A Terrific Tube Preamplifier From Korea, And A - Ultra High Fidelity ...

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Gossip&News Feedback iPods and Other Players Apple’s iPods have long been our favorite portable music players, and we have reviewed its incarnations several times, starting with one that still had a physical click wheel. Our current model is the 4th Generation iPod touch, which, more than ever, can be described as “the iPhone without the phone.” But how does it sound? It is, after all, a music player as well as a PDA. Our firstgeneration iPod touch certainly sounded better than our iPod Photo, which had an actual hard disc inside. Our finding is that the new model sounds about the same with lossless music (our motto: jst sy no to lssy comprssn). That is to say, it’s slightly soft compared to the original CD in a good player and with the same high-quality headphones, but by any standard it sounds amazingly good. We’ve been looking over iPod accessories too, and Griffin (griffintechnologies.com) kindly sent over a couple of them we want to tell you about. The first is the PowerBlock Reserve, a beautifully-designed little battery you 78 ULTRA HIGH FIDELITY Magazine can use to more than double the run time of an iPhone or any iPod with a dock connector. It consists of a compact charger and the battery module, which is magnetic, and glides onto the charger as by magic. On most trips, you can bring just the fully-charged battery, and you’re good for dozens of extra hours. It costs $50, with street price somewhat lower. The down sides? It doesn’t have the oomph to run an iPad (which is also an iPod, though Apple doesn’t stress that), and on an iPod touch it blocks access to the headphone jack. The other killer device from Griffin is the Navigate, a small control device you plug between the dock connector and your headphones. What is it? It’s a headphone amplifier, which substitutes for the one in the iPod. It’s a control device, with buttons that let you skip tracks and change volume. And it’s even an FM radio. It has a small luminous screen so you can see what you’re doing. Unfortunately, the button legends are black on black, and unless you’ve memorized their placement you’ll be — all too literally — in the dark. It’s expensive for an iPod accessory too, with a $60 price tag, but it’s so practical that we give it two thumbs up. Finally, we have sad news about one other, older, portable player, the Sony Walkman. Sony will stop making them. No, we didn’t realize they were still making them either, but Sony doesn’t quit easily. It was relatively recently that Sony stores stopped stocking Beta video players, giving new meaning to the phrase, “Forgotten but not gone.” In truth we loved the Walkman, which — until it was commoditized for the price-driven market — was terrific. We still have a Walkman Professional, the WMD6, once the bootleg record producer’s tool. Who remembers when the acronym “WMD” meant audio on the go, and not a pretext for military invasion? Incidentally, the name will live on, because Chinese companies will continue production, at least for the domestic market, under license from Sony. And that’s not counting the “Sonny Workmans” you can buy in dollar stores. The name also lives on as the trademark on Sony’s current digital players, which own a vanishingly small part of the market. “Walkman” was once a great brand name, but then so was “Polaroid.” Both are now symbols of long-obsolete technologies. Using them on modern products can only drag them down.
