Innehållsförteckning för April - May 2018 från Sound + Image

When we find someone who clearly knows stuff, we like to ask them questions. And when we heard a talk by Jim Peterson, the President of Lumagen Inc., on the company’s Radiance Pro processor (pictured below), he mentioned in passing that they recommend 4:2:2 chroma subsampling over 4:4:4. So in addition to why that might be, we asked him to explain the whole idea of chroma subsampling, and why it happens. SOUND+IMAGE: What do the numbers in 4:2:2 and 4:4:4 actually mean? JIM PETERSON: All consumer video is encoded using 4:2:0 YCBCR, where Y is Luminance, CB is the ‘Chroma Blue’ channel and CR is the ‘Chroma Red’ channel. But note that CB is different to B, and CR is different to R in the red-green-blue (RGB) format. RGB…

While the idea of combining two or more functions into one box can be attractive — it can save space, reduce the number of required inputs, diminish complexity — there is often a downside of less than optimal performance compared to separate devices specialising in the individual functions. So would it be wise to buy the combo device? Of course the answer is: it depends. It depends on how well the combination unit performs the component functions. Which brings us to the Panasonic DMR-UBT1 Ultra-HD Blu-ray player and HDD recorder. This combines five functions: TV receiver, personal video recorder. UHD Blu-ray player, network media player, and network media server. Of those five, it is at least as good in two of those functions as any standalone device, and pretty damned…

SUMMARY Sony STR-DH790 Price: $849 + Good sound performance + Bluetooth with AAC + Lowish entry cost - Spring-clip speaker terminals - Not rated to drive four-ohm loudspeakers - No networking or AM While we spend much of our time basking in the glories of mid to high-end gear (hey, I’ve just packed up and returned nearly $40k-worth of Trinnov gear!), we can get equally excited about the value on offer from stuff that’s closer to entry-level. Sony produces equipment covering just about as wide an affordability gamut as any company, and this STR-DH790 is one step up from its latest base-level DH590 AV receiver. So let’s see what features have been selected for inclusion and exclusion, given the $849 price-point. Equipment The box is marked with a headline power…

When we heard that Len Wallis Audio had recently commissioned a unique version of Naim Audio’s Statement amplifier — one which doubled up on the twin power amplifiers of this already uber- high-end design — we wondered what the rest of this system might possibly include. We soon discovered that this was for a longterm client, and LWA’s Charl du Plessis talked us through the relationship so far. “When I first met the owner around 2010, he had just upgraded to a full Esoteric high-end CD player — the set with separate transport, power supply, clock and twin mono DACs,” says Charl. “He was looking to update to a good high-end amplifier, and our discussions led to the Krell Evo 1 and Evo 2 reference twin mono pre-amps partnered with…

Keith Monks started it all in 1969 with his electric cleaning machines built for the BBC; one of the latest-generation ‘KMAL’ cleaners is the Discovery One Mini (in blue here). But there’s no shortage of rivals, some almost as long established such as Loricraft (top right), some much newer ultrasonic systems from Audio Desk Systems and KL Audio (bottom right). There’s the classic Nitty Gritty line, and the gorgeous Clearaudio Smart Matrix and Double Matrix (around $2k and $8k in Australia). The Record Doctor V (shown with the orange LP) is the cheapest vacuum cleaner around at $365, and we’ve had fun experimenting not 100% successfully with Record Revirginizer fluid, which forms a skin overnight to be peeled away, like a facemask for LPs.…

SUMMARY Meridian 251 Price: $2699 + Hi-fi multiroom solution + Great smart amplifier + Great iOS interface (and even better with Roon) - No bananas, no spades, <2mm bare wire only - No physical remote control - No Wi-Fi networking Here we have something rather smaller than the previous Meridian product this reviewer encountered, which was the company’s range-topping active Special Edition 8000 loudspeaker, price $94,999 the pair — a demonstration, were one necessary, that this is a company that reaches to the very heights of audio reproduction. Yet here’s the 251 Powered Zone Controller, a mere 5cm high and a fraction of the price at $2699 — surprisingly affordable for a fairly fully equipped Meridian smart amplifier. Yet there are a good few links between large and small, both…

