Innehållsförteckning för December 2016 - January 2017 från Sound + Image

‘HEOS by Denon’ has become ‘HEOS by Denon and Marantz’, as the two brands from the D&M stable begin including the HEOS wireless multiroom platform in products beyond the existing ecosystem. The first Marantz products with HEOS inside are two new flagship models, the nine-channel $4190 SR7011 AV receiver and the 11-channel $3970 AV7703 AV pre-amp processor. HEOS branding on Marantz products is relatively subtle, while Denon models wear it proudly — above is the 11-channel $4699 AVR-X6300H, while the $2999 AVR-X4300H also includes HEOS. Aside from gaining the app control and streaming abilities of HEOS, these receivers will all be able to pass all their inputs via HEOS to any other HEOS products in the home, and of course with AV receivers, that’s a whole lot of inputs! The…

Not one but four new Uniti players have been announced by Naim Audio, revamping and reimagining the company’s all-in-one hi-fi concept, to which you just need to add speakers. Under the group name of ‘New Uniti’, three of the four new models incorporate a large top control knob similar to that on the company’s Mu-so wireless speakers, together with a new streaming platform which can sync with up to six other Naim systems on your network, including Mu-so models. A new and improved Naim app for iOS and Android allows full control from a smart device, while a fourth-gen 40-bit SHARC DSP processor promises snappy control of your music. Networking via Wi-Fi operates on both 2.4 and 5GHz bands, with the antennas cleverly integrated behind slots in the heatsinks on…

Held every year since 1989, our Sound+Image Awards recognise excellence in the design, manufacture and installation of audio, AV, home entertainment and in-car electronics equipment. We also organise an annual Presentation Dinner every year, to announce the winners and invite them each to the stage to make an acceptance speech, and we hope this night has become an essential event in the calendar of the audio-visual industry over the last 25 years, a rare occasion when the industry can mingle under informal (black-tie dress code notwithstanding) circumstances. But the Awards are chosen for our readers, with the goal of highlighting the hi-fi, AV and in-car gear that delivers the very best and best value (an important distinction, see ‘picking the winners’ on the right). Most of the winners hold happy…

Soundbars present, for our reviewing staff, a quandary. We would far prefer to recommend a pair of stereo speakers either side of your TV, small active ones if you want to keep it neat, than a soundbar. While some soundbars, particularly more expensive ones, can deliver excellent sound, most of them don’t, or they can bluster up a lot of energy for movies but sound like a duck when you play music through them. Just saying. So we thought we’d get that comment in first, before highlighting those soundbars that do the best possible job. At the entry-level, below $500, we don’t have anything we’d recommend. A little above, though, brings you to the realm of this unusual design from Q Acoustics. Unlike most cylindrical soundbars, the $749 Media 4…

It looks like an AV receiver, and in many ways that’s what it is — but in stereo only. So what got us so excited that we first splashed the Arcam SR250 on our cover a few issues ago then created this ‘Special TV Audio Award’ for it? Put simply, it solves a problem we’ve been moaning about for some while. For most real-world lounge situations, AV receivers and rear speakers are, if not quite things of the past, at least deeply in decline (dedicated theatres are a different matter entirely). This has left us with soundbars and stereo systems as TV audio options. Clearly soundbars are not the optimal solution. But nor are stereo systems, because we end up using the TV as an HDMI hub, then running a…

It is hard to express the physical scale of this projector — 88cm in its longest dimension, 43kg in weight. It’s part of a family which includes models designed for commercial and military applications. And it can deliver up to 5000 lumens of brightness for a picture of full 4K — that is, 4096 by 2160 pixels of resolution, or the domestic UHD of 3840 by 2160 pixels. Sony remains the only company delivering native 4K projection (see News for our thoughts on Texas Instruments’ confusingly-named ‘4K UHD’ solution). This projector uses three 19mm SXRD (Silicon X-tal Reflective Display) panels, Sony’s version of the reflective Liquid Crystal on Silicon panel technology, illuminated by two laser light sources. Rather than somewhere between 2000 and 5000 hours for a lamp, the laser…

