Modularity is one of the ways to take hi-fi closer to sustainability. Modularity is what Schiit and Moonriver (review soon) do. Another way is to make a product that comfortably out-performs anything in its price-range. We lose our superficial need to upgrade if we are forced to spend significantly more to get an insignificant increase […]
I enjoy Schiit. The last couple of months I’ve had the pleasure of reviewing both the Asgard 3 and two versions of the Gungnir. The Gungnir is a fluid sounding DAC, organic and I hold it in very high regard. The Asgard 3 is a $200 miracle worker. To these ears it performs way beyond […]
This is part 2 of my review/comparison of the two DAC modules in the Schiit Gungnir (you can find part 1 here). So which sounds better, the Delta Sigma or the Multibit? And is modular architecture a way to make hi-fi greener? What does modularity do for a product. This site views modularity as upgradability. […]
This is the first of a two-part review of the Schiit Gungnir. I will test what modularity can do for a DAC. Delta Sigma vs. Multibit: here we go… Why two parts? I review gear with an eye to sustainability. As a luxury commodity hi-fi will never really be sustainable, but maybe we can find […]
Under review today are the Lyd 8, a pair of active studio monitors from Dynaudio. There is nothing velvety about these. The Dynaudio Lyd 8s are active speakers, and active speakers are on the rise. No wonder, because they sound good and they are Marie Kondo’s best friend: like integrated amplifiers they ditch the separates […]
Under review is the Schiit Asgard 3. This is the least expensive modular headphone/pre-amp from Schiit and it is a doozy. Do you remember when gourmet food was all about foie gras, caviar, and lobster flown in from who knows where? Now, as haute cuisine has become ubiquitous, food is all about how local the […]
This is a review of the Quad Vena II Play. An all-in-one integrated amplifier with a small footprint and big sound. But let me start further back. When I was nine or ten I discovered music. It had something to do with the tactility of the album covers in my dad’s record collection; the photographs […]