account
Jimmy Gauvin the advice and considerations that I
QUEBEC CITY, QC read from your latest book (published
in 1994).
These products are similar only insofar as Don't you think, it would be worth
they can be used for hard disc-based music, publishing a new version, given the time
but they are complementary rather than elapsed, and the progress that have been
Own a Creek amp? Or Epos
equivalent. For example, the Benchmark made, especially in electronics since that
speakers? Try DNM cables!
(which is a digital-to-analog converter) and time?
Epos speakers are internally wired
the Slim Devices Squeezebox (a device to pull Philippe Martiat
with DNM
in music streamed over WiFi or Ethernet) BRUSSELS, Belgium
and it's the recommended
can be advantageously used together. The
cable for Creek systems
Linn Klimax DS, like the Squeezebox, can Point taken, Philippe.
8 ULTRA HIGH FIDELITY Magazine
One was a singularly musical loud-
speaker, Bob, but Totem has never played
Free Advice
the currently popular game of building
ever more efficient speakers. The Model
One, despite its startlingly reduced
Box 65085, Place Longueuil dimensions, requires substantial power,
and also the ability to deliver current
Longueuil, Québec, Canada J4K 5J4
without breaking a sweat. Neither of the
[email protected] two amplifiers you mention qualifies.
But fortunately there are plenty of
integrated amplifiers that can handle the
For almost a year now, we have been upgrade being an Atlas Opus digital job. Among models we have reviewed in
enjoying the following system in our cable between the CD and the DAC. the past few years that may be suitable
family room: iMac G5 computer with Denis C. Coté are the Moon I-5 (now the I-5.3), the
160 Gb of lossless music, Benchmark SAINT-LAZARE, QC Bryston 2BSST, and the Cyrus 8vs. The
Media DAC1 USB digital-to-analog Totems get along well with tubes too,
converter, CEC TL51XR CD player, As you note, Denis, the Benchmark and you may want to look at the excel-
McIntosh C2200 tube preamplifier DAC is also a preamplifier (and of lent Copland 405 or the tube amplifier
and MC402 power amplifier, MaxCon course a very good headphone amplifier reviewed in this very issue.
Squared filtration, BIS AC cables and besides), which makes the McIntosh Those are just examples, we hasten
Totem Mani-2’s sitting on Founda- preamp redundant if you have no analog to add. Give the Model Ones reasonable
tion stands, biwired with Atlas Hyper sources. We don’t mean to suggest that power and current, and we think you’ll
Biwire. a converter’s or CD player’s built-in like what you hear.
Since my LP’s are long gone I have preamp will always be superior to a
no intent of introducing a turntable, at standalone preamplifier, because there My current components are: Cam-
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digital output with a regular XLO bal- anyone’s guess, but you can try it if you’re a “hi-fi” saving accounts.
anced interconnect and the computer’s curious. What would you suggest, in this
USB to the Benchmark, and connecting We do own a CEC TL51X transport, configuration as a major improvement
the Benchmark’s output directly to the but before ours arrived we were using a in loudspeakers cables? Moreover, is it
power amplifier, I completely bypassed borrowed TL51XR player as a transport. really worth investing in a dedicated
the preamplifier, I noticed a definite We thought that, as transports, they power cord?
improvement in both rhythm and lower sounded the same. Philippe Martiat
midrange definition with the elimina- BRUSSELS, Belgium
tion of boomy bass. Playing mostly jazz, I have Totem Model One Signature
you can imagine the significance of this speakers, and recently moved to a larger Better power cords are always a good
improvement. The Benchmark has a area. Now I am having difficulty finding idea, Philippe, for a couple of reasons.
