LATEST ADDITIONS

Loudspeakers
Elac Air-X 403 - £2,848
 |  Feb 05, 2015  |  0 comments
There are umpteen wireless speakers around now, but what makes the Air-X 403 interesting is that it’s aimed at serious audiophiles and yet is (relatively) affordable. Startingat £2,499 for these entry-level 403s plus £349 for the base station, there’s also the option of the larger 407 floorstanders for £4,299. Elac makes very fine loudspeakers and has done some pioneering work especially with tweeter technology over the years. So we’re not talking about a consumer electronics company sticking its wireless tech into any old pair of transducers here! They are effectively active, wireless versions of the highly capable BS 403 passive standmounter.
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All-In-One Systems
Yamaha CRX-N560D - £400
 |  Feb 05, 2015  |  0 comments
If you’re looking for a compact, micro hi-fi system that covers all the bases, then the Yamaha CRX-N560D could well be the answer. It’s petite in size, but manages to pack a lot of functionality into its rather diminutive frame. The N560D is a new model in Yamaha’s PianoCraft series and comes with an onboard CD player and DAB/DAB+/FM tuners, but its network streaming capabilities are what really sets it apart, greatly expanding your listening options beyond these more traditional formats. Its Ethernet socket gives you access to the online and networking world, but it lacks the built-in wi-fi I was hoping to see.
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Integrated Amplifiers
Hegel H80 - £1,350
 |  Feb 05, 2015  |  0 comments
It might not be a household name, but Hegel has a considerable reputationin its home country of Norway and is increasingly winning favour with dealers and customers further afield. The company has a strong technology pedigree and its approach to its extensive audio product range is to do things rather differently from the norm. Unsatisfied with some of the supposed limitations of digital signal handling and transistor amplification, Hegel has gone back to the drawing board for the manufacturing of the H80. This is an integrated amplifier and DAC in one box that is setting its stall out to offer convenience and quality.
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Loudspeakers
Polk Audio RTIA1 - £299
Hi-Fi Choice  |  Feb 05, 2015  |  0 comments
What’s the best kind of hi-fi product? The only problem with a dreamy vision of ‘the-one-that-gets-you-closest-to-hi-fi-heaven’ is the painfullyhigh price tag or, worse still, a speech bubble that reads: “if you have to ask the price, you can’t afford it”. Life’s cruel. Fortunately for most of us, there are more hi-fi designers and engineers tasked with wringing the last drop of performance from every pound you spend than those chasing sonic Shangri-La at any cost. As Ross Walker, son of Quad founder Peter Walker, once told me: “Any fool can design a great-sounding amplifier for £30,000, the trick is to do it for £300.
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Turntables, Arms & Cartridges
The Funk Firm Flamenca - £850
Hi-Fi Choice  |  Feb 05, 2015  |  0 comments
When The Funk Firm releases a new turntable, you can expect innovation to be high on the agenda. Challenging the norms of turntable design is what company founder Arthur Khoubesserian is all about. Let’s not forget that this is the man who some decades ago first introduced novel ideas like fitting DC motors to belt drive decks alongside acrylic platters for placing your LPson sans mat. Back then this wastruly leftfield thinking, but now it’s commonplace on many of today’s high-end vinyl spinners, showing that Arthur was clearly ahead of the game.
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Pre/Power Amplifiers
Oppo HA-1 - £1,099
 |  Feb 02, 2015  |  0 comments
Who would have thought it? Obscure manufacturer of decent Chinese optical disc players starts spin-off company (Oppo Digital Inc. ) in California to make high-quality hi-fi products. It’s not a typical tale of hi-fi success, but the story is getting ever more believable with every product launch. Less than a year after the excellent PM-1 headphones were released, the company now has its own matching DAC/preamp/headphone amp too – in the rather pleasing shape of the HA-1.
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Pre/Power Amplifiers
Parasound ZCD/ZPRE2/ZAMP - £400/£400/£350
 |  Feb 02, 2015  |  0 comments
For those that love music, there are going to be times where you want to hear it in other rooms apart from the listening room. One solution is to have extension speakers wired up to the main system, but that means running speaker cables everywhere. It also means having your system running full tilt when all you wantis some background music in your kitchen. A better solution is a completely separate, standalone system that doesn’t take up too much space and won’t break the bank.
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Loudspeakers
ATC SCM19 - £1,996
 |  Feb 02, 2015  |  0 comments
There is a school of thought among certain loudspeaker manufacturers that what’s good for studios is alsogood for the home. One of those manufacturers is ATC, the Acoustic Transducer Company, which builds professional and domestic monitors and voices both in the same way. In studios monitors are used to reveal problems, to highlight sounds that shouldn’t be there. Monitors are a fundamental tool of recording and mastering, the window into the production.
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Loudspeakers
Eclipse TD-M1- £999
 |  Feb 02, 2015  |  0 comments
On occasions, a design idea that notionally offersthe highest possible performance can fail to deliver on that promise in reality. In theory, a crossover is a considerable impediment to the performance ofa speaker and far less effective than having a single driver reproduce the entire frequency range. In reality, the laws of physics ensure that the single driver speaker has as many issuesas one with a crossover in terms of performance at frequency extremes. This hasn’t stopped Eclipse from becoming perhaps the best known manufacturer of single driver speakers.
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Turntables, Arms & Cartridges
VPI Nomad - £795
Hi-Fi Choice  |  Feb 02, 2015  |  0 comments
Choosing a turntable is never an easy business and often the more you spend the harder and more complex the choices become. After finding your preferred basic deck, you’ve then got to consider what cartridge to go for to complement your tonearm, and which phono stage will get the best out of your cartridge while allowing for upgrades further down the line, all of which makes choosing a CD player seem like child’s play in comparison. That’s why for many a plug-and-play vinyl solution makes a lot of sense, provided the components are carefully chosen and quality prevails over convenience. Step forward New Jersey’s VPI Industries, a company renownedfor its high-end decks usually with four-figure price tags.
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