The Magic Without 3D What’s dominating movie screens this year? It’s 3D, that’s what. Or perhaps not. What caught our attention was a news item informing us that the next-to-last Harry Potter film, The Deathly Hallows, Part 1, would not, after all, be presented in 3D. Expecting us to cry? You’ll be waiting a long time. The reason for this supposedly disappointing announcement, says Warner, is that it would take too long to do the conversion. Wait a minute. Conversion? Do we need to say it again? A 3D movie needs to be shot with two lenses capturing two images. “Converting” to 3D is like “converting” a mono recording to stereo. They used to do that too some years ago, until public protests forced them to stop. Check the article in this issue, When 3D Falls Flat, and you’ll see what we’re on about. We’re disappointed to note that all news outlet other than ourselves seem to have accepted “conversion” as legitimate. Of course, releasing such a guaranteed blockbuster in 2D means leaving money on the table. Because cinemas charge extra for 3D, their operators love films that come with a 3D label, even when that label is fraudulent. Also losing money is RealD, the company whose projection process those cinemas use (the RealD system is legitimate, but it can’t add a dimension that doesn’t exist). Even IMAX may lose something. Though the new film will be shown in IMAX cinemas, more people might pay the extra dough if they thought they might see 3D. Of course Warner isn’t going to lose a dime. Is anyone, anyone, not going to see the new Harry Potter film because it’s not in 3D? We didn’t think so. Not us, anyway. We’ll be there. Now the bad news. It’s noised about that the film will eventually be released in 3D Blu-ray (still bogus, of course), and that it might first, eventually, be projected in “3D” at a theatre near you. Just as bad, Warner does expect to release the final film, coming next July, in the glory of full fake 3D. You’ve been warned! The UHF Reference Systems Equipment reviews are done on at least one of UHF’s reference systems, selected as working tools. They are changed as infrequently as possible, because a reference that keeps changing is no reference. The Alpha system Our original reference is in a room with special acoustics, originally a recording studio, letting us hear what we can’t hear elsewhere. Main digital player: Linn Unidisk 1.1 Additional CD player: CEC TL-51X belt-driven transport, Moon 300D converter Digital cable: Atlas Opus 1.5m Digital portable: Apple iPod Touch Turntable: Audiomeca J-1 Tone arm: Audiomeca SL-5 Pickup: Goldring Excel Phono preamp: Audiomat Phono 1.6 Preamplifier: Copland CTA-305 Power amplifier: Simaudio Moon W-5LE Loudspeakers: Living Voice Avatar OBX-R Interconnects: Atlas Navigator All-Cu, Pierre Gabriel ML-1 Loudspeaker cables: Atlas Mavros with WBT nextgen banana connectors Power cords: Gutwire, Wireworld Aurora AC filters: Foundation Research LC-2 (power amp), Inouye SPLC The Omega system It serves for reviews of gear that cannot easily fit into the Alpha system, with its small room. Digital players: shared with the Alpha system Turntable: Linn LP12/Lingo II Tone arm: Alphason HR-100S MCS Pickup: London Reference Phono preamp: Audiomat Phono 1.6 Preamplifier: Simaudio Moon P-8 Power amplifier: Simaudio Moon W-8 Loudspeakers: Reference 3a Suprema II Interconnects: Atlas Navigator All-Cu, Atlas Mavros, Pierre Gabriel ML-1 Loudspeaker cables: Pierre Gabriel ML-1 for most of the range, Wireworld Polaris for the twin subwoofers Power cords: BIS Audio Maestro, GutWire B-12, Wireworld AC filters: GutWire MaxCon Squared, Foundation Research LC-1 Acoustics: Gershman Acoustic Art panels The Kappa system This is our home theatre system. As with the original Alpha system, we had limited space, and that pretty much ruled out huge projectors and two-metre screens. We did, however, finally come up with a system whose performance gladdens both eye and ear, with the needed resolution for reviews. HDTV monitor: Samsung PN50A550 plasma screen DVD player (provisional): Pioneer BDP- 51FD Blu-Ray player Preamplifier/processor: Simaudio Moon Attraction, 5.1 channel version Power amplifiers: Simaudio Moon W-3 (main speakers), bridged Celeste 4070se (centre speaker), Robertson 4010 (rear) Main speakers: Energy Reference Connoisseur (1984) Centre speaker: Thiel MCS1 Rear speakers: Elipson 1400 Subwoofer: 3a Design Acoustics Cables: Atlas, Van den Hul, MIT, GutWire, Wireworld Line filter: GutWire MaxCon Squared All three systems have dedicated power lines, with Hubbell hospital grade outlets. Extensions and power bars are equipped with hospitalgrade connectors. ULTRA HIGH FIDELITY Magazine 79 Gossip&News Feedback
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Issue No. 89 Cover story: Two of th
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music from a computer via Ethernet
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Page 55 and 56: INTERCONNECTS ATLAS NAVIGATOR Oxyge
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Page 81 and 82: Industry News Dan d’Agostino is b
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