Bricasti Design CEO Brian Zolner opens up on the company’s flagship product, the M21 dual-mono DSD DAC. As I am about to publish my findings on the Bricasti Design M21 DSD DAC, the complexity of the $21k DAC is such that Brian Zolner, CEO of the company, and I conducted many correspondences on the subject. […]

  Aaudio Imports system details Room: Lobby Pavilion Music system: Grimm (Netherlands) MU1 Music Server. $12,500 HB Design (Germany) PowerSlave Marble MKII Power Distributor. $21,500 Stacore (Poland) CLD Footers. $1,080 set of 3 Stage III (USA) Ckahron (pronounced KAI-RON) XLR Interconnects. $16,500/pair Chimaera Digital Link. $8,800 Kraken AC Power. $10,000 Proteus AC Power. $13,400 Poseidon […]

FinkTeam KIM  Ah yes, I remember it well. February 2018 found me in Bristol, England at its eponymous HiFi Show. The show, a warhorse of sorts, has been in existence for decades, and I daresay it will persevere for yet a few more. It was there, in the pub (bar for the Yanks) I met […]

The CAS is the only show in which attendees and reviewers can vote for companies to be recognized for their best efforts at the show. Vote count: 2 – per Member of the Press, 1 – per Attendee Vote allowance: 1 vote allowed per Type per person. Best Sounding Room Award. Most Innovative Product Award. Best Value Component Award. […]

Tickets Instructions: Please pick your CAS10 badge up at the CAS Registrar during the show. If you are purchasing additional tickets for your guests, send their names to cas@dagogo.com in a separate email so that proper name badges will be created. Prize: one (1) PS Audio Stellar PowerPlant3 AC regenerator, valued at $2,999 (retail price) […]

EXHIBITORS   Aaudio Imports. Room: Lobby Pavilion. System details. – Grimm Audio – Stage III Concepts Ckahron (pronounced KAI-RON) XLR Interconnects. $16,500/pair – Wilson Benesch A.C.T. 3zero loudspeakers. MSRP $54,000 per pair. – Ypsilon Electronics Phaethon Silver Edition integrated hybrid amplifier. MSRP $56,000. High End By Oz. Room: Lobby Platinum Ballroom, Gold Ballroom (separate exhibits) […]

MAIN PAGE Welcome to the new landing site of the California Audio Show! EXHIBITORS TICKETS and PRIZE CAS AWARDS SYSTEMS   Overview Tenth annual California Audio Show (CAS10)  Time and Dates: 10am – 6pm, Friday, 9/22/23 10am – 6pm, Saturday, 9/23/23 10am – 4pm, Sunday, 9/24/23 Location: Hilton Garden Inn San Francisco/Oakland Bay Bridge (Google […]

Introduction We are all no doubt familiar with the reality of dwindling number of brick-and-mortar audio shops. The loss is a real problem for two reasons: (1) it makes it a great deal more difficult to audition equipment that could have potential for purchase; and (2) it makes it harder to determine which combinations of […]

  Entry points to this article If you are unfamiliar with the PureAudioProject brand of speakers, I encourage you to explore the other articles I have written, as a great deal of background and discussion of their sound quality is contained those reviews. Those reviews are here at Dagogo.com: Trio15 TB (featuring the Tang Band […]

  Introduction: super tweeters I’m sitting here listening to Al DiMeola’s Dinner Music of the Gods and thinking, “Wow, this sounds great!” But does it sound great without the TAKET-LIVE super tweeter and WHD PURE “woofer-high definitioner”? I unplug both of those satellite speakers and, sure enough, my system sounds really good but not as […]

Do not rush. (16.20) In unhurried motion. Without haste. (9.32) Restful. (20.06) Very comfortable. (8.25)   4th movement: We enjoy the heavenly pleasures, so we avoid all earthly things. No worldly clamour is heard in Heaven! All live in gentle peace! We lead an angelic life, yet we are quite merry withal! We lead an […]

The performance of many cables is very similar and comparable to each other, and some cables continue to employ original designs of others dating back to the early two-thousands. I have therefore endeavored to seek out more original designs and that often entails products over $10,000. Like everything else, cable systems manufactured per budget allocation […]

Recently, I published an article about one man’s quest for the best sound possible in a large room using state of the art gear. Most of that gear was at price points many would not likely consider. Nevertheless, the gentleman’s journey was — to me — a fascinating one. Reader response suggests that I was […]

Iconoclast Cables already proved they have a serious design worthy of the finest systems, but Iconoclast’s designer, retired Belden Cable engineer Galen Gareis, has taken his initial work further with the development of the Series 2 SPTPC speaker cables. Most of the design parameters for Series 2 speaker cables remain the same from the extensive […]