Australians listen to more radio than any other audio source, so it’s an important source. But this is another evolving category — most radios now do more than ‘just’ radio, as witnessed by our winner here, a new unit from Bush Australia. It has no speakers of its own, instead plugging into a spare input on your hi-fi, much as do the ‘squirter’ units from the various wireless multiroom systems. Indeed the BR330DABC is directly comparable to those wireless multiroom units, as it has multiroom abilities itself. Bush uses the third-party Undok platform to stream across your home network from shared folders, all controlled by an easy app for iOS or Android devices, and this platform can further share the inputs of the BR330DABC with other Undok-equipped Bush units in…

It’s a whole new format — UHD Blu-ray, raising the resolution from 1920 × 1080 of standard Blu-ray (closer to 800 lines if you don’t count the black movie bars) right up to 3840 × 2060. Plus the higher bit-rates enable the wonders of High Dynamic Range, which maps studio-defined brightness levels to the abilities of your TV... plus a wider available range of colours... plus higher frame rates... So UHD Blu-ray is just the thing to go with your 4K TV, assuming you didn’t adopt too early, before the required (and stupid) Hollywood-enforced HDCP2.2 copy protection was fully developed. In Australia a 4K disc source is particularly useful, since most of us don’t yet enjoy internet bandwidth capable of streaming 4K. Two UHD Blu-ray players had arrived in Australia…

So it’s a mark of Sennheiser’s continued strength and breadth in the headphone market that the company’s products this year won both our lowest price break (saee p52) and this, a special award in which we’re recognising the extraordinary achievement of pushing headphone design to another level. Even in this age where there’s no shortage of high-falutin’ headphones up in the thousands of dollars, the HE 1 puts them all in the fiscal shade with its price of around $75,000 — that’s if you can actually get one, given their limited edition status. The inspiration was, of course, the legendary Sennheiser Orpheus created 25 years earlier — indeed this new design is widely but erroneously referred to as the Orpheus, perhaps because Sennheiser made a pretty late call in redubbing…

In combination with our sister publications Australian Hi-Fi, Audio Esoterica and Best Buys Audio & AV, we have reviewed an unusual number of power amps in the last year — that’s amplifiers which do nothing but amplify, so no input socketry aside from the preamp input, no switching, just your classic definition of an amplifier as a straight line with gain. So we’ve added Power Amp categories this year, to recognise the best of them. Our two winners are very different beasts — the Bryston opposite is a stereo power amp and enormous, while the Bel Canto here is mono, so you’d need a pair of the $3990 power amps for a stereo system. And it’s relatively compact, ‘half-width’ at 22cm wide (though deeper than it looks in the image…

The second of our Joint Winners in this category comes from the great Australian marque of Richter Acoustics. Richter’s floorstanding models have long been designed by one of Australia’s most famous speaker designers, Martin Gosnell, but the smaller bookshelf models like the Merlin are designed by none other than Brad Serhan, another of Australia’s most famous speaker designers, the founder of Orpheus Loudspeakers and renowned for designs for Duntech, Axis (including last year’s award-winning VoiceBox S) and others — which makes this award doubly appropriate, since we recognise Brad in this year’s Lifetime Achievement awards. Although Richter has made many updates over the years, the Merlin in its new Series V incarnation has changes that are by far the most dramatic in Richter’s 30-year history. By way of example, both…

We are great fans of JBL’s Studio Monitor series, awarding the smaller 4429 model a few years back, and positively blown away by this larger 4367, the last speaker designed by the great Greg Timbers prior to his departure from Harman International. This is not a small décor-friendly speaker — but you know what? Nor are the speakers used in recording studios, and if you want your system to recreate the sound heard there by the artist and producer, well, size does matter. The $25,990 JBL 4367 is a 61.2kg two-way floorstanding speaker 94cm high, featuring a 15-inch bass driver with a free-air resonance (Fs) of 27Hz. Mounted above the thick front baffle behind the HDI (High Definition Imaging material) waveguide horn is the new D2430K Select driver, which uses…