SUMMARY Sonoma Acoustics Model 1 headphone system Price: $6999 + New technology does the job + The joys of electrostatic sound - Fit a bit firm - No outputs to loop through into your main system Any fan of high-end headphones will be unlikely to require conversion to the joys of electrostatic headphones, which are an aspirational high for head-fi lovers everywhere. Renowned for speed and detail, electrostatic designs replace the usual cone speaker inside a headphone with a flat diaphragm held at a fixed charge, while a dedicated headphone amplifier biases and modulates the voltage across perforated metal grids (stators) on either side. (Not to be confused with planar magnetic designs, in which the signal is applied to the diaphragm itself, positioned between fixed magnets.) At least, that’s how…

SPECS BLADE RUNNER 2049 2017 – Universal Sony Pictures Home Entertainment Australia Pty Ltd MOVIE: PICTURE: SOUND: EXTRAS: DIRECTOR: Denis Villeneuve STARRING: Ryan Gosling, Dave Bautista, Robin Wright, Ana de Armas, Wood Harris, David Dastmalchian, Tómas Lemarquis, Sylvia Hoeks, Edward James Olmos, Jared Leto, Hiam Abbass, Mackenzie Davis, Lennie James, Carla Juri, Harrison Ford, Sean Young RUNNING TIME: 163 minutes RESTRICTIONS: Rated MA, Region Free UHD BD PICTURE: 2.35:1, 2160p/24, HEVC, HDR, BT.2020 SOUND: English: Dolby Atmos; Portuguese: DTS-HD Master Audio 3/2.1; English Descriptive Audio, Czech, Hungarian, Polish, Russian, Spanish, Thai, Turkish: Dolby Digital 3/2.1 @ 640kbps SUBTITLES: English, Arabic, Bulgarian, Cantonese, Chinese Simplified, Chinese Traditional, Croation, Czech, Greek, Hebrew, Hungarian, Icelandic, Indonesian, Korean, Malay, Polish, Portuguese, Portuguese, Romainian, Serbian, Slovak, Slovene, Spanish, Thai, Turkish, Vietnamese EXTRAS: Ultraviolet Digital Copy;…

WELCOME Our buying guide is based on the Sound+Image Awards that are presented each year – the very best value at each price level. We list all the latest winners, but also every still-available product from previous awards, varying the categories each issue. First from the back: loudspeakers... Loudspeakers up to $6999 Every model listed here has won a Sound+Image award – so they represent the height of loudspeakerdom, each offering top-value performance at its price, whether low or high! A ‘ ’ means you can read our full review on AVHub.com.au. Prices can vary with finish. Key  AWARD Shows the year and level of Sound+Image Award W = Product of the Year HC = Highly Commended PRICES marked * indicate a superseded model, see notes AVHub indicates where full…

When you’re reading the review of Meridian’s 251 Powered Zone Controller in this issue, you’ll notice I get a little distracted towards the end by the experience of using it as an ‘endpoint’ for the software music player Roon. And indeed several weeks after the review I was explaining to a friend what Roon does, and after my brief but enthusiastic monologue of an explanation, my friend raised his eyebrows and said, “Mmm — sounds like you’ve joined a cult.” Which was a keen observation, because I’ve had a similar impression in the past when reading other reports of Roon and its merits. Roon calls itself a music player but it might best be described as organisational software. It doesn’t give you access to any new music*; rather you point…

Even after being in this game for quite a while now, I am startled by how relentlessly the home theatre and home entertainment experience improves, year by year, decade by decade. Especially at the affordable quality end of the market. Take as an example the Focal Sib Evo Dolby Atmos speaker system, the subject of this review. Yes, it is affordable, especially for a 5.1.2 system — the regular surround channels, a subwoofer, a centre channel, and Dolby Atmos-enabled front stereo speakers. It costs $1500. You’ll have to add an AV receiver, and you’d surely want a 7.1-channel Atmos model to take advantage of the height abilities. So with that added, it’ll costs more than most premium soundbars. But this system would then quite kill them in terms of performance.…

