high

Most of the music people enjoy doesn't sound very good. That's not to say it isn't good music, just that it doesn't sound great. I'm not picking on digital or contemporary music; most of my favorite Motown and Stax soul music from the 1960s and 1970s sounds like crap. Most rock music from any decade sounds cruddy; that's just the way it is.

A lot of today's best bands, including alternative darlings Arcade Fire, make awful-sounding recordings. I'm specifically referring to their Grammy Award-winning "The Suburbs" album from 2010; it'… Read more

I've heard a number of Verity Audio speakers over the years, and it was always the company's smaller, more apartment-friendly models like the Finn and Leonore that most impressed. Small Verity high-end speakers are still pretty expensive, but when I heard that Verity was about to introduce something a lot more extreme, I wanted to know more about the design. The Monsalvat is very much in the Verity tradition, but the $325,000 speaker system breaks new ground for the company.

Design details are scarce right now, but as statement speakers go the Monsalvat isn't huge: its … Read more

Laptop news keeps coming this week, and Acer's latest is a funky one indeed. The newly-announced Acer Aspire Ethos is a new laptop line that's aimed squarely at the high-end over-$1000 market, with a very unique twist: its touch pad detaches and becomes a wireless remote.

That's right: a remote. The design's enough to mildly surprise even the most jaded laptop expert. While the rest of the Ethos chassis is downright staid, that wide multitouch pad's transformation into a separately functioning wireless remote complete with LED-backlit controls might qualify as one of the most … Read more

I cover a wide range of headphones on this blog, everything from the $40 Deos earbuds to the state-of-the-art Woo Audio WES headphone amplifier ($4,500) and Stax SR-007Mk2 headphones ($2,410). I've written about a lot of great headphones priced between those two extremes.

The common thread to all of the headphones I cover here is they all have excellent sound quality, but if there's one thing I know about the audio business, it's that most people don't prioritize sound quality, even when a better sounding product fits within their budget. With headphones, most buyers … Read more

High-speed trains running from Paris to Amsterdam will now make part of the trip with the help of solar power.

On Monday, a train successfully made its inaugural run using solar powered systems along the way, said Infrabel, the company that runs Belgium's railroad network. Solar panels were installed atop a 3.4-kilometer length of man-made train tunnel that makes up part of the high-speed rail line running along the E19 highway between Amsterdam and Antwerp, Belgium (see video below).

The solar energy generated by those tunnel panels can now power things like signaling, lighting, and heating for the … Read more

Defining exactly what qualifies audio gear as "high-end" or "audiophile" isn't easy, but I'll give it a try. Sound quality that rises above what's available from mainstream manufacturers would lead the way, followed by exceptional build quality, and a high price.

Well, by those standards it's safe to say Emotiva's ERC-2 CD player is definitely a high-end machine. The only disqualifier might be the ERC-2's price; it's just $449, which includes free shipping in the U.S.. The ERC-2 boasts individually regulated and shielded power supplies that separately feed the CD transport mechanism, the display, microprocessors, and digital and analog electronics sections. Build quality, from the thick machined-metal faceplate; beefy, all-metal remote control; the Analog Devices' digital-to-analog converters; and fully discrete analog circuitry are all more in-line with what I'd expect to see on a $1,500 CD player.

You can also use the ERC-2 as a CD "transport" with an external digital-to-analog converter; it has a "professional grade" digital output XLR connector, as well as RCA and Toslink optical digital audio connectivity. The ERC-2 has RCA and XLR (balanced) analog outputs.

Where most digital players, including many high-end models that sell for many times the ERC-2's price have one- or two-year warranties, the ERC-2 has a five-year warranty!

I listened to the ERC-2 in my high-end system with Pass Labs electronics and Magnepan 3.7 speakers. It's a high-resolution system, so it was easy to hear just how spectacular the sound of this CD player really is. … Read more

High-end audio shows are a great way to see and hear the very best gear. I'm getting good feedback about the goings-on at T.H.E. Show: Newport being held this weekend at the Hilton Hotel at the Orange County Airport in California.

There are oodles of outrageously priced, groovy turntables; gorgeous amplifiers; and statuesque speakers on display; and lots of great music to buy. More than 100 high-end audio companies will be demonstrating their best products in rooms throughout the hotel.

T.H.E. Show: Newport is also presenting a series of seminars on computer audio; tips on … Read more

Following the wave of scam "MacDefender" software and its variants, Apple recently released a security update for Mac OS X 10.6 that updates the built-in "XProtect" feature to identify these threats; however, after installing the update, a number of people are finding the system is stuck with high CPU usage, resulting in the system being bogged down and running slowly. Upon checking Activity Monitor, a process called "MRT" is using a large percentage of CPU, and even with forcing the process to quit it will reappear and continue to use the CPU.

Apple'… Read more

Magico, based in Berkeley, Calif., has established itself as a major American high-end speaker manufacturer in just a few years. The company builds state-of-the-art speakers with truly innovative technology. I've listened to a lot of large and not-so-large Magico speakers over the years, and was never less than astonished by their sound. The company is just now introducing its smallest speaker ever, the Q1 ($24,950 per pair). The Q1's cabinet is an extensively braced-aluminum-and-copper design.

It's a small monitor speaker, but it's sold with an integrated stand. Mounted on the stand, the Q1 measures 44 … Read more