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HE2006: Nagra
Swiss Nagra embraces your fantasizes of owning audio equipment styled like the cockpit of a Russian MiG fighter jet. Feminine tastes be damned, this stuff is rad. And it sounds great as well, or so was the opinion of everyone who heard the Nagra/Verity room.
Nagra is making a resurgence with a handful of components coming out of the ultra-expensive pro scene. That CD-C transport was the star of the room. The entire CD drive mechanism ejects from the transport and can, I'm told, support hundreds of pounds of pressure (but don't test it). The player also has a solid state line stage built in, as can be seen in the larger pics next page. Price for the Nagra CD-C is expected to be between $10k and $16k. On the very top is the Nagra V professional recorder.
Below, those barefoot-in-a-dark-room-nightmares on the floor are the $19,295 Nagra VPA monoblock amps using 845 tubes for 50 watts of juice. On the bottom of the rack is the $15,995 Nagra MPA solid state amp pumping out 250 watts which was playing when I was there. An integrated version of the MPA with remote is also available for $18, 995. In the middle of the rack is Audion's Quattro double box preamp which was used for most of the show.
All cabling was solid palladium wire by Silversmith. Prices are as follows:
Six foot speaker cables: $9800
Three foot interconnects: $4000
Dixie cup cable elevators: Priceless
Keep reading for some of the coolest photos from the show.
COMMENTS (2) | Permalink | Amplifiers $10k to 20k , Disc players $10k and up , Interconnects $1k and up , Pre-Amps $8k to 20k , Shows and Expos , Speaker Cables $2k and up | Posted by Josh Ray on Jun 21 '06
HE2006: Joseph Audio and Soundsmith
Joseph audio put on a much loved room with Soundsmith, makers of wildly bizarre components crafted out of wood. It's one thing to slap on wooden face plates or cheeks, but Soundsmith gets out the whittling kit and carves grooves, pits and lettering into solid blocks of wood and then packs the contraptions full of LEDs that blink and pulse with the music. Price for the Soundsmith 350 watt stereo amp will be around $22,000 and the preamp around $15,000 when they are officially released. Speakers playing were the Joseph audio $2299 RM7XL bookshelves.
COMMENTS (2) | Permalink | Amplifiers $20k and up , Pre-Amps $8k to 20k , Shows and Expos , Speakers $2k-5k | Posted by Josh Ray on Jun 20 '06
EAR 912 Preamplifier and VTL S-400 Amp Reviews
Big week for Stereophile and hyper-expensive tube gear by companies with acronym names. First up they published Art Dudly's rave review of the EAR 912 tube preamplifier. Priced at $9995, he finds all kinds of new sounds in his records he never heard before. Of course, preamps aren't nearly as sexy as power amps so they also stuck up VTL's new (relatively) S-400 stereo amplifier.
We've covered buckets of micro-powered tube equipment but very few monster power tube designs. VTL blew up the scene a few years back with their massive Wotan monoblocks pumping out an unbelievable 1250 watts of tube magic. Of course, not all tubes are made equal, that's why the tiny power tubes have such a huge following these days.
In any case, VTL's S-400 is packed with tubes for 400 stereo watts with a price of $20k. Not cheap but, of course, Stereophile's Brian Damkroger raves the S-400 is the most neutral amp he's ever heard in his life and the new benchmark in tube design. Of course, VTL also makes the monoblock version of these amps called the Siegfried with double the power and double the price.
COMMENTS (1) | Permalink | Amplifiers $20k and up , Pre-Amps $8k to 20k | Posted by Josh Ray on Dec 29 '05
