Arcam's irDAC is here!

We've got our hands on the eagerly awaited Arcam irDAC!

We open the box to find everything perfectly wrapped in individual compartments.

With everything unpacked its clear to see Arcam has been quite generous. Supplied with the irDAC is all the relevent cables needed to get you on your way. PSU, Remote, x1 Stereo phono-phono cable, x1 Digital Optical cable, x1 Digital Coax cable, USB A-B cable, and Manual.

The Arcam irDAC uses x1 Burr-Brown/TI PCM1796 DAC chipset (Hang on don't they use x2 of them in Arcam's D33... Yes!) So arguably quite a lot of DAC for a mere £399!

On the back of Arcam's irDAC you will find x1 USB input Class I/II(switchable)[Faster is better :) Driver needed visit http://www.arcam.co.uk/extranethome/tor and download the D33/irDac driver to support the faster class II USB input], USB iPod input, x2 Optical inputs, x2 Coax inputs, x1 Digital Coax output & x1 Analogue Phono output.

So for those of us that don't have £2200 to spend on Arcam's wonderful D33! Is this the answer?

We have our irDAC running in now, so our thoughts will follow in a couple of days(Watch this space!)

Arcam's irDac is everything I expected from the little brother of the mighty D33.The irDac stays true to Arcam's sonic signature, which I feel is a vast,immersive 3D sound stage which brings you closer to the music & allows the listener to forget about their speakers & electronics! Arcam's irDac sounds right... everything I've played through it (from Classical to Metal, and everything in between) has made me smile with its sweet, natural tones. In turn this has given me more head room to crank the volume up, without my system losing control.

The Arcam irDac is one of the best £399 I can think of spending, which is why mine's on order.

Book a demo today!

Audio-T Enfield

Tel: 0208 3673132

Email: enfield@audio-t.co.uk

Treat Your Ears To The MASSive Sound Of Monitor Audio's Latest 5.1 Speaker Package!

 

Get up close & personal with Monitor Audio's MASS 5.1 surround sound speakers.

The MASS 10 & Centre satellites contain 1x 4" C-CAM Bass/Midrange driver which uses a single bolt through driver and bracing system, for increased overall bracing and rigidity & 1x 1" C-CAM Tweeter. The cabinet also features a single rear mounted port featuring HiVe technology for clean, powerful, punchy bass. 

 The MASS Centre speaker is identical to the MASS 10's but turned on its side which sits on a rubber support to prevent any vibrations from the surface it sits on. Keeping the same size speaker as the left, right and rears ensures excellent steering of effects while listening to your favourite movies. (All satellites can be wall mounted using Monitor Audio's Speaker Mount £15(each)

 

The mighty MASS W200 uses x1 10" C-CAM Long throw driver driven by 220Watts of class-D power.

On the other side of the MASS W200 you will find a 10" Passive Auxiliary Bass Radiator (which is usually used to gain more volume with a more controlled response than simply porting a subwoofer cabinet). Using quality cabling always pays off we suggest The Chord Crimson VEE3 or the Cobra VEE3 for even tighter bass.

Listen in one of our purpose built demo rooms to find out just how good the Monitor Audio's MASS 5.1 speaker package can really sound!

We would describe the satellites as "Fast, Focused & Detailed"

And the W200 subwoofer as "Room shaking" & "Trouser Flapping" :)

Book a demo today!

Audio-T Enfield

Tel:0208 367 3132

Email:enfield@audio-t.co.uk

You Cannot Be Sirius!

Well in fact we can...

The Isotek EVO 3 Sirius is a very serious 6 outlet power bar that will protect and improve any Hi-Fi system. Priced at £450 it may be the best value upgrade you could ever make.

For the techies amongst us the salient features are:

Removes common and differential mains noise.

Drops the noise floor by 40dB!

No cross contamination between sockets.

22,500A of instantaneous protection.

2,300W maximum power

Multi-strand silver plated OFC cable with a PTFE dielectric.