I recently was introduced to a superb but very expensive add-on product known as a “super tweeter” designed and manufactured by Kan Sound Lab in Japan. I was not even familiar with this type of transducer or what it purports to do, and was quite surprised when it was first inserted into my main system. […]

Also read: Part 1   The range of hybrid speaker products For many years I asked Bruce Thigpen of Eminent Technology to make a bigger, more capable version of the LFT-8B, which would have been a terrific affordable solution for persons seeking a bigger slice of hybrid sound. Prior to reviewing I had owned the […]

Note to reader: As I have invested time in reviewing the  Aspen Acoustics Lagrange L5 MkII published at Dagogo.com and the speaker under consideration here is a new model built using the same principles, I will not be revisiting previously discussed background of Scott Kindt, Aspen Acoustics owner and designer, or my discussion of DLT […]

HEAVEN AND EARTH Cappella Romana John Michael Boyer, associate music director & conductor, with 45th Parallel Universe Ikon of Light Sir John Tavener | Heaven and Earth: A Song of Creation Matthew Arndt · John Michael Boyer · Alexander Khalil · Kurt Sander · Richard Toensing · Tikey Zes   DISC 1 – Ikon of […]

Initial suspicions One afternoon I find myself sitting in my listening chair, listening to music playing from my main audio setup. The only new things are two 10-lb 111/130/192 (H/W/D) mm boxes sitting on the floor next to my Vivid Audio Giya G1. Nonetheless, I’m thinking to myself “What the heck just happened?!” The two […]

I recently reviewed the Music Hall mmf-1.3 turntable, and as good as the turntable was, I did feel the included $30 Audio Technica AT-3600L phono cartridge prevented the turntable from performing as well as it could. After discussing about using a better phono cartridge with both Roy Hall of Music Hall and the folks at […]

The Ziering-Conlon Initiative for Recovered Voices at the Colburn School 1. Concerto for Piano and Small Orchestra, Op. 43 (21:05) Molto sostenuto Sostenuto Allegro alla jazz Dominic Cheli, piano RVC Ensemble James Conlon, conductor Five Pieces for String Quartet (15:29) 2. Alla valse Viennese (2:03) 3. Alla serenata (3;39) 4. Alla czeca (1:45) 5. Alla […]

I had two turntable goals at the beginning of this year. The first was to find a reasonably priced turntable to review. The second was to be able to play the 78 rpm records that I inherited a number of years ago. I have not played any 78s since I was a very young child. […]

Lorenzo speakers with Goldmund sounded quite nice – Big but cohesive. Gobel and Riviera – Another one of the better sounding rooms at the show. I always seem to enjoy Tannoy speakers. And the big Westminster’s didn’t disappoint. They brought their apartment sized models as well. Audio Physic and Gold Note sources and Analog Domain […]

The best sound of the show for me came not from stereo systems but from Steinway & Sons Pianos and their SPIRIO/r set-up.  The player Piano has now become “elite”. The version I heard was the 38th model of Lang Lang’s 88 models of Steinway & Sons (8 is a lucky number in Asia and […]

One of the more relaxing sounding rooms was from Western Electric with speakers older than me, the 753C speakers.  Western Electric had their new SET amplifier on display.  The sound was smooth and one of my favorites.  I would be interested to hear the speakers on stands or tilted up to perhaps improve the image […]

This is a story about evolution: How I became a better listener, how the product I’ve been listening to improved, and how my experience improved as I got to know the product. The product central to this story is the Audience ClairAudient 1+1, an eight-inch tall, eight-pound dual full-range driver monitors from a southern California […]

                    Coming soon: AV Show HK 2022, Part 4 Also see AV Show HK 2022, Part 1, Part 2.

                        NEXT: AV Show HK 2022, Part 3 – Brinkmann, Zesto, Arcam, Acoustic Solid, Bryston, Burmester, Lumin, Avantgarde Hong Kong, Transrotor, Gold Note. Also see AV Show HK 2022, Part 1, Part 2.

I would like to star off by saying that I find very large shows like this one tend to be more about seeing the equipment in person than evaluating sound.  Unlike other shows where I try to comment on sound quality I won’t be doing that here too much.  I will chime in on some […]

1/18/23 – UPDATE: First Proposed Settlement in the Music Direct/MoFi Predicament A proposed settlement has come to light in the first class-action suit regarding Music Direct/MoFi. Court summon case number: No. 22–cv–01081–JLR. United States District Court Western District of Washington: https://www.wawd.uscourts.gov/attorneys/pacer STEPHEN J. TUTTLE, et al, Plaintiffs, v. AUDIOPHILE MUSIC DIRECT INC. d/b/a MUSIC DIRECT […]