MSB Technology Premier Digital-to-Analog Converter
- Written by Jeff Fritz
- Category: Full-Length Reviews
So there I was, listening to the MSB Technology S202 stereo power amplifier ($29,500, all prices USD) paired with my own MSB Discrete DAC ($9950 base price, $21,380 as configured) through Magico A5 loudspeakers ($24,800/pair). I marveled at the system’s resolution and quietness—“blacker” backgrounds I’d never heard. The sound of this system was so good, so right—so everything—I kept thinking that if I were an audiophile who didn’t have to review gear for a living and I owned such a system, where could I go from here? Would I need to “go” anywhere at all? I was so impressed by the sound that I wrote about it in my last month’s “Opinion” for SoundStage! Ultra, “Building a Supersystem Around Magico Speakers and MSB Technology Electronics.” I could have just stopped chasing better sound and been thrilled with that setup for the long haul.
Ray Charles: "Genius + Soul = Jazz"
- Written by Joseph Taylor
- Category: Recording of the Month
Verve Records/Impulse! Records B0033210-01
Format: LP
Musical Performance: ****½
Sound Quality: ****
Overall Enjoyment: ****½
Acoustic Sounds, Inc. and Verve Records/Universal Music Enterprises continue their reissue collaboration, the Acoustic Sounds Series, with the re-release of Ray Charles’s 1961 recording for Impulse! Records, Genius + Soul = Jazz. This album consists of ten tracks, three of them featuring Charles on vocals, with big-band arrangements by Quincy Jones and Ralph Burns. Prior to the original release of Genius + Soul = Jazz, Charles’s 1959 album The Genius of Ray Charles had also featured big-band arrangements by Jones, among others, on one side—and Burns had provided the string arrangements on side 2.
Siltech Classic Legend 680L Speaker Cables
- Written by Hans Wetzel
- Category: Full-Length Reviews
Audiophiles are an eccentric bunch. When we start describing sound the way a sommelier might describe a bottle of fine red wine, it can be difficult for even the most openminded non-audiophile to take us seriously. Speakers, DACs, and amplifiers are the easiest suspects for which to make an objective case. You can measure them, and correlate your subjective listening impressions to draw broad conclusions about how good a component sounds.
Building a Supersystem Around Magico Speakers and MSB Technology Electronics
- Written by Jeff Fritz
- Category: Opinion
The notion that high-end audio can’t offer strong value propositions is ridiculous. If you choose your components wisely, you can assemble and own an incredible-sounding music-reproducing system that will virtually transport you to the best clubs, concert halls, and recording studios in history—a system that will last for decades as it provides thousands of hours of listening enjoyment to you and your family.
Magico A5 Loudspeakers
- Written by Jeff Fritz
- Category: Full-Length Reviews
Magico’s A series of loudspeakers is interesting for several reasons—certainly in terms of their design and sound, but also in how this series fits into Magico’s entire history of speakers. Those of you who recall the introduction in 2010 of Magico’s first Q-series speaker, the Q5 ($59,950/pair when introduced, all prices USD), will know that those who first saw and heard it thought it a groundbreaking product. Its all-aluminum cabinet was displayed at the 2010 Consumer Electronics Show, in Las Vegas, with one side panel removed. Attendees were mesmerized—the lattice of braces and bolts and high-tech drive units began an era of Magico’s history that saw huge growth, not only in terms of units sold but in stature within the industry. The company’s founder, Alon Wolf, was making speakers his way. They looked like nothing else, and they sounded like nothing else.
Steve Cropper: "Fire It Up"
- Written by Joseph Taylor
- Category: Recording of the Month
Provogue Records PRD76431
Format: LP
Musical Performance: ***½
Sound Quality: ***½
Overall Enjoyment: ***½
Steve Cropper is a guitarist many people know without actually knowing his name. His guitar riff opens Sam & Dave’s “Soul Man,” and he appeared on countless other recordings on the Stax Records label, and on sister label Volt Records, as a member of the Stax/Volt house band, Booker T. & the MGs. He cowrote a number of songs with Otis Redding, including the singer’s biggest hit, “(Sittin’ On) The Dock of the Bay.” After the Stax/Volt years, he played on, or produced, records by Jeff Beck, Rod Stewart, Ringo Starr, and John Lennon, to name just a few.
Allnic Audio: Humble Excellence
- Written by Hans Wetzel
- Category: In Good Company
This is intended as a companion piece to the review of Allnic Audio’s L-9000 OTL/OCL preamplifier.
Big things have small beginnings. Some beginnings, however, are smaller than others. For Allnic Audio founder Kang Su Park, the story begins in the South Korean countryside during the 1950s. “We were very poor,” he told me. The South Korea of his youth was a far cry from the technology-forward nation we know today. That’s not exactly a shock after the Korean War tore through the Korean Peninsula from 1950 to 1953, leaving a literal scar in the form of a demilitarized zone, and a figurative one that left South Korea with the unenviable task of rebuilding a nation from scratch.
Allnic Audio L-9000 OTL/OCL Preamplifier
- Written by Howard Kneller
- Category: Full-Length Reviews
Based in Songnam City, South Korea, Allnic Audio was founded in 1997 by Kang Su (“K.S.”) Park. Park has always been keenly interested in music and electronics—his older brothers, both electricians, taught him the basic principles of electronics at an early age, and soon he was building his own audio components. However, according to Park, at the time neither Korean culture nor his parents valued the electronics trade. When he attended university in Seoul, he studied for and received a degree in French language studies.
What Matters Most in an Audio System: The Loudspeaker Drive Unit
- Written by Jeff Fritz
- Category: Opinion
Who among us hasn’t thought about what matters most in an audio system? The subject often comes up when the total cost of the high-end audio components we’re buying to assemble a system must fit within a certain budget. For example: If you believe that garbage in results in garbage out, then what will most matter to you will be the source component—a turntable, a DAC, a CD player—which means you’ll be willing to spend relatively more on that component. Many audiophiles find that the most significant audible differences among high-end brands tend to be between speaker manufacturers; consequently, those audiophiles are likely to spend the lion’s share of their budgets on getting the best-sounding speakers they can afford. Still others will tell you that the magic resides in the preamplifier—and many of those folks will swear that, all else being equal, what makes the biggest improvement in sound is a tubed preamp. Coming up with an answer to the question of which component matters most, and then acting on that answer, is part of the fun of being an audiophile.
MSB Technology S202 Stereo Amplifier
- Written by Jeff Fritz
- Category: Full-Length Reviews
In May 2020, when MSB Technology announced their S202 stereo amplifier ($29,500, all prices USD), I thought it a perfectly sized power amp. I could move its 90 pounds myself, and its dimensions of 16″W x 7″H x 19″D meant that it could fit many places, including the shelf of an average-size, high-end audio rack. Still, I could see, even in the photos, that it was a substantial machine. Its contoured aluminum case and chassis—in this model they’re the same thing—were obviously the results of lots of CNC milling, and inside, its jewel-like parts and layout made clear that the S202 was a lot more than a pair of tiny class-D amps rattling around inside an otherwise empty box.
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