SUMMARY Rega Planar 6 turntable Price: $1999, $2399 (reviewed), $2799 + Excellent resolution and accuracy at the price + Adjustable electronic PSU + Good-looking deck - Can’t replace stylus Rega’s entry-level decks — currently Planars 1, 2 and 3 — have been consistently a top choice for those re-entering the vinyl world with a reasonable budget. The company’s latest deck, this Planar 6, offers a jump to a higher level. You might view this as a halfway house to Rega’s reference offerings, the RP8 and RP10. But in fact it seems from the new technologies and materials here that Rega intends the Planar 6 to lead the way, rather than merely offering middle-ground for upgraders. And we found its performance to confirm this path. Equipment Philosophy first. You might think…

SUMMARY Cambridge Audio Solo & Duo Price: $299 / $449 + Highly precise imaging + Low noise floor + Channel balance adjustment – Rumble filter permanently engaged It’s the most delicate signal in hi-fi, and handling it is one of the greatest challenges in audio engineering. Often forgotten is that vinyl reproduction is an unpowered system. We plug a turntable into the mains power to drive the motor which spins the platter, and in ‘automated’ decks the arm may be powered to lift and move onto the record. But the parts which actually play the music — the stylus, cartridge, tonearm and signal cables — these receive no power at all. The signal which sets forth from a turntable’s output cables is produced only by the tiny movements of a…

Both Sooloos and Roon use ‘Focus’ as the term for filtering your collection using a combination of criteria — from genre and mood to performance credits, instrumentation (just ‘piano’, say), and a host more, including ‘quality’, so that you can exclude anything below CD quality, say, or show only high-res tracks. As with many aspects of operation, Roon achieves it with rather more flair. The Sooloos focus selection box is shown left, the Roon one below and right — so pretty!…

Last week I listened to an organ concert in a familiar venue, but with a completely new instrument. A venerable (but serviceable and well-tuned) pipe organ had been replaced by an Allen digital organ. So I was listening to music generated not by the physical process of air passing through pipes but by an array of speakers. I wondered if I would be able to hear the difference between ‘pure’ notes generated by metal or wooden tuned pipes and ‘reproduced’ notes, digitally generated, electronically amplified and sent through what was effectively a stereo speaker system (with a pair of surround speakers at the rear for ambience). This was a fascinating test. I knew the venue well and had heard the organist play the pipe instrument very recently, so I expected…

SPECS WESTWORLD SEASON ONE: THE MAZE 2016 – Roadshow Entertainment MOVIE: PICTURE: SOUND: EXTRAS: CREATORS: Jonathan Nolan/Lisa Joy STARRING: Evan Rachel Wood, Thandie Newton, Jeffrey Wright, James Marsden, Ed Harris, Talulah Riley, Anthony Hopkins, Luke Hemsworth, Angela Sarafyan, Jimmi Simpson, Ben Barnes, Simon Quarterman RUNNING TIME: 620 minutes RESTRICTIONS: Rated MA, Region Free UHD BD PICTURE: 1.78:1, 2160p/24, HEVC, Dolby Vision, BT.2020 SOUND: English: Dolby Atmos; French, German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, Czech, Polish: Dolby Digital 3/2.1 @ 640kbps SUBTITLES: English, French, German, Italian, Spanish, Dutch, Chinese, Korean, Spanish, Portuguese, Arabic, Czech, Danish, Finnish, Norwegian, Polish, Swedish EXTRAS: 24 page Westworld ‘Handbook for New Employees’; 6 page pamphlet; Resume from Last; 8 Special Features (80 mins); 7 Big Moment Special Features (15 mins); Gag Reel (2 mins) On the one hand,…

We mention in our review of the Trinnov Altitude16 (see p38) that Dolby Atmos and other immersive sound systems have been limited in their boundless scalability by the traditional channel count of AV receivers and their iterative evolution. But Denon has announced it’s up for lifting the channel count with its new AVC-X8500H (RRP $5999), claiming it as the industry’s first true 13.2-channel amplifier. The X8500H features Dolby Atmos, DTS:X and Auro 3D surround decoding, plus plenty of smarts — full HEOS multiroom compatibility, Apple AirPlay, and also Amazon Alexa’s Smart Home Skill for Entertainment Devices, a new feature set which will become available in Australia later in 2018. Of course the AVC-X8500H is fully prepared for UHD Blu-ray disc players and other ‘4K’ UHD sources, with onboard Dolby Vision…