As part of Alpine’s legendary DDLinear range of high-end speakers the DLX-F17S features a 170mm transducer with a heavy-duty alloy frame, composite hybrid diaphragm with a central aluminium phase plug, beefy wire terminals and a massive ‘DDLinear’ magnet structure— seriously-engineered drivers, complemented by superb damped cloth tweeters with aluminium phase ‘nipples’. The judges pronounced the DLX-F17S as one of the most accurate yet musical speakers heard for some time, while also being totally impressed with their dynamic snap, detail retrieval and fast transient attack. “Just pure enjoyment.” More info: www.alpine.com.au HIGHLY COMMENDED Focal EC 165 K…

Subs in a box — usual practise in hi-fi, but a special category in incar, won here by Alpine’s Type-R 8-inch subwoofer with dual 4-ohm voice coils, loaded into a ported enclosure designed for optimum volume in terms of matching to the driver. The sturdy timber enclosure is smartly finished in durable grey carpet front and back while around the perimeter edge is black laminate. The speaker itself features superb driver engineering and outstanding build quality, and the resulting sub is a serious little powerhouse which blends subsonic response with considerable force… an impressive little beast as it manages an extraordinary level of output for its size. More info: www.alpine.com.au HIGHLY COMMENDED Axis XT1408A Fusion EN-AB1102…

In the digital age of entertainment, we are moving ever more swiftly away from spinning optical discs – CDs, DVDs and Blu-rays. Today we move movies and music around our home via Ethernet and Wi-Fi, no discs required, able to enjoy blockbuster movies at the press of a button, even to enjoy the exact digital music files created in the studio – high-resolution, high sampling rates – replayed bit-perfect through today’s networked music players. Not merely high fidelity, but absolute fidelity. It is, in many ways, a golden age of entertainment. THE JOYS OF NAS So today’s entertainment lovers will have a burgeoning collection of movies and music stored as files on computer, or on external drives, or – surely the ultimate storage solution for the modern media lover –…

Bluesound is the wireless multiroom system from The Lenbrook Group, which includes NAD and PSB Speakers — the Bluesound platform is slowly expanding to include those brands as well as Bluesound itself. Almost the entire range was replaced with ‘Gen 2’ models after its first year, updating them to rather less quirky designs, while adding Bluetooth and a useful ‘remote learning’ feature. But it retains the emphasis on being a ‘music-first’ system — Bluesound was, for example, able to handle high-res audio before its rivals. This Pulse Mini confirms the music-first philosophy — not cheap at $1199, but we found ourselves using words like ‘purist’ to describe its sound, which avoids the excessive digital EQ manipulation common in wireless boxes that can so often lead to lumpy bass and a…

Samsung can’t be hurting too badly from its Galaxy Note problems — the company has announced it is acquiring Harman International for $8bn in cash. The November 14 joint release from Samsung and Harman sees Samsung gain all Harman’s brands, including JBL, Harman Kardon, Mark Levinson, AKG, Lexicon, Infinity, and Revel. But it seems to be the automotive market which has prompted the move, Samsung highlighting “connected car technologies, including [Harman’s] top positions in infotainment, cyber security, over-the-air updates and telematics”, as well as Samsung’s complementary expertise in connectivity technologies including 5G, UX/UI, display technology and security solutions. Harman recently boasted that “1 in 4 cars today are equipped with HARMAN technology that makes driving more comfortable, safe and personalized... HARMAN connected car and audio systems also power 8 of…

WHAT A DIFFERENCE A COLOUR MAKES! Yamaha have an illustrious history of manufacturing superlative audio equipment, dating back to the late 1970s. In some ways it is unfortunate that their (very good) commercially focused products often steal the limelight. A couple of years ago Yamaha launched a range of very high quality amplifiers and CD players competing with some of the most prestigious manufacturers on the market. I must admit to being a little sceptical when they announced they were going to release an integrated amplifier at twice the price of a basic Krell. My concerns were ill-founded! All models are available in both silver and black facia, but Yamaha took the unusual approach of offering a range of timber side panels in different finishes. As it transpires some of…

