The quest to review the Pearl Acoustics Model One began at the 2025 Montreal Audiofest, which I was covering for Stereophile. It was there I crossed paths in a hallway with Galion Audio's Thomas Tan, ...

Unlike every other system featuring expensive speakers—some flagship pairs among them— Bowers & Wilkins' new 801 D5 floorstanders, which I heard in this room at Audio Advice Live 2026, surprised not ...

Playing Frank Sinatra on a Dual CD 529 turntable fitted with an Ortofon 2M Red cartridge through the Vienna Acoustics Schubert Grand Sonata loudspeakers in this Playback Distribution room at Audio ...

Sometimes, I must admit, mega-luxury components really are all they're cracked up to be. However, these beautiful Focal behemoth Scala Utopia Evo M speakers, connected to classic Naim electronics in ...

I could hear it from the hallway at Audio Advice Live 2026. It was the sound of music—not an audiophile's wet dream of treble and bass extension, not an AV lover's vision of bombs bursting under the ...

You're Gonna Need a Little Music is Yard Act's third album, and it's their first to be recorded together as a band in a studio. Their first two albums were made on laptops, each member recording their ...

I saw Rudi Mahall for the first time in 2009 at the Oslo Jazz Festival, in a band led by Alexander von Schlippenbach. I thought he was the best bass clarinet player I had ever heard, with the possible ...

After Luxman's Masakazu Nagatsuma (shown above) walked me through all the company's gear in this most impressive system put together at AXPONA 2026 by Rhythm Audio, I settled in for a full demo. The ...

In ancient times, when I first ventured beyond playing files stored on a USB stick or NAS to streaming from Tidal and Qobuz, I ran a USB cable between a MacBook Pro and my DAC. For playback software, ...

Taste is a funny thing. Love cilantro? Millions swear it tastes like soap. Similarly, design cognoscenti will gush over a minimalist Scandinavian sofa that others dismiss as just a pricey plank with ...

A few summers ago, I briefly got it in my head that I could become a wine connoisseur. This was due to a very generous and unexpected gift. A local acquaintance had passed away, and his wife wanted to ...

Bluetooth headphones have brought me joy for years—sometimes a little too much. Once, while waiting for a flight at my regional airport, I switched on the active noise cancellation, closed my eyes, ...