Take it to 11
Adding this component to your home audio system can unveil new layers of realism to sounds and vastly improve your listening experience, even if you already own most expensive gear out there. How and why the DEQX HDP-Express ($1,950) works is a bit complicated, so we’ll spare you the lengthy audio lesson and stick with [...]
A touch more advanced
Headphones are the new status symbol in a world where everyone owns the exact same phone. So it’s not surprising that Parrot, maker of a wide range of random accessories for mobile devices including a remote controlled helicopter drone and the Asteroid car audio receiver, decided to enter the fray. Like the $1,500 Zikmu iPod [...]
Ready for the next 20 years
Flash back to 1984. Prince still went by Prince and was ruling the music charts. Ralph put the macho in Macchio by laying the hurt on Cobra Kai. A former hollywood actor was just reaching the middle of his tenure in the oval office. And Koss introduced what would become one of the most iconic [...]
Forget one-size-fits-all
Typically, buying a set of custom molded earbuds from brands like Ultimate Ears (now a subsidiary of Logitech) or Etymotic can take months. That’s because consumers must first visit the Audiologist to have inner-ear molds made, which are then shipped to the headphone company for production. Sonomax’s Sculpture Eers Custom Molded Headphones ($199+) ship with [...]
Clear the mechanism
If there’s one thing that Bose does well, besides marketing, it’s noise cancelling headphones. They just work, even if they scream “I live for middle-management”. And despite efforts from some of our favorite brands, most of the offerings have been pretty lackluster. AKG aims to remedy that, including their former noise-cancelling headphones, with the all-new [...]
Audiophile AirPlay
Did you lust after Widealab’s Aurender S10 music server, only to have your heart crushed by its $6,800 price tag? Pioneer’s newly announced N-50 and N-30 streamers might be just the substitute for those with more humble budgets and who couldn’t care less about internal storage. The N-50 ($699) is the higher-end model and features [...]
Analogous
It doesn’t take a sleuth to see that the analog stereo bandwagon is growing beyond its fringe enthusiast roots into a mainstream consumer request. But unlike their positively eyegasmic flat screens, we can’t recall a time we’ve ever clamored for a piece of Samsung audio gear, much less an iPod dock, but the Samsung DA-E750 [...]
Digital Dynamo
Most people are perfectly content to store and experience their music collection on a computer (we do it everyday at the office). The convenience of accessing massive amounts of music and rich metadata on a whim with just a click or a search is simply unparalleled. For audiophiles, though, this ease of use comes at [...]
Roombox
The Arcam rCube is another high-end iPhone dock to hit the home audio market along the lines of the Bowers & Wilkins Zeppelin Air. What sets Arcam’s offering apart from the rest is the Sonos-like ability to wirelessly network up to four rCubes throughout the house, using an included USB dongle, for a complete home [...]
The virtual DJ your party's been waiting for
Services like Pandora and Apple’s Genius technology changed the way many of us consumed music, by intelligently mixing and matching songs to fit a particular theme or mood. These jukeboxes of the digital age, however, still fall well short of what professional DJs do best — the continuous mix. Pioneer’s newly launched Mixtrax music software [...]
Not so nano
Yeah, we know. Another day, another iPod Dock. But unlike the one sitting in your bedroom, the 8-foot by 4-foot Behringer iNuke Boom ($30,000) probably won’t fit on your nightstand. Then again, it won’t win any awards for classy product names either. Inside the 700 pound stereo beast, the iNuke has been endowed with 10,000 [...]
Home sweet home theater
As rabid movie, music fans and gamers, we’re always on the hunt for gear that can push our home entertainment experience to 11 (much to our better half’s chagrin). This roundup includes some of our favorite home theater products out today that we’d love to host in our living room. Continues after the jump.
Good things come in pairs
Ahh, that musty smell of dusty, disorganized vintage record shops. Or how about the high-pressure unapproachability of hi-fi audio retailers? Instant turn-off, right? Not so fast. The crew at In Living Stereo prove that purveying fine audio gear and records can indeed live in harmony. With a recent move from deep in the East Village [...]
Can-do attitude
We credit the Rams’-like looks of the new hidden radio & Bluetooth Speaker on Kickstarter for catching our eye this morning — despite our luke warm feelings about most Bluetooth audio. The monolithic can avoids spoiling its clean lines with external buttons by incorporating a simple but effective twist top design. The first twist turns [...]
Beats goes Business Class
It’s hard to believe that only three years have passed since Dr. Dre and Jimmy Iovine launched a line of headphones designed to bring their studio sound to the masses. History now shows the move was a prescient business decision that spawned a title wave of copy-cat products endorsed by anyone with a hip-hop single. [...]