So, having rudely dissed the soundbar genre in toto on our previous page, we now have to eat some wordage as we present one of the most musical soundbars we’ve ever encountered. Definitive Technology was making high-end soundbars before most people had heard of the word, in those days requiring a separate AV receiver and a wonderful wirefest to connect them. Now the amps are inside the bar — yet what a stylish and slim bar it is, topped in a nice slate-streaked matte top which will minimise screen reflection, a fabric front over its many drivers, and some angular stuff going on at the sides, echoing the design of the W series of which this is a part. That W family is a significant bonus, bringing with it full…

While BenQ is pushing into higher territory with the kinda-4K W11000 projector (review next issue), it continues to deliver spectacular value at the entry level. The W1090 is its latest example, priced at just $1149 but delivering full-HD (1080p) projection using Texas Instruments’ DLP technology, and with a DarkChip3 device no less, the favourite of the biggest hitters only a few years ago. This is a shortish-throw projector, firing its image up just a little so it ought to be suitable for coffee table placement in a lot of homes if being used as a pull-out-when-required projector. Of course, it can be permanently ceiling mounted as well — it is certainly a small unit, and quite light in weight. Yet that doesn’t seem to take away from performance. It has…

The AV receiver has evolved into the most versatile, action-packed, facility-loaded high-value category of audio available to buy today. Take Denon’s AVR-X1300W — not far from the entry-level of receiverdom at $1099, yet offering seven channels of amplification at a properly specified 80W per channel, with plenty of analogue and digital audio inputs plus a healthy six HDMI inputs, including full support for Ultra High Definition video standards, along with HDCP 2.2. It networks, with Ethernet and a new Wi-Fi module that offers dual-band (2.4GHz and 5GHz) wireless connectivity, and can stream music from network shares up to 24-bit/192kHz PCM and DSD128 or 5.6MHz DSD. There’s Bluetooth, internet radio, and Spotify Connect. For your movie soundtracks it includes Dolby Atmos and DTS:X decoding, and Dolby Surround processing, able to create…

You wouldn’t dream of buying a speaker from one manufacturer for your left channel, and one from another manufacturer for your right channel, would you? We thought not. So why should a centre channel be any different? As for using the same drivers, and maybe more of the same drivers, most people don’t realise that in a home theatre system the centre channel is doing most of the work when images are centred… which they are most of the time. So whereas in a normal two-channel system you have two loudspeakers combining to produce a central image, in a home theatre system, the centre channel has to do it all on its own. So now you know why Krix’s Epicentrix Mk2 centre-channel speaker is so large, and why it costs…

A system designed to achieve ‘Cinema Reference’ with peak levels of 105dB and concert level peaks of 110dB — amps and speakers from California’s Pro Audio Technology, the projector a three-chip DLP SIM2 Luminus 3DS achieving the THX/SMPTErecommended screen brightness of 16 foot-lamberts. Yet one of the most remarkable things about our winning home cinema installation was the space into which it was fitted — a humble basement used for storage, transformed into a showpiece theatre used by the whole family. Wavetrain and David Leisk redesigned the room itself, constructing a room within a room to provide a better acoustic shape and to deal with the sound isolation details, also contributing special design touches such as the golden glow to the cinema from a backlit brass mesh ceiling sandwiched in…

Network Music Player — what’s this category exactly? We’re looking for a box that can, like any traditional source, plug into your hi-fi, and then access music stored on your home network — perhaps on a networked drive (NAS), or from a shared folder on a computer. There are now a great many options for this — some modern amps and receivers can do it without requiring a box at all, and the better multiroom wireless systems each provide a suitable box for plugging into your hi-fi to network and stream from the internet. Auralic is a company that has led the way in network streaming at both high quality and, crucially for judging here, high reliability. While some of its upper models are space-age in design, the Aries Mini…

Vinyl is back — some might say it never went away — and we have three price breaks this year, when we’re embarrassed to admit that only five years ago, we neglected to have a turntable award at all. How much should you spend on a turntable if you’re returning to the black stuff? It’s a category where higher expenditure delivers greater rewards than you might get from a digital source — and that makes Rega’s achievement with the $549 Planar 1 all the greater. Rega is, of course, one of the great turntable brands, although it has a different take on their design to most of its competitors. Others go for high-mass plinths, but not Rega, which believes low mass (zero as an ideal) with high rigidity is the…

