Lab: Paul Miller

At the tail end of 2020, when Marantz released its Model 30 amplifier [HFN Jan ’21], the name paid homage to the brand’s Model 1 preamp of 1954 while the chassis styling nodded at past Marantz designs from hi-fi’s ‘golden age’. However, this was not a case of the New York-born (but now Japan/California-based) company jumping headfirst into the so-called ‘nostalgia economy’ with a retro/vintage-inspired product, more the first step in a complete overhaul of its brand image. Since then, there have been various additions to the new-look Model catalogue, but all have sat below the Model 30. Until now...

Once CD players had become established it did not take long for hi-fi manufacturers to come up with new features and facilities to offer. Of these, the ability to play more than one disc at a time was perhaps the most intriguing and visually obvious. Toshiba was the first to produce a practical machine with the XR-V22 [HFN Jun ’24]. This could take two discs, but it was fellow Japanese brand Pioneer which led the field, coming up shortly afterwards with a six-disc cartridge player. This ‘universal’ cartridge system was common to all Pioneer’s multi-play models, allowing collections of discs to be rapidly swapped between systems at home and in-car.

Hegel is fond of its idiosyncratic product names. In 2023 the Norwegian brand felt confident in christening its new CD player the ‘Viking’, ignoring a model number altogether [HFN Sep ’23]. In the same year it also launched the P30A preamp and H30A power amp [HFN Jun ’23] – separates also known as the Conductor and the Orchestra, respectively. 2024 saw the arrival of the H400 integrated amplifier [HFN Oct ’24], aka the Streamliner due to its networking features, and now we have the new D50, a DAC that Hegel says is ‘affectionately named the Raven’.

Are you the hands-on type who finds most power amps a bit boring because all they have is an on/off switch? Manley Laboratories’ Neo-Classic SE/PP 300B monoblock (£13,699 per pair) is the opposite: it lets you fine-tune the sound by fine-tuning the applied feedback.