Indholdsfortegnelse for Issue 1 - 2021 i Best Buys – Audio & AV

While we’ve been promoting the merits of OLED since the very first OLED TVs arrived, LCD technology has evolved more dramatically than OLED in the years since, closing the performance gap. Does Hisense’s Dual Cell technology, which aims to deliver OLED-level blacks, now level the playing field? Equipment How does Hisense attempt to do this? The Dual Cell technology used in this 65SX incorporates a remarkable two million individual dimming zones of control for the backlight. The panel itself has the 8.3 megapixels expected of Ultra-HD resolution. The backlight has close to 2.1 megapixels of control. Note we say that it has 2.1 mexapixels of ‘control’, while the backlight itself has rather less — fewer than 100 zones, we’re told. The trick is the placement of a Full-HD LCD panel…

Are you keen on the next step up in your home cinema experience? Let us introduce you to the Marantz SR8015 AV amplifier. Note that ‘amplifier’; not ‘receiver’. There’s no radio tuner here (well, there is internet radio) built into this 11-channel unit. Instead there’s an extra pair of analogue audio inputs labelled ‘Tuner’. Equipment We shall return to the Tuner thing (because we think it’s interesting), but first let’s get into the core of the Marantz SR8015 multichannel amplifier. Because it’s the real deal. It comes equipped with 11 amplifier channels, each rated at up to 140W output into 8 ohms across the full audio bandwidth, at miniscule (0.05%) levels of total harmonic distortion, two channels driven. The amplifiers can be set to run optimally with 8, 6 or…

Yamaha describes both its two new ‘entry-level’ soundbars as upgrades for your TV sound, something very much required in these days when flat TV screens generally mean weedy built-in TV sound. There is mercifully little pretence here from yamaha that the bars will deliver ‘surround’ sound, other than options labelled ‘3D Surround’ and some rather optimistic claims for the inclusion of DTS Virtual:X. These marketing extravances aside, what’s promised is simply solid sound with which to enjoy your shiny new flatscreen. And what we particularly like about the SR-B20 on review here is that it aims to perform without the usual wireless subwoofer. This not only keeps the price down, it makes the whole package far more convenient to site and to use. The question, then, is whether a long…

We don’t recall a product ever ‘coming good’ during a review to the quite same extent as did the Ruark R3 Compact Music System. It positively alarmed us when we first turned it on. But by the end of our time with this streaming tabletop music system we were using it daily for pleasure as much as for assessment. Join us in our journey with this timeless design from a UK company which has made this genre of smart radiogram-like music system something of a specialty. Equipment The R3 is a table-top audio system some 42cm across and 17cm high, bringing together CD replay, reception of DAB+, FM and internet radio, streaming via network and Bluetooth (with aptX), Spotify Connect, Tidal and other music services… pretty much everything, in short,…

For a quarter of a century, the 600 Series has been the most affordable set of designs available from the speaker line-up of Bowers & Wilkins. And the loudspeakers in this Series are proof positive that a company that makes some of the most expensive and esoteric loudspeakers in the world, such as the famous Nautilus ($100,000+ per pair), can also deliver outstandingly good sound for those of us on more modest budgets. One of the reasons B&W has been so successful over the years is that it is one of the very few loudspeaker manufacturers that makes speakers that are used both in the home and in the recording studio. Yes, there are other companies — JBL is one — that are equally successful in both arenas, but mostly…

Richter can lay claim to being one of Australia’s oldest loudspeaker manufacturers, and the Harlequin one of its longest-running designs. It takes its name from the famous mischievous ‘devil’ or ‘demon’ character in French passion plays that were popular in the 16th century, and it’s a name that is very appropriate considering that the top-of-the-range model in Richter’s speaker line-up is called the Wizard. Equipment As you can see from the photographs here, the Harlequin is an unusual design, a two-way, two-driver floorstanding loudspeaker. That’s unusual because most two-way designs are in small cabinets that are intended to be placed on stands or on a shelf or side-table (and indeed Richter has just such a model in its range: the Merlin). Yet floorstanding two-way speakers have many advantages over their…

In the vast majority of Australian homes, the television delivers entertainment — be it broadcast, recorded, streaming or gaming — to the lounge. And televisions are getting ever larger, with 75-inchers currently being touted as “the new normal”. In this they are eating slowly into the realm of the home AV projector, hitherto the solution if you wanted real big-screen entertainment. But projectors are fighting back. A key development is the addition of smart interfaces, so that instead of being dumb display devices, projectors can be used more like TVs, streaming via their own connection to the internet, even having a built-in TV tuner onboard. Increasing numbers of projectors now have their own sound system as well, often of a fairly basic quality, but certainly handy to have as an…