Times were when Japanese electronics companies were famous for making things smaller — yet ‘proper’ hi-fi long ago settled on a standard 17-inch component width, with amps single height and AV receivers frighteningly enormous. Well Marantz has challenged that in several areas — with its slimline AV receivers, and now with a lovely pair of rather retro-looking Marantz units, the HD-DAC1, and this HD-AMP1. We reckon the amplifier to be a classic in waiting — this ‘MusicLink’ series comes under the design auspices of Ken Ishiwata, so we were not surprised to enjoy impeccable audio tuning in addition to the combination of beautiful looks, with its wooden end-cheeks and classic knob layout, and facilities that have been carefully chosen to answer the needs of many a modern living space. There…

Canada’s Bryston confidently offers an industry-leading 20-year warranty on its amplifiers, based on a long record of designing nigh-unbreakable power units. The new ‘Cubed’ series of amplification certainly oozes longevity from the build quality on display — the handcrafted 14B3 here is built like a tank, and weighs in at a chiropractor-friendly 42kg. It’s the company’s top-of-the-line stereo offering (the 28B3 monoblock power amps are the absolute flagships). The design is offered in either a black or natural aluminium high-quality front fascia in 17- or 19-inch widths, with front handles on the 19-incher (all feature handy rear handles). This $13,999 stereo power amp offers 600W into eight ohms, and 900W into four ohms, with a very low THD (Total Harmonic Distortion) of 0.005 percent from 20Hz to 20kHz at full…

We have a separate award for Active Loudspeakers, since ‘active’ means they include their own amplification, so you’re getting both amp and speakers for your money. Indeed you get significantly more with Dynaudio’s $1999 Xeo 2s, which also include both Bluetooth and wireless technology to stream direct from a hub device to which you connect your sources. So you’re gaining significant neatness, and also saving on speaker cables. They’re certainly physically convenient, being an impressively compact two-way active speaker in black or white, with a protruding 27mm soft-dome tweeter and a magnesium-silicate polymer (MSP) mid-bass woofer which Dynaudio’s specs quote at 14cm diameter, but nearer 10.5cm from roll to roll. We used them sitting directly on a sturdy stand, but there’s also a $229 wallmounting kit (they’re usefully shallow at…

One of the quintessentially American car audio brands, Rockford Fosgate has here delivered a fine 2-way component set comprising two 6.5-inch midranges and two 25mm tweeters with matching crossovers. Both tweeter and mid-bass use a liquid crystal polymer material (LCP) developed to be extremely unreactive and inert to deliver uncoloured and neutral sound reproduction, while large neodymium magnet systems help efficiency and driver control, the ferrofluid cooling assisting this grace under pressure. They delivered all manner of low-level details that other component sets missed… indubitable accuracy. More info: www.directed.com.au HIGHLY COMMENDED Vibe Audio CVEN63C-V4…

This latest NEO range from American stalwarts db Drive spreads across a number of amplification configurations but it was the 4-channel Class-D NEO4 that ultimately raised our eyebrows. It may be relatively compact but the NEO4 packs a punch with its 125W into four ohms for each of its four channels. And there’s a two-ohm drive capability, meaning high current is available to drive tough speaker loads too. Build quality is far better than we have any right to expect at this price point and sound quality likewise — not the last word in absolute power output, but a good, honest full-range sound with the crossover switch set on Full. More info: www.dbdrive.com.au HIGHLY COMMENDED Axis XT4D Sony XM-GS4…

In our System Solution category we look for a complete solution, or one which just requires you add speakers. Indeed we were left trying to think of something that isn’t included in our winner, this $1250 M-CR611 networked CD receiver, another compact solution from respected audio company Marantz. It packs a CD player, FM and DAB+ radio, network audio streaming via DLNA, Apple AirPlay and, from the internet, Spotify Connect and internet radio, plus Bluetooth with NFC for convenient point-to-point connections. Missing is AM radio, but all but the most obscure of the absent stations can be heard via internet radio. It’s a clock radio too. The single analogue input may limit versatility for some, though there are two optical digital inputs and two USB-A slots. All this is in…

