Hi-Fi News
383 FOLLOWERS
Hi-Fi News delivers uniquely in-depth reviews of high-end audio equipment, including the best in vinyl replay and iconic vintage gear from the early days of audio. It is essential reading for all music enthusiasts. Since its launch in June 1956, Hi-Fi News & Record Review has been delivering insightful reviews of the key products and technologies that lie behind our shared hobby.
Hi-Fi News
2d ago
The jazzical nature of this ostensibly religious piano cycle invites an array of approaches that range from reverential grandeur to gaudy showmanship, finds Peter Quantrill
In the summer of 1944, the head of music at French radio asked the 35-year-old Olivier Messiaen, and the Catholic writer Maurice Toesca, for a reflection on the Nativity in words and music, to be broadcast over the Christmas season. Beyond its title, there is nothing very Christmassy about the piano cycle that became Vingt Regards, which may be why Messiaen's contribution was eventually shelved.
Fast And Loose
Indeed, Chris ..read more
Hi-Fi News
6d ago
Martin Colloms wonders if this all-tube line preamplifier can re-establish Audio Research's supremacy in the exalted reaches of the high-end
As an increasing number of digital source components come equipped with variable output level one might think that line controllers – preamps without a phono cartridge input facility – are an endangered species. This will make sense to those embarking on an all-digital system, mixing a variety of digital sources and prepared to convert from the analogue disc domain to digital via an A/D converter function. Indeed, some digital control units are digital-on ..read more
Hi-Fi News
6d ago
Launched a little after Halloween, iFi Audio's devilish top-of-the-range portable aims to put a bat up the nightdress of the competition. Are you ready to sell your soul?
With its wide range of portable, battery-powered DACs and headphone amplifiers, few companies have done as much as iFi Audio to improve listening on the hoof. Yet the new iDSD Diablo 2, its latest range-topping model and a replacement for the iDSD Diablo of 2021, pushes the envelope of the mobile DAC/amp genre, both by being far from budget at £1299, and large enough for its manufacturer to deem it more 'transportable' than g ..read more
Hi-Fi News
1w ago
A cryogenic/demagnetisation process and proprietary piezoelectric crystals lie at the heart of Furutech's 'Clear Line' plugs. We cut through the noise.
Cryogenic treatment is key to almost every Furutech cable and connector, as is the promise of exceptional build and finish quality [HFN Mar '18]. With cables, of course, the material engineering can easily be quantified, but with the Japanese brand's 'noise busting' NCF Clear Line plugs – supplied with RCA and XLR terminations for insertion into unused audio inputs – the science can easily lose some clarity. Prices are £205 for each RCA-equippe ..read more
Hi-Fi News
1w ago
B&W's premium 800 D4 range is bookended by Signature versions of the flagship 801 D4 floorstander and the 805 D4 standmount. But is the polish more than skin deep?
Only two years after launching the D4 generation of its flagship 800 series [HFN Nov '21], Bowers & Wilkins has announced Signature editions of both the range-topping 801 D4 floorstander [HFN Sep '23] and its partnering 805 D4 standmount. At £10,000 a pair the 805 D4 Signature increases the stakes for this compact model, as the 'standard' 805 D4 [HFN Feb '22] retails for a full £3000 less.
While this signals a move into more ..read more
Hi-Fi News
1w ago
Rock tempos and mind-melting guitar solos rub shoulders with down-and-dirty lyrics on a 50-year-old album now remastered on 180g vinyl, says Steve Sutherland
There are a number of reasons why musicians take umbrage with their work being hosted on streaming platforms. Some bridle against the scant renumeration forthcoming. Others have taken a moral stance, unwilling to be considered bedfellows with artists or podcasters who they deem to be politically undesirable. And then there are those who consider the very nature of streaming itself to be artistically damaging.
Killer Or Filler?
A good exam ..read more
Hi-Fi News
2w ago
Incorporating Auralic's latest Tesla G3 streaming platform, the Aries G2.2 digital server also features a beefed-up PSU, a solid-state storage option and the promise of Dirac Live
At Munich's High End show in May 2023, a rare appearance by Auralic founder Xuanqian Wang heralded the launch of G3 versions of its Aries streaming transport and Vega streaming DAC, destined to extend the company's reach into the high-end when they arrive later this year. Yet at the same event the digital audio specialist introduced new G2.2 iterations of the Aries (tested here) and Vega [HFN Nov '23], both now avail ..read more
Hi-Fi News
2w ago
Nestled at the heart of dCS's three-box Lina headphone amp solution is the Lina DAC, now refreshed with APEX-level firmware as a springboard into its mainstream range
When dCS was founded in 1987, the idea that hi-fi hardware could be comprehensively upgraded without the need to lug it back to the shop might have seemed the stuff of science-fiction. Skip forward some 40 years, however, and firmware updates – delivered over-the-air for networked products – have become the norm. They're often used to squash 'bugs' and tweak minor settings, but what the Cambridge-based company has done with its L ..read more
Hi-Fi News
2w ago
Putting its re-badged CD players behind it, in 1987 Denon unveiled a machine to take on models from the brands that first brought CD to the market. How will it shape-up today?
Early CD players from Philips and Sony are considered by some collectors to be the most covetable vintage models because they came from the very companies that created the format. You can add to this list machines from Denon, whose Pulse Code Modulation (PCM) system underpinned the way analogue signals were transformed into digital data, recorded, played back and finally turned back into music again.
PCM was first demons ..read more
Hi-Fi News
3w ago
The politically infused post-punk of the band's early singles morphed into meticulously crafted electronic pop for their major label debut album in 1985, although singer Green Gartside's philosophical lyrics would remain as elusive as ever...
In 1985, Scritti Politti had enjoyed chart success with their second album, Cupid & Psyche 85, and had achieved hit singles both in the UK and the US. And with his dreamy demeanour, honeyed vocals and dyed blonde mullet, lead singer and occasional guitarist/keyboard player Green Gartside had become a bona fide pop star.
Label of Side 1 of the origina ..read more