LATEST ADDITIONS

Review: Cliff Joseph, | Jan 01, 2018

It took some time to develop its first noise-cancelling headphones, but Bowers & Wilkins has thrown down the gauntlet to its rivals with this high-tech PX model

Noise-cancelling headphones are undoubtedly useful if you want to relax and block out the background drone on a long journey by train or plane, but the technology can also have a frustrating, deadening impact on sound quality. And rarely is adding Bluetooth wireless streaming a boon to great sound.

Turntables, Arms & Cartridges Vintage

Technics SL-Q303 turntable

Review: Tim Jarman, | Jan 01, 2018

When launched, this turntable was just one of over a dozen Technics decks offered. Is it now the pick of the radial-tracking pack? Time to take it to the test bench...

Think of direct-drive turntables and the chances are that one brand will spring to mind: Technics. What's more, its SL-1200 turntable will be the model most people think of first. This famous deck casts a long shadow over the others in the company's range and yet there were many to choose from. In fact, when the SL-Q303 seen here was launched in the UK in 1982 it was part of a 13-model lineup – a series that went from the professional-spec SP-10 MkII right down to moulded plastic belt-drive budget models such as the SL-B202.

Integrated Amplifiers

Luxman L-509X integrated amplifier

Review: Andrew Everard, | Jan 01, 2018

The style may be ‘retro’, but this powerful integrated amp from a Far East legend is no exercise in nostalgia: it lacks fashionable digital inputs, but has serious sonic appeal

OK, so it may help explain the whole ‘vinyl revival’ thing, from portable record players with greater tracking weight than a Caterpillar bulldozer to supermarket own-brand LPs, but looking to the past will only get you so far. Forget all that longer summers, colder winters and ‘jumpers for goalposts’ stuff: even nostalgia’s not what it used to be. Products must stand on their own merits in today’s competitive market.

Turntables, Arms & Cartridges

Pro-Ject 175 Vienna Philharmonic Recordplayer turntable

Review: Nick Tate, | Jan 01, 2018

Limited to just 175 pieces, this luxuriously-appointed version of Pro-Ject's 'The Classic' turntable is offered in celebration of the VPO. Is this gilding the lily or musical gold?

Forget concept albums, for this is a 'concept turntable' – a striking looking record player that, at first sight, might seem rather 'Trump Tower', and perhaps aesthetically overpowering for conservative European eyes. Put your sunglasses on however, and all becomes clear as the VPO logo engraved into the lower right hand corner of the top plate is revealed. For this is a special commemorative product, a plush limited edition version of Pro-Ject's The Classic turntable [HFN Aug '16], made to celebrate one-and-three-quarter centuries of the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra.

Cables

QED Supremus loudspeaker cable

Review and Lab: Paul Miller | Jan 01, 2018

As one of the brands that kick-started the cable revolution, QED has always emphasised value in its designs. The Supremus flagship is no exception.

What began with its 42-strand and 79-strand speaker cables has seen QED on a journey of discovery culminating 40 years later in this flagship Supremus offering. Closer in physical bulk and generally unwieldiness to a hawser than a speaker cable, QED's new top-of-the range wire has almost nothing in common with the figure-of-eight-shaped 79-strand cable that was in the vanguard of that early subjective revolution.

Loudspeakers

Vivid Audio Giya G1 Spirit loudspeaker

Review: David Price, | Jan 01, 2018

It may not look as outrageous as the iconic B&W Nautilus, but this is its younger, and arguably superior offspring

When B&W introduced the Nautilus in 1993 it created what is surely the most iconic loudspeaker any of us will ever see. Its 'snail on steroids' look projected it on to countless magazine pages around the world and gave B&W the kind of PR boost company CEOs dream of. Only it wasn't a PR man that contrived the Nautilus, it was B&W's then senior design engineer Laurence Dickie. And though it looked like something created by H R Giger for the set of Alien, the Nautilus was actually an exemplar of the Bauhaus diktat that form follows function. It looked that way because it needed to be that way.

Loudspeakers

Franco Serblin Accordo loudspeaker

Review: Ken Kessler, | Jan 01, 2018

At long last, we get our hands on the iconic Franco Serblin Accordo. Does it redefine the small loudspeaker?

We may have waited over five years to review the Franco Serblin Accordo but, as I found within five seconds of switching them on, it was worth the hold-up. The Accordo is one of the late Franco Serblin’s last designs, chronologically falling in between the Ktema and the Lignea, and its appeal to the archetypal British audiophile is blatantly overwhelming. With its predecessor and follow-up both floorstanders, the Accordo differs as a petite two-way standmount, complete with a 740mm angled pedestal. The Accordo is sold in mirror-imaged pairs, in walnut for £7500 with the integral stands, or in high-gloss grey for an additional £300.

Loudspeakers

Focal Kanta N^o2 loudspeaker

Review: Cliff Joseph, | Jan 01, 2018

A new range combines Focal’s traditional performance values with a more relaxed – and colourful – design

Based in Saint-Étienne, the company’s resolutely ‘made in France’ philosophy has led Focal to develop a number of its own acoustic technologies and designs, and even to use locally grown materials in the manufacture of its speakers. And now the company is continuing that no-compromise approach with its Kanta N^o2, the first in a new range of compact loudspeakers.

Hi-Res Downloads

Jan Lundgren Et Al Potsdamer Platz

B. Willis (Music); P. Miller (Lab) | Jan 01, 2018

The emotional tenor of this journeyman jazz ensemble ranges from joyous and celebratory, as in the title track, to imploring (‘No. 9’, ‘Lycklig Resa’), to near-rock frenetic (‘Bullet Train’) to insistently screechy (‘The Poet’). Among the eleven tracks are a few that touch on all these (‘Song For Jorgen’), then there’s the mysteriously compelling ‘Dance Of Masja’. Capable of swinging hard or taking it easy, Lundgren and bandmates Jukka Perko, Dan Berglund and Morten Lund are never far from moody traditional late-night musings (‘Never Too Late’), nor are they strangers to extended improvisation (‘Twelve Tone Rag’).

Hi-Res Downloads

Kammerorchester Basel & Julia Schroder : Bologna 1666: Perti, Torelli, Colonna

C. Breunig (Music); P. Miller (Lab) | Dec 25, 2017

Still thriving, Bologna’s Accademia Filharmonica was opened in 1666: a magnet for aspiring composers and performers. This (appropriately) 66m selection of unfamiliar concertos and sinfonias spans from primarily vocal 17th-century composers – Colonna, Perti – to followers whose music was exclusively instrumental. Director Julia Schröder proves well able to meet the technical demands of the ornate decoration in the violin concertos, and while a lot of this music will only interest the specialist collector, works such as Zavateri’s ‘A tempesta di mare’ or the dramatic first section of Perti’s Sinfonia ‘Gesù al sepolcro’ are worth investigating. As are Laurenti’s four-movement Violin Concerto and the anonymous galant tribute to Bologna’s patron saint Petronius.

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