Bluesound wins not only Wireless Multiroom Speaker of the Year (p87), but also this Multiroom Component of the Year — so we’re including here any part of any of the wireless ecosystems, seeking products which leap above the considerable range of such components available for particular skills or quality. So why does the $1599 Powernode 2 impress us so much? Firstly, we’ve always been fond of the ‘receiver’ concept among multiroom components — the Powernode 2 neatly creates a ‘just-add-speakers’ zone of Bluesound, including all the wireless multiroom receiver technology plus two channels of high quality amplification. Secondly,the appearance of teis second-gen Powernode is a great improvement over Bluesound’s original — still distinctive, but more suitable and versatile for placement in most imaginable scenarios. And thirdly there’s the Bluesound system…

BenQ Australia used The Australian Hi-Fi & AV Show in Melbourne to debut “the world’s first DLP 4K UHD home cinema projector”, the W11000. The projector takes a UHD input and uses Texas Instruments’ new DLP solution for 4K projection, also achieving prestigious THX HD Display Certification. Its optical engine is specifically designed for 4K image quality, with a super-high resolution 14-element lens array structured into six groups with a metal barrel and cell framework, and using the highest-grade glass, aiming for greater light penetration. The W11000 uses a 6× speed RGBRGB colour wheel, and has a price of $7999 — significantly less than 4K projector offerings to date. Note, however, that Texas Instruments DLP solution uses an 0.6-inch DMD (Digital Micromirror Device) of 2716 × 1528 resolution, rather than…

Since LG Display cornered the OLED market by coming up with a way to improve yields in panel production, there’s been nothing to touch them. Although a separate company to LG Electronics, which makes the actual TVs, LG Display’s OLED prowess has clearly given its sister company (under LG Corporation) the lead in bringing this very different technology to the market. Other companies are now buying the panels from LG Display (Panasonic, Philips, Loewe and Grundig among them), but as yet, the $8999 65EF950T is the television to beat. Or it was — we gather there are only a few hundred left in the Australian market, despite it being unveiled to Australian journalists only in February. LG has moved on, introducing C6, B6 and E6 models, the last of these…

If we lay into soundbars on occasion, Yamaha has a clever way to side-step this — at this level it calls them all Digital Sound Projectors, not soundbars! And this is the latest top-of-the-line model, the Yamaha YSP-5600, along with its trusty sidekick the YST-RSW300 subwoofer — together they form the $2499 YSP-5600BSW package. And they bring not just surround, but support for the new Dolby Atmos and DTS:X audio systems. They are certainly a different proposition from conventional bars, which have fairly conventional driver sections for left, right and usually centre, sometimes also side-firing ‘surround’. Yamaha’s technology is different from the rest, because of its Sound Beam capabilities to steer the sound where the system wants it. It does this by using lots of drivers, each fed its own…

The race is on to deliver 4K projection, and while Epson hasn’t gone native 4K with the EH-TW9300W, this projector can accept a proper 2160p input and thereby implement some of the uniquely 4K attributes, such as High Dynamic Range and improved colour gamut. This is the second highest home theatre projector Epson presently offers (behind only the laser light sourced EH-LS10000), yet it has a very reasonable RRP of $4999. It offers the extremely useful WirelessHD connection between the projector itself and a small transmitter unit into which you plug your HDMI source, doing away with the long and troublesome HDMI cable normally required. And we found the WirelessHD operates flawlessly even with 4K/2160p signals. Its panels are full-HD in resolution, but the projector uses ‘pixel shifting’ technology, which…