If you own a good HiFi system then you owe it to yourself to try this out (idealy with a matching IsoTek mains lead).

 http://www.isoteksystems.com

Transform Your Vinyl....Part 2. Apheta Prime...

Rega Apheta moving coil cartridge.

Now thats what I call a headshell !! 

The Rega Apheta has been with us for a number of years now and after the recent introduction of the magnificent RP8 which comes with an optional Apheta cartridge, we have been reintroduced to the delights of this wonderful cartridge. 

After 4 years of research by Rega (no pun intended) and many experiments the Apheta was complete. The end result is a fantastic sounding cartridge. Big, open sounding and with great spatial performance it truly is a joy to listen to.

Ours is as expected attached to a Rega RP8 which in turn is hooked up to the Rega Aria phonostage.

On the front end are a pair of Pro-Ac Response D40s connected to a Rega Isis integrated amplifier.

All beautifully displayed on our ground floor at the Manchester store.

As you can see here Rega use the three point mount for use on Rega arms.

 What did you do with rest of the body Chromey ??? Run!! Optimus is coming....

So, want to transform your vinyl? Contemplating a new cartridge? Why not pop in and have a quick listen to the Rega Apheta.

It's all hooked up and ready to play on the shop floor. Just ask any of the guys to spin up some vinyl for you. We'll also be happy to set up the Apheta in our dedicated demo room for a quieter listening experience.

Thanks

Munir, Kevin, Mike and Dave

Audio T Manchester

Tel: 0161 8398869

Just in time for the Saturday's Vinyl Roadshow

Unboxing the all new Rega ELICIT-R integrated amplifier. We'll be running it solidly to prepare it for Saturday's event. First listen is very promising and a review will follow. Better still, pop in for a listen and check out Diverse Vinyl's stock!

No indication on the box that this thing weighs a ton...

...just as well the packaging is tough then.

Much improved remote in the form of the Solaris.

Looks promising.

Seriously solid build, mind your toes!

At 105w into 8 ohms and a whopping 162w into 4 ohms, expect and equally solid performance.

Keep an eye out for our thoughts soon.

Simon

Audio Technica AT-LP1240

We've just received the new Audio Technica AT-LP1240 DJ/domestic turntable

First impressions are great, nice box and feels solid

DJ Danny is obviously excited at the prospect :)

Now for the ritual unpacking

As you can see the internal packing is very good, nothing is going to rattle about in there!

Now to get all the parts together to assemble this beauty

And shortly afterwards the deck is ready, fitted with an Ortofon 2M Red cartridge

Oooh Shiny !

Right we're off to have a listen to this, try out all the DJ features, play with the built in phono stage and USB connection, and load up the bundled Audacity software.

We'll report back later on how it sounds

Countdown To The Projector Event Only A Day To Go!

Final preparation is being made ahead of our Projector event next Thursday, Friday and Saturday 20th-22nd of June.

We will have 2x Epsom Projectors in our smaller demonstration room with a 5.1 package.

In our larger demonstration room we will be running a JVC, A Sony HW50 and the big daddy that is the 4K Sony VW1000ES! We are excited about this and are sure it will impress music and film enthusiasts alike.

The big picture event will be complimented with a high end home cinema packages from Anthem and Focal.

We already have many people attending so be sure to give a call and book in a tine if you are attending in the evening.

We are open each day from from 9.30AM-5PM (Thursday till 7.30pm) and representives from the manufacturers will be on hand to answer all of your questions.

Refreshements will also be available so even if you just love your movies but want to see and hear it and have some cake feel free! Who says nothing in life is free :-)

We look forward to seeing you 

Danny, Paul and Mahmood

May the tracking force be with you..

Having problems with your turntable? Is your vinyl sounding harsh and sibilant?

You may need a new cartridge or stylus. You could do yourself a favour and pop into Audio-T Manchester and have a chat with Dave. With over 20 years of turntable experience what he does not know about styli and cartridges isn't worth knowing.

Dave can advise you on the correct set up for your turntable and recommend the best cartridge for the tonearm and phono stage you are using.

He also does the complete turntable set up in store.