This is a bit weird. We are going to briefly laud the maximum resolution of the new Sony VPL-VW790ES home theatre projector. And then we’re going to ignore it. What we’re really going to focus on is how well the Sony VW790ES projector works with content of slightly less than its full resolution. Equipment First, an oddity about the home projection market. While we live in a UHD world, where 4K Blu-rays, Netflix, Disney+ et al can deliver a resolution of 3840 × 2160 pixels, there are presently, to our knowledge, no projectors on the market which have a native resolution actually matching that. Most UHD projectors use a chip of 1920 × 1080 pixels, shifting these to create additional pixels… with various degrees of success. Whereas this Sony VPL-790ES…

Soundbars have changed their stripes in the last few years. They began as a convenience and a compromise, back when 5.1-channel surround sound was messing up lounges everywhere with rear speakers balanced on couches and cables tucked under carpets. The soundbar came along, offering a way to scale up TV sound without installing a large system that would compromise the ever cleaner décors and room designs which were sweeping through the world’s living spaces. To that end, most early soundbars touted an ability to deliver pseudo-surround — because at the beginning they were presenting themselves as a direct replacement for a surround sound system, yet delivered miraculously from just a neat bar at the front. A subwoofer was generally required because a neat bar at the front couldn’t produce bass.…

Most hi-fi turntables are driven by a belt. But there have always been plenty of adherents to the alternate philosophy of direct drive, where the motor is an integral part of the platter, with neither belts nor pulleys involved in spinning your vinyl. DJs certainly favour direct drive, most famously in Technics’ SL-1200, which ruled the disco and club scenes until 2010, when Panasonic announced it was ceasing manufacture of all Technics products. It has more recently reversed that decision, but in the vacillation period Audio-Technica and Pioneer (along with several other less well-known brands) began selling turntables that were near clones of that model. One of these was the AT-LP120, here reviewed in its ‘XUSB’ version, and still more recently released (see panel overleaf) in a version which adds…

Having established its credentials as a high-end true wireless earbud front-runner with two generations of its Momentum True Wireless, Sennheiser has now turned its attention to the less rarefied air down where Apple, Microsoft, Sony and all the rest duke it out with more affordable earbuds. At $299, and currently rather lower on the street, the CX 400BTs are pitched right into the thick of the action. Equipment At first glance, it seems possible that the CX400BTs are specified well enough not only to compete at their own level, but with Sennheiser’s own premium model. After all, they share the same 7mm full-range dynamic driver as the Momentum True Wireless 2. They have a good range of Bluetooth codecs: not only the basel-level SBC, but AAC for Apple devices to…

Two years ago JBL released its L100 ‘Classic’ loudspeakers. Those large standmounters gained the ‘Classic’ tag not as instant classics on their own terms, but because they took key DNA from the original L100 design from 1970. That was a speaker which went on to become the company’s best-seller, known as the ‘Century’ and earning further iconic status after appearing in a Maxell tape ad where thekr sound blew back the hair/wine glass/wall-ducks of a long-haired listener (in the UK version, Peter Murphy of Goth group Bauhaus). The new 21st-century L100 Classics were really all-new designs with fully up-to-date components within, but they sported those classic white woofers and similar black, blue or orange Quadrex foam grilles. We loved them; they walked away with our Sound+Image Judges’ Choice award for…

Want an affordable giant-screen TV? We mean something in the region of 100 inches (2.54 metres), but not costing north of $10k? There is a new category of ‘TV’ available now which mates an ultra-short-throw projector with smart TV internals, and often with projection screens available. The Epson EpiqVision EH-LS300B does that and tosses in a little extra: ultra-long-life operation. Equipment Ultra-short-throw projectors use a combination of lenses and mirrors to cast the picture up onto a screen almost immediately above them. The Epson EpiqVision EH-LS300B is a fairly compact specimen at only 467mm wide and 400mm deep. Inside there are three 15.5mm LCD projector panels using Epson’s C2 Fine technology, and a laser diode. That kind of light engine works by firing the laser into some phosphor, which then…