Seven generations of Yamaha Aventage receivers — and seven wins in our top receiver category for the flagship integrated model... its latest iteration being this $2999 RX-A3060. It’s about as fully-featured as receivers get, with eight HDMI inputs all rated to full support for Ultra High Definition, and nine amplifier channels rated at 150W into eight ohms across the full audio bandwidth with less than 0.06% distortion, plus the ability to add two more power amp channels externally. That enables full 7.2.4 Dolby Atmos/Dolby Surround/DTS:X sound. There are plenty of analogue and digital audio inputs, even a phono input for turntables. Plus much, much more. This is, of course, network-enabled, via Ethernet or Wi-Fi, and it carries Yamaha’s MusicCast wireless multiroom system (see p89), which assures Bluetooth, AirPlay and DLNA…

The format of Compact Disc itself may be on the decline, as first downloads and then streaming have undermined CD sales year after year — and vinyl too, taking its revenge! But with 30 years’ worth of silver discs in our homes, garages and selling for a buck a-piece in op shops, there’s still good reason for music lovers to invest in a high-quality CD player, and therefore reason for hi-fi manufacturers to continue pushing the barriers of what can be achieved from a good disc spinner. Denon is clearly of this mind, since the ‘NE’ on the model of this $4499 CD player stands for ‘New Era’, and we gather this series of hi-fi separates was put together from the ground up, rather than being the usual iterative annual…

Here’s where our Network Music Player category gets a little confused... this Moon by Simaudio Evolution 780D is called a ‘streaming DSD DAC’ by its Canadian creators, and we might just as easily have recognised it in our category for digital audio converters. Because it’s a stunning example of that breed, as you might hope at the price of $21,499, with its aircraft-grade aluminium chassis sporting nine inputs including USB, optical, coaxial and AES/EBU. It can handle lossy compressed formats (all flavours), lossless compressed formats (all flavours), PCM (all flavours up to 32-bit 384kHz via USB), and DSD (all flavours up to DSD256 via USB). Internally, the 780D has two ESS9018S Sabre DACs in a dual-differential fully balanced design using two DAC chips, each with 16 unique DAC circuits. It…

If you happen to be reading this outside Australia, you should consider this award as given to the model mmf-9.3. Your non-Australian mmf-9.1s, we don’t want those — our Australian versions are better, upgraded to use a motor identical to that on the more expensive mmf-9.3. This particular motor conformed to Australia’s strict electrical code, and so was bestowed upon all the 9.1s on sale in Australia, which are therefore, according to Roy Hall of Music Hall: “essentially 9.3s”. As you can see, the turntable, whatever you prefer to call it, is distinguished by a triple-layer plinth — one more layer than on the lower-cost mmf-7.3. Each layer is separated from the other by vibration absorbers made from sorbothane, and if you do experience any vibration issues, it’s probably because…

As we saw with the Stax winner on p57, there’s more to a Stax ‘earspeaker’ (as they prefer to label their unique electrostatic designs) than just the headphone itself. They require a specific driver amplifier for their unique requirements and proprietary cable connection, so Stax produces a range of driver units — indeed these provide an upgrade path for Stax owners. But rather than give the new customer a double decision, Stax also offer complete systems in a single purchase. So this SRS-5100 comprises the SR-L500 earspeakers and the SRM-353X driver unit for $2999 all up, only $500 more than the price of the SR-L700 alone. The SRS-5100 combo is a lower level, then, but you still get a large dose of the delights that Stax designs bring to music.…

Parasound hasn’t built an integrated amplifier since 1986. Not that founder Richard Schram and designer John Curl have been sitting around doing nothing for 30 years — rather they have specialised in building separate preamplifiers and power amplifiers… which they’ve done with resounding success, winning dozens of awards and literally hundreds of rave reviews over the decades. Maybe the reason they decided to build the $4995 Halo Integrated is that it’s not ‘just’ an integrated amplifier. It has an on-board digital-to-analogue converter, as well as a subwoofer output with its own variable low-pass crossover network, and a built-in electronic crossover that can be used to tailor the signal at the Halo’s own speaker terminals as well as those at the ‘pre-out’ terminals on the rear panel. It has home theatre…