Why not get your turntable serviced now and bring your vinyl back to life!.....and put the force back into your music. 

You can also speak to Munir, Kevin or Mike if Dave is busy.

Thanks

Audio-T

Manchester

Tel: 0161 8398869

Email : manchester@audio-t.co.uk 

Rega Aria phonostage touches down in Manchester....

Our very own demonstration Rega Aria Phonostage has arrived and is warming up nicely and our Brighton store have unboxed theirs, take a look at the blog right here.

Meanwhile we thought we would take a closer look around the back and under the bonnet.

As you can see there are various capacitance, resistive load settings and gain settings to match a variety of moving coil cartridges.

Terry Bateman, Rega's head designer likes to personalise the equipments pcb's with little quotes !!

There is definitely something poignant about this one !!. Nice one Terry !!

 You're the real bobby dazzler here chromy....don't you worry.

 

Our own experience of the Aria phonostage comes from the Manchester Show back in March this year. Dave Mac & Paul Darwin used it in the Audio-T room. 

Having a weekend of continuous listening and impressing the public, the Aria excelled with all genres of music.

Give us call on 0161 8398869  if you would like to listen to the Rega Aria at the Manchester store. 

For more information on the Rega Aria Phonostage you can visit the official website here.

Rega Aria Phonostage Arrives In Store!

Unveiling of the new Aria in store...

The Aria is housed in the Rega R series casework to match with their existing Apollo CD Player, Brio Amplifier and Dac and available in a black finish

The Aria is a moving magnet and moving coil phonostage in one neat box. The moving coil stage includes adjustments for resistive input loading, capacitive loading and gain enabling matching for the moving coil cartridge you use.

We were lucky enough, along with some of our customers, to have a sneak preview of this on our vinyl day here at the shop with Diverse Vinyl and were suitably impressed, so we could not wait to get our hands on our demonstration one to put it fully to the test.

So time to plug it in and spin a few records, so we will report back soon with our conclusions.

In the meantime don't just wait for our report, come in and try it for yourself and don't forget to bring your favorite album.

Update

on 2013-06-21 10:55 by Brighton

Now having had the chance to put the Aria through its paces a little more on some of our tried and trusted records, I'am pleased to say we were more than a little impressed.

Using an all Rega system composed of RP6 with Exact cartridge, Brio R amplifier and RS3 loudspeakers, we added the Aria phonostage and started to listen, we felt the performance of the Aria in this system was quite remarkable.

The Aria had a sense of space around all the instruments, enabling you to follow the tune and become immersed in what was being played. It coped incredibly well with surface noise giving an almost inky blackness to the background with no distractions from the music, with its even handed balance, great sense of timing, whether we were listening to Falla - Three Cornered Hat, a 1960s' Decca recording, through different eras and genres all the way through to the current Low - The Invisible Way album, every record just sang as if you'd recently just bought it.

The Aria has a performance you'd expect from phonostages of a much higher cost, so if you're in the market for a significant upgrade to your record playing system, we'd suggest this is a very good place to start.

Don't just take our word for it come in and have a listen for yourself.

Im Baaaaack

Yes it's true, after a few months in the weird and decidedly wacky world of VERY high end audio I'm back "home" at Brentwood. It will be good to see, or talk to, you all over the next few weeks and months.

This of course means the team supreme of Paul and Danny are ready to sort out all your HiFi and AV needs, I will be focussing mainly on 2 channel and Danny mainly on AV but of course we can both deal with either (I think that made sense!)

Good to be back and see you soon

Paul

Unboxed, The New Ruark MR1 Active Bluetooth Speakers

Just arrived in store today are the eagerly awaited Ruark MR1 Active Bluetooth Speakers.

Hand-crafted wood enclosures and available in a choice of finishes, soft black, soft white or walnut to compliment any decor.

Using the latest Apt-X technology and custom designed drive units ensures CD quality audio from all your Bluetooth devices.  Streaming music wirelessly from your phone or i-device could not be simpler.