When you’re onto a good thing, stick to it! Perhaps the most surprising thing about the Marantz NR1711 (the first and smaller of two Marantz receivers reviewed this issue) is that the other major brands haven’t copied its form factor — it’s the size of a normal stereo hi-fiamplifier, rather than having the double-height hulk of a chassis more common to AV receivers. Not that Marantz can’t hulk with the best of them — see the next review. But here we have what the company calls a ‘slimline’ receiver: a nice compromise for those who want the proper quality for a surround sound experience, but don’t want the bulk of most receivers. Equipment And, yes, this is a proper home theatre receiver, with seven channels able to be configured in…

Three things we like in a soundbar: first the ability to deliver great TV and movie sound; second the ability to play music at least pleasingly; and third, the neatness for which the breed was originally created, at least when compared with a set of multichannel speakers around your lounge. One thing we really don’t like: soundbars which pretend to deliver multichannel ‘surround’ sound without even having dedicated drivers to deliver each channel. So it was pleasing that the packaging and manual of the TCL Ray Danz TS9030 doesn’t overly boast of impossible sonic feats. It uses the word immersive, and it advertises Dolby Atmos. But otherwise what it promises is clear dialogue, “ground-shaking bass”, a larger sweet spot — and these are the real merits of a well-priced soundbar.…

If you use a high-quality phono cartridge with your turntable, then a high-quality external phono stage is essential if you’re to extract the best performance from it. The phono stages built into even the best high-end pre-amplifiers and integrated amplifiers simply won’t do it justice, most particularly if yours has a moving coil. Although there are many high-quality phono stages available, most of them are difficult and inconvenient to use, and don’t offer the wide range of load, gain and filter options we’d expect to find in 2021. You kind of have to choose one that best matches the cartridge you’re using… but then if you subsequently change to a different cartridge, your phono stage might not provide the correct load or gain, which would mean buying a whole new…

Why do some people buy standmount speakers and others buy floorstanders? Why do manufacturers make both? If the floorstanding versions are bigger and more expensive, is it just a question of having the budget? So many questions. But you’re right to ask. The question of whether to buy standmount or floorstanding speakers is one of the earliest and most fundamental considerations you will have to make when deciding to purchase speakers. It will direct the rest of your research, and so the subject is deserving of your in-depth consideration. We’ve put together eight questions below, the answers to which may hold the key to the dilemma, depending on your specific circumstances. More importantly, ignoring any of these may leave you wasting money on something that’s not right for you. What’s…

South Australian loudspeaker maker Krix has long been a favourite in Australian homes, and in both Australian and overseas cinemas for which it provides world-class cinema sound systems. But the Krix Hemispherix SPS speakers are of a slightly different genre: installation or architectural speakers. You know: those speakers which are inset into walls and ceilings. Equipment The Krix Hemispherix SPS speaker is designed primarily for ceiling placement in multiroom systems. We say this to distinguish it from ceiling speakers you might put into a home theatre room to handle overhead channels from Dolby Atmos and DTS:X soundtracks. As opposed to those mono speakers, you need only one Hemispherix SPS to deliver a stereo signal. Krix itself says that it’s “ideal for use in applications where installing two speakers is not…

A pair of Magico’s latest top-of-therange M9 speakers will cost you around one-and-a-quarter million dollars, depending on the prevailing exchange rate with the US, where Magico loudspeakers are made. That’s the bad news. The good news is that Magico’s ASub subwoofer, while not entirely inexpensive, will cost you less than one hundredth of that figure, yet it has much of the same DNA, which includes the fact that, like all Magico speakers, its enclosure is made from 10mm-thick sheets of solid 6061 T6 aluminium that’s internally braced and damped. And even better news: Magico’s ASub is a phenomenally good-sounding, high-performance subwoofer, which has by far and away the best and most flexible room tuning and speaker matching circuitry we have ever seen. It’s also the most fun to use —…

Despite its decidedly un-French-sounding name, Triangle is a completely French loudspeaker manufacturer that builds its speakers entirely in that country, including building its own drivers (of which its famous horn-loaded tweeter, with its distinctive gold-coloured phase plug as used on the company’s top-line Magellan, is the best-known). Triangle was founded by Renaud De Vergnette in 1980 in the town of Soissons, around 100km north-east of Paris, and has remained there ever since. The town is one of the most ancient in France and in 1429 was famously liberated during the Hundred Years War by French troops under the command of Joan of Arc. (And in fact, of course, the word triangle is spelled the same in both French and English. It also has exactly the same meaning: a two-dimensional shape…