Many audiophiles endorse the concept of cable looms, i.e. using the same brand of cables in their system, from the same series if possible. Alleged benefits include a sonic coherenceโa synergyโthatโs derived from using cables built the same way, according to the same design principles, and thereby share one โcontinuousโ sound.
Long ago are the days when CEDIA could be considered, among other things, a high-end audio industry show. Now itโs mostly for designers, sellers, and installers of various home and commercial electronics products that revolve around home automationโthe Smart Home segment.
Our “Best $10,000 systems” feature is one of our most popular, so it was only a matter of time that we’d start to stretch our budgetary palette, so to speak.
โAudio Showโ is a funny term to me. โAudioโ and โShowโ. They donโt really fit together, do they? How can you show sound? Or is audio show shorthand for audio gear?
One of the things that impresses me most about PMA Magazine contributor Claude Lemaire is the manโs encyclopedic knowledge of popular music. If there was an edition of the game show Jeopardy! entirely focused on the minutia of who did what on any recording, Iโm convinced Claude would have a legitimate shot at being inducted…
Hints: It isnโt your speakers. And it isnโt your source. As a child, you probably played the game โTelephoneโ or โChinese Whispersโ. Itโs a simple game where each kid in a line or circle whispers a message into the next kidโs ear with the goal that the message remain intact all the way to the…
High End Munich is an extraordinary event unlike any other. Nowhere else can you hear and see such a large display of high-end gear assembled by exhibitors from around the world. I had a chance to attend the 2022 show, which ran from May 19 to 22. Over the course of those three days, I…
Welcome to this second installment of the Cable Guru, an appreciation series on audio cables and, to a lesser degree, accessories.
Be forewarned: If your stomach knots in pain at the very thought of expensive, high-end audio cabling or AC conditioning products, you may want to bypass this article, which contains many references to such items. Ditto, if youโre averse to systems costing comfortably in the six figures, such as the one that is the subject…
Prices listed in US$. $10,000 is a lot of money to spend. Or not. It depends on what you get for your 10K. By the same token, what if that 10K is for an audio system? And when I say a system, I mean it has everything you need to listen to music: a pair…
After PMA Magazine posted its inaugural โNo, I have the best system in the world!โ, a few willing participants answered our call to talk about their own audio journeys and โBestโ system,ย i.e. a system they felt had reached a certain level of performance they could live with for the long term. To do the series,…
If there’s a specialist audio company that better exemplifies the meeting point between high end audio performance and objet d’art aesthetic than Netherlands-based Metaxas & Sins, I don’t know about it.
My setup has evolved over the last few years into one of the best Iโve ever heard anywhere, especially for one that hovers around the $50K mark, not an outlandish sum for a high-end setup.
In this part and the next is where the meat is; Iโm going to provide a shopperโs guide on what to look for and what to avoid in terms of recording quality.
The point behind our new โNo, I have the best system in the world!โ series is not to have people brag about their system. Okay, it is, a bit, but itโs a bragging that I think we can all get behind. Itโs a brag without braggadocio or pretention or saying that you need to spend…