Most modern TV's from the likes of Panasonic or Sony also have Bluetooth built in, so these can be used to greatly enhance the sound of your latest flat screen. A sub woofer output on the back will allow you to enhance the sound even further, turning these little speakers into a superb 2.1 system. A 3.5mm jack will also allow to to connect a CD player or any other device with a line output.

With a power output of 20W, remote control and manufactured by a well respected company who are fanatical about sound quality and famous  for their award winning range of DAB radios and loudspeakers we guarantee you will not be disappointed. However, don't take our word for it, pop in and have a listen.

The Ruark Audio MR1's compact, multi-purpose loudspeakers. We shall now plug them in, run them in and report back soon, so stay tuned for the review.

New arrival: ARCAM BDP300 Blu-Ray Player!

At long last the eagerly awaited Arcam BDP300 Blu-Ray players arrived with us on Wednesday. Already having customer orders for the players we were lucky enough to have one that we could open up for demo....

 The player was planted straight into our cinema demo room which has a system comprising of Anthem MRX500 amp with PMC Twenty series speakers and REL subwoofer....

Needless to say we were isntantly impressed!. The first thing we played was Avatar, the improvement in picture qaulity was quite surprising (we were using a Pioneer LX55). The very fine detail just was staggering bust most surprisingly was the improvement in the depth of the image, the sense of scale and depth of the opening scenes showing space and then the forested area was so much better that we rewound the disc and watched it again!..

But from my point of view the best thing about this player is the sound quality. Most people that know me are aware that my views on home cinema hinge on the sound quality, I feel that the picture quality of a vast majority of most player screen/projectors are simply fantastic but there are so many systems that fall over on their sound quality. I watch a lot of live music concerts and sadly a lot of blu-ray players can sound awful even through very respectable amp and speaker packages. When testing new players I will head for my favourite Joe Bonamassa Blu-ray and play one of the acoustic tracks, so many players can sound falt and dull or even messy and aggressive it surprises me, as if manufacturers are going all out to improve picture quality and neglecting the sound qaulity. But not with the Arcam.....all I could think was: WOW!!!!!

When you hear a player that has very good sound quality you then realise how much of an influence it has on movies just like Avatar. Ignoring the dialogue you realise how the sound track is subliminally setting the mood for the film, a good example is the old film "7" where the detectives are just about to come across the serial killer and are in an appartment block with guns at the ready... there is hardly any dialogue but the sound track makes it terrifying!

I've only played a couple of music concerts and CDs on the player but already it has proved to be absolutely brilliant!

 As with the last Aracm Blu-Ray the set-up menu is very simple and easy to navigate so you can get it up and running very quickly....

If you would like to read more about the player in detail here is the link to the Arcam product page: http://www.arcam.co.uk/products,fmj,bd-players,BDP300.htm but my advice would be to come in and have a good listen in the demo room... feel free to bring a few of your own discs in....

A bit of Jeff Beck next I think....

Heed Obelisk

After a succesfull Heed event at the shop we thought we should mention their shining star in our blog.

Heed has made quite a splash of late especially with there integrated amp the Obelisk. If you have around £1290 to spend on an amplifier you would be doing yourself an injustice not to try it. This amp just gets on with it, being able to drive most speakers with ease without displaying a hint of aggression. It's very versatile with optional extra's ie a dac card for digital input or the phono card to allow you the use of a record player without additional box's. You can also upgrade the amp with a dedicated power supply the X2, this gives it even more power and musicality.  Stay tuned for our thoughts on the full range of Heed products or come and hear for yourself.

Iphone5 docks arrive.

B&W have expanded their range of airplay devices with the new Z2. A compact yet powerful little unit that can be used as a dock for the iphone5 or as an apple airplay unit for many other apple products. The have also refitted the classic Zeppelin Air with the new lightning connection and in true B&W tradition both units sound awesome.

New KEF home cinema speakers are amazing !!

KEF E305. A stunning new home cinema speaker package that just oozes with quality. These little speakers look stylish and fresh and come in deep black or pure white. The sound quality from what appears to be small speakers is amazing, reaching a fullness and depth that has to be heard to be believed.