volume control, digital input switching a good integrated amp to match. Properly-built connectors (both the
and headphone amplification as a bonus, I tried the YBA Intégré and didn’t AC power plug and the IEC equipment
a perfect preamplifier if your source is like the sound. Then I tried the Naim 5i. connector) will give a more positive
digital. I did like the sound, but I seem to need contact, thereby reducing the genera-
First, is removing the extra circuit more power. tion of broadband noise and maximizing
responsible for this improvement? Coin- What integrated do you recommend voltage transfer. Good power cords are
cidentally, my Totems reached about for the Totems, or should I just get more also shielded, so that they don’t transmit
200 hours. Am I missing something efficient speakers? I listen to female vocal high-frequency noise from the power
here other than superfluous electron- mostly. line to other nearby cables.
ics? Second, is using my CD player as Bob Hansen We’re not sure why you would be
a transport only the right thing to do? PEMBROKE, ON thinking about new speaker cables just
Is it damageable? Should I simply trade yet, because the Actinote LBD offers
it for the TL51X? I can see my next We’ve always thought that the Model very high-level performance. Their only
ULTRA HIGH FIDELITY Magazine 9
a Copland CTA305 preamplifier, we
would like to use its phono input. We
started looking at new turntables under
$2000, the likes of Clearaudio, Music
Hall, and also the Roksan Radius which
had a nice review in your pages.
In one store they were selling a
used LP12 equipped with a Valhallah
power supply and an SME Type 3 tone
arm with a Grace cartridge. We were
wondering if this table would be a good
purchase or not.
I know it could be upgraded eventu-
ally, but that is not in our plans for now.
Is this older Linn competitive with those
newer turntables?
I hope we can keep on reading your
magazine for many years to come!
Marie and André Avon
SAINT-JEAN SUR RICHELIEU,
QC
disadvantage is that they cannot be used NAD 6130 cassette deck , Rega Planar The LP12 may be a good choice,
for biwiring. We would look at upgrad- turntable, and Magneplanar Flat SMGa depending on how far below $2000
ing the source before touching any of loudspeakers. I realize that the system is it is. The SME arm is imperfect but
the cables. 20 years old, but I was hoping it is still nonetheless superior to many arms found
worth something in terms of resale. I on older Linns. The Grace cartridge
I have an NAD 7250PE receiver, may be disillusioned with this hope, but was reasonably good too, though it is
I would really appreciate your help with inevitably very old, and its condition
some advice about routes of resale. after all those years is uncertain. What’s
Renzo Pella more, as you already know, the LP12 can
TORONTO, ON be eventually upgraded to the level of
performance you desire (and of course
Our guess is that the Rega Planar can afford).
turntable and the Magneplanar speak- You are right that we like the Roksan
ers would find ready buyers. A receiver, Radius, and we generally like Clearaudio
even one made by NAD, is much more turntables as well. We don’t consider
e
ckicv difficult to sell, and cassette decks are Music Hall turntables to be in the same
adb today mostly offered at yard sales, where league.
A
d ee they don’t attract flies.
ee
rF At one time we would have suggested Ahhhh vinyl; so musical, so lifelike,
F
you list the components in our own so much better than digital…except for
classified ad section, but that section one thing.
died last year for the simple reason that I recently purchased a collection of
the Internet is now replete with sites 1950’s jazz LPs on labels such as Colum-
offering classified ads for free. The bia, Emarcy and Verve. The sound of
best-known sales sites are of course some of these albums is incredible (even
eBay and Audiogon, but you may want in mono), except for the pops and clicks
to begin with something free, smaller and groove noise. Although some of the
and closer to home. Try entering the noise is due to scratches, the majority of
following in Google: Magneplanar “for the pops and clicks are random which,
sale” Toronto. When we tried it, some I’m hoping, is due to dirt, mould, mold-
of the 232 links Google turned up were release compound, etc. Some of these
classified ad sites. albums (e.g. Sarah Vaughn on Emarcy)
have a visible coating on one side which
My wife and I are looking to purchase is nearly impossible to remove and is very
a new source for music . Since we own audible.
10 ULTRA HIGH FIDELITY Magazine