Definitive Technology is a company that does things a little differently, with often impressive results. The company has taken out Sound+Image awards not only for its loudspeakers but for headphones and multiroom speaker systems too. But it is best known for its high-level black fabric-covered tower speakers, which are notable for their inclusion of bass radiators and active drivers in their lower portions, adding to conventional passive drivers driven by external amplifier power. Even its new Demand series of standmounters take the path less travelled by adding a top-mounted passive radiator to reinforce their low-end response. Two stars aligned as we prepared this issue — we were invited to hear a complete Arcam-powered Definitive Technology BP9000 Series surround system, just as the Audio Connection store in Sydney completed work on…

SUMMARY Trinnov Altitude 16 Price: $23,999 Trinnov Amplitude 8m Price: $11,499 + As powerful and versatile a system as seems possible + Very high-end performance + Enormous power from the Amplitude power amp - No ARC support - Limited to 96kHz music When Dolby Atmos appeared, one of its most interesting aspects was that it moved outside the 5.1 or 7.2 loudspeaker paradigm not only by adding height channels, but by allowing entirely different channel counts. Dolby Atmos is able to process the sound uniquely for each installation to make best use of the available speakers, regardless of configuration. In practice, however, Atmos has appeared on equipment which generally conforms to the 5.1.2 or 7.2.4 paradigm for reasons both of backwards compatibility, and because those are the sizes…

SUMMARY Denon DRA-100 networked stereo receiver Price: $1799 + Conventional inputs plus loads of streaming options + High-quality design & build + Powerful Class-D sound - No turntable or computer inputs Denon has a long history in producing very conveniently-sized micro systems, but this is something rather larger, between those offerings and full-sized component hi-fi. And in many regards it is the quintessential modern amplifier — handling conventional analogue inputs, plus digital inputs handled by an internal DAC, and then transformed by Wi-Fi and Ethernet, Bluetooth and Spotify into a streaming networking music player as well as amplifier. As its ‘receiver’ tag implies, it also has radio on board, though this is internet radio rather than ye olde FM and AM. So much stuff! The trick, then, is making it…

The MC200 Media Core on loan from Australian distributor Cogworks came loaded with a folder of MQA tracks. MQA is the container developed by Meridian (but now licensed by a separate ‘MQA Inc’) to do two things — first to reduce the file size required for high-res audio, and secondly to ‘authenticate’ the recording as being a true studio master, hence the name ‘Master Quality Authenticated’. File-size reduction is useful primarily for high-res served from online (e.g. Tidal), whereas in the home that side of MQA might just save a bit on storage . The ‘authenticated’ brings the hope of banishing dodgy high-res recordings — of which Sound+Image discovered many in the early days of high-res through our reviews conducted in collaboration with the UK’s Hi-Fi News & Record Review.…

SPECS BATMAN: GOTHAM BY GASLIGHT 2018 – Roadshow Entertainment MOVIE: PICTURE: SOUND: EXTRAS: DIRECTOR: Sam Liu STARRING: Bruce Greenwood, Jennifer Carpenter, Chris Cox, John DiMaggio, David Forseth, Grey DeLisle, Anthony Head, Bob Joles, Yuri Lowenthal, Lincoln Melcher, Scott Patterson, William Salyers, Tara Strong, Bruce Timm, Kari Wuhrer RUNNING TIME: 77 minutes RESTRICTIONS: Rated M, Region Free UHD BD PICTURE: 1.78:1, 2160p/24, HEVC, HDR, BT.2020 SOUND: English: DTS-HD Master Audio 3/2.1; French, Spanish: Dolby Digital 3/2.1 @ 640kbps SUBTITLES: English, French, Spanish EXTRAS: Nil BD PICTURE: 1.78:1, 1080p/24, MPEG4 AVC @ 23.01Mbps SOUND: English: DTS-HD Master Audio 24/48 3/2.1 @ 2568kbps (core: DTS 24/48 5.1 @ 1509kbps); French, German, Spanish, Portuguese: Dolby Digital 3/2.1 @ 640kbps; Commentary, Portuguese: Dolby Digital 2/0.0 @ 192kbps SUBTITLES: English, French, German, Spanish x 2, Portuguese…