New Sony KDL46W905

Sony KDL46W905. Sony’s latest smart TV is a real eye opener. The new “Triluminos Display” delivers an amazing picture straight out of the box. With wireless internet, tablet and phone connectivity it makes sharing your photo's and other media a breeze and it is quickly become our favourite screen.

Free Phone Offer. Sony are celebrating the launch of the new W series televisions by offering a free Sony Xperia Z smart phone with every purchase. This offer runs until 14^th July.

 

Sunny Day Out At The Chord Company!

Yesterday we spent a very enjoyable day as guests of The Chord Company at their factory near Amesbury.

I must admit that the rare event of early morning sunshine yesterday was suggesting a visit to the seaside more than the thought of spending a day in a factory.  The usual traffic chaos on the M3 didn't help either but we soon arrived at The Millsway Centre and were warmly greeted by Chord's cable guru Nigel Finn.  It was immediately obvious that Chord Company House was a great place to work, light and spacious and everyone there was welcoming, relaxed and enthusiastic and any desire to escape to the beach instantly dissipated.  

Matt, our friendly Chord representative, guided us around the factory and we saw the care and skill which goes into assembling Chord interconnects and cables.  This was soon to become even more apparent as we were next given the opportunity to make some interconnects ourselves, ably assisted by Mike. The time consuming attention to detail in the construction of Chord products was highlighted by our attempts to assemble leads.  It's safe to say that customer orders would take somewhat longer if we were the in production instead of the highly skilled Chord team!  Thanks to Mike and the rest of the team for correcting any errors in our work and for turning our attempts into useable products!

After an excellent lunch provided by Chord we spent the afternoon in their excellent demonstration room with Matt taking us through most of the Chord interconnects and speaker cables with differences being clearly demonstrated between products all the way through the range.  Highlights were the new Chord Signature Digital Tuned Aray (£400 for a 1m RCA-RCA) which was a revelation and the newly released Epic Reference speaker cable (£125 per mono metre) also sounded fantastic, open, coherent and transparent.  Everything sounded great at it's price point but we were reminded how much really good cables can transform a system, turning hi-fi sound into real music.  The better the cables got the more the speakers and hi-fi disappeared allowing the music to fill the room unhindered.  Once we'd reached the dizzy heights of Sarum Tuned Aray mains cables, Sarum Tuned Aray digital interconnects, analogue interconnects and speaker cables the music was a solid three dimensional presence in the room.  It would be churlish to talk about price at this stage but for those who can afford it and want to experience the full emotional impact of music in their home Chord Sarum Tuned Aray is the way to achieve it.

We had a fantastic day at The Chord Company and would like to thank everyone there for making us so welcome and making it such an enjoyable experience, and, to top it all, the sun was still shining when we headed home!

Full Metal Jacket.....

Musical Fidelity EB-50 headphones. 

Beautifully machined from military-spec aluminium. The light weight design also make the EB-50's a joy to use and very comfortable when in use. 

Now just in case you may be wandering how good the EB-50's actually sound, we think they sound great. Detailed with clean bass lines comes to mind. They are also very easy to drive, suiting almost every portable device out there. 

Don't believe us? Why not pop in to Audio-T Manchester and have a listen for yourself.

For more information on the Musical Fidelity EB-50 visit the official website or you can read a glowing review from Av Forums right here.

Thanks for reading

Munir

Audio-T Manchester

Neat Momentum 4i

We do love our speakers here at Oxford, so you can imagine how delighted we were when we rediscoverd Neat Acoustics last month after a gap of nearly 20 years. I can hardly overstate how great these speakers sound.

We will be keeping a representation of three ranges but at the moment the top model that we hold is the Momentum 4i: Click here to read the Hi-Fi World and Audioreview reviews.

This is a 2.5 way floorstander that is unusual in having integral iso-baric bass units. An 'Ultimatum' bass/midrange drive and Titanium tweeter complete the driver line up.

If you are looking for a fast, detalied, dynamic speaker with wonderful bass then please contact us for a demonstration.