We very rarely allow Joint Winners for an award — we lock the judges away until they make the call. But on this occasion we had two standout standmount speaker designs that offer different strengths without one being an obvious winner over the other. So for once, two winners. First, then, the Elac Debut B6, well-named (the ‘Debut’ part) since the Debut series saw the first impact of the company’s new Chief Engineer, the highly-respected Andrew Jones (ex-TAD, ex-KEF), appointed to further strengthen the product line-up as Elac celebrates, remarkably, its 90th anniversary. Jones has waved his slide-rule over an entry-level range that features, even at this modest level, custom-designed drivers rather than common off-the-shelf componentry. The in-house-built tweeter is a 25mm cloth-dome type, protected by a domed metal fine-mesh…

Danish Audiophile Loudspeaker Industries, commonly known just as DALI, is one of Europe’s speaker-making powerhouses, playing on the same field as the likes of Bowers & Wilkins, Focal and KEF, and delivering everything from high-value entry-level models right up to the high performance of the Epicon series, DALI’s flagship range. The Epicon offering begins with the Epicon 2 stand-mount design, and is topped by the much-lauded Epicon 8 floorstanders. But our award goes to the smaller floorstander of the range, the $15,995 Epicon 6, in which DALI has achieved a remarkably detailed, transparent and dynamically lively speaker. It’s beautifully styled and finished to suit many a décor — a solid and beautifully rounded enclosure, our review unit in an extremely high quality gloss piano-black lacquer (also available are gloss white,…

Not only the exceptional clarity and accuracy of sound Alpine is renowned for, the CDE-196DAB provides extras as well — on-board DAB+ digital radio, Bluetooth for hands-free telephony and music streaming, plus steering wheel control inputs and a bundle of supplementary extras including IR remote control, the KAE-242DA-R digital antenna and a colour-coded and labelled loom with ISO plugs. It brings improved audio quality by taking full advantage of Alpine’s superb amplification implementation, and crucially the judges thought the CDE-196DAB delivered exceptional ease of use across all formats too. More info: www.alpine.com.au HIGHLY COMMENDED Rockford Fosgate PMX-5…

Although retaining a comparatively low profile in Australia hitherto, Helix forms part of a cadre of European developers synonymous with ultimate high-end audio equipment. It’s a master-crafter of everything audio from processors through to high-end amplifiers, with the impressive A series amplifiers being among the most popular. Although its switching methodology remains primarily within the Class-A realm, in actuality it’s an expertly engineered Class-AB which blends the best of both classes with aplomb. Outputting just over 85W continuous when presented with a four-ohm load and 150W continuous when saddled with a two-ohm load, it boasts impressive ancillary specs such as the very low total harmonic distortion of just 0.009%. The result is a sound that’s not only robust and controlled in every way, but downright accurate and lifelike, the Helix…

The growth of wireless multiroom systems has been defined in every way by Sonos, which pretty much had the market to itself for a decade, and Sonos defined the early shape of a wireless ecosystem — a squirter, a just-add-speakers amplifier, and several sizes of wireless speaker. A soundbar and subwoofer came later. One characteristic of Sonos is that its hardware models don’t change often, though they are regularly firmware updated with new abilities. And when we looked at all these systems a couple of years back, the largest of its wireless speakers, the Play:5, was getting on a bit — rivals were edging ahead with updated tech. After we wrote that, Sonos was kind enough to call and quietly agree, saying ‘Watch this space’. And sure enough, along came…

Our Sound+Image Awards Presentation Dinner kicks off Melbourne’s ‘Hi-Fi Week’ as the Hotel Intercontinental The Rialto on Collins Street starts filling with hi-fi and AV systems large, small and experimental, ready for the three-day weekend event. With two floors dedicated to the Show, beds and furniture are removed and hidden away to create the loop of consecutive listening rooms pictured in these pages, where Australia’s leading manufacturers and distributors displayed and demonstrated everything from the latest headphones and wireless streamers up to the highest levels of hi-fi — including the likes of Mark Döhmann’s Audio Union Helix 1 turntable (in two rooms this year), Yamaha’s new NS-5000s, B&O’s remarkable BeoLab 90 speakers and many more, often with key company personnel or the designers themselves on hand to answer questions and…