The Audiophiliac

A friend turned me onto this amazing video of a man hand crafting vacuum tubes. He makes every part, the metal structures, blows the glass envelope, the base, pins, everything. It's a hugely labor intensive process. I just love that there are people out there doing this sort of thing, almost the same way it was done 100 years ago.

Just received a preview from next week's CES show in Las Vegas--Wadia Digital, a high-end audio company will be demonstrating the first digital player dock to retrieve a direct digital signal from iPods. As a result, the iTransport will provide CD-quality resolution from full-resolution file formats such as .WAV and AppleLossless.

The iTransport (SRP: $349) will turn any currently available iPod player into a high-end media server by providing a bit-perfect digital audio output to an audio/video system. The really cool thing about the device is that it can bypass the player's internal D/A conversion and … Read more

It's like the difference in taste between a tomato you grew in your backyard or one of those plastic things at the supermarket, or frozen pizza vs. a slice fresh out of the oven in Little Italy. We're talking big differences here. And those are the sort of sensual pleasures high-end audio delivers compared to iPods and ear buds. Sure, the little buggers sound good enough, but if you really love music, don't you want to hear your tunes sound as good as they can?

I'm sitting here listening to the late British singer/songwriter Nick … Read more

Sophisticated baby boomers and Gen Xers pride themselves on their ability to appreciate the finer things in life. They're wine snobs, crave gourmet food, drive exotic cars, buy 1080p high definition TVs, but for some bizarre reason think low-end speakers are just dandy. At a New Year's Eve party I polled perfect strangers about their hi-fi systems, and the three men and one woman all said that, sure, music was once really important, but now it's mere background. And they now owned very small systems, because "I can't hear the difference anymore."

Hmmm, I … Read more

I own 3,000 CDs and 4,000 LPs. They take up a lot of space in my apartment, and that's OK with me. They're lined up in metal racks, wood shelving, and stacked up in piles on the floor. But a lot of my friends with just a few hundred CDs are in a big hurry to dump them into their computers and get rid of the discs. I just had lunch yesterday with an audiophile friend who is in the midst of transferring all of his CDs as WAV files to his new HD. As always … Read more

Narrated by Forest Whitaker, Before the Music Dies, is a cautionary documentary focusing on the sad state of the music business. Or as someone so eloquently put it, "mixing music and art is a bad mix." The film is loaded with interviews and performances by Erykah Badu, Eric Clapton, Dave Matthews, and Branford Marsalis.

Since its release in November 2006, the film has screened more than 200 times in more than 130 North American markets. Before the Music Dies is available as a download and DVD. Check the Web site for more info.

UPDATE: An earlier version of this blog incorrectly described the technology used in an advertisement for the A&E's TV show Paranormal State. The technology, developed by the Holosonic Research Lab, uses a beam of ultrasound as a "virtual source", which changes into audible sound as it travels through the air. Please read the technology's inventor, F_J_Pompei's comment or visit the Holosonic Research Labs site to learn more.

The folks who heard the ad for A&E's TV show Paranormal State emitted from a billboard in New York City's Greenwich Village … Read more

Klipsch has just made a limited number of these available on its website, for just $249! This blog originally ran on November 29.

I have fond memories of Klipsch's three-piece iPod speaker. Back in 2005 it stood out in a field of itsy bitsy iPod speakers--the iFi came with a bona-fide 8-inch, 200 watt subwoofer and a pair of two-way satellite speakers. Wow, what a concept, speakers you could actually place far enough apart to create stereo imaging. Most of today's iPod speakers, including high-end contenders like Bowers & Wilkins' Zeppelin sound small because they are small. Yes, … Read more

I thought technology was or should be designed to serve us. Make life easier, and that as the technology evolved it would become smart enough to figure out what we're trying to do and accomplish the task at hand. But that rarely seems to be the case; you buy a cell phone, and it comes with a 150 page owner's manual. That's why John Tierney's "Why Nobody Likes a Smart Machine" piece in yesterday's New York Times struck a chord with me.

I guess it has something to do with the manufacturers loading … Read more