Munich 2025

Swiss manufacturers of high-end electronics and sources Soulution introduced an unexpected product at High End Munich 2025: their new Soulution 787 turntable, in its late-stage pre-production form.

Marking a new category entrant for the brand, the 787 table could be viewed as completing the “final frontier” in some regards, as Soulution now manufactures components across all hi-fi categories apart from speakers. This product release enables the company to offer customers an all-Soulution system from digital and analog sources to amplification.

Fittingly, the Soulution 787 turntable prototypes were shown in a nearly all-Soulution system (exceptions being an Antipodes music server and Alsyvox Botticelli planar speakers). The setup included the maker’s flagship 700 Series components: a Soulution 727 preamp, a pair of Soulution 701 monoblock amps, a Soulution 760 D/A converter, and a Soulution 757 phono preamp that contains DS Audio’s EQ technology for pairing with DS Audio optical cartridges.

The Soulution 787, an unusual design concept, is described as a linear tracker that also borrows elements from a pivoted tonearm. It uses a resonance-controlled subplatter with a precision-engineered sintered magnetic bearing to minimize friction. The platter drive motor slides laterally on polished axles beneath the tonearm.

Two of the 787 tables were shown at Munich — one had a DS Audio Master 3 optical cartridge attached to its tonearm (seen way above, at the very outset of this story), and the other had a Koetsu Urushi Vermilion cartridge on it (below).

The 787 turntable deploys precise inductive proximity sensors to “monitor and control the motor for the lateral movement,” according to Soulution. The company claims a tracking error of less than ±0.15° for the 8in tonearm, which is mounted to the turntable’s isolated subchassis. The design is said to remove “the friction and unbalanced forces inherent with linear tracking tonearms.”

The 787 comes with a low-noise switched mode power supply that uses fast linear regulators to generate the necessary voltages. It has just one pair of RCA outputs. As I had stopped by Soulution at the end of the show, a proper listening session wasn’t really possible at that time, alas.

And then there’s B.audio. They’re a relatively young French company producing smart, modular designs that appear to pack plenty of tech into chassis that aren’t outsized. Prior to the Munich show, I had heard some buzz about a new B.audio phono stage. As it turns out, they did introduce a new phono pre at the show — in the form of a modular option that can be incorporated into their Alpha One streaming integrated amp, wherein it was housed for the displays in Room F125. This new phono pre module can also be retrofitted within other existing B.audio models.

B.audio engineer Cédric Bermann shared a few technical details. Via remote control, users can choose between MM or MC cartridge options, and adjust gain (low or high). For MC carts, users can select from five different impedance settings (33ohms, 50ohms, 100ohms, 150ohms, 300ohms). All these settings can be changed during vinyl playback, enabling sonic fine-tuning on the fly.

So, what prompted Cédric Bermann (above left) and his brother Sébastien Bermann (above right), both of whom are quite tech-forward, to design a phono pre? Their response was two-fold: 1) Their own personal interest — “We have a lot of old phono stages at home,” Cédric said by way of referring to some of their early R&D; and 2) there was strong market demand from their various distributors in different countries. “We already had DAC and streamer within an integrated amplifier,” Cédric continued. “We wanted to make a full-featured unit, all in one chassis.”

Next, I asked how they were dealing with noise. “We use no-noise transistors in the input stage that operate in Class A,” Cédric replied. They’ve also deployed a dedicated power supply with special regulators (for the transistors) for the phono section, he added.

The B.audio phono preamp module option will run €2,000 for current and upcoming units; a retrofit for existing models will go for €2,500 — but the latter action must be done at their factory. The new phono pre module is expected to be in the marketplace sometime around the time of this posting (or soon thereafter).

The active demo system in the room included a Clearaudio Ovation turntable setup with (you guessed it) B.audio Alpha One amplification — via an Alpha One IIRC — driving a pair of Audio Physic loudspeakers.

The album playing at the time I dropped by the room also happened to be Munich-centric: 1975’s Gateway, a classic ECM album featuring guitarist John Abercrombie, bassist Dave Holland, and drummer Jack DeJohnette. (Footnote 1) ECM is, of course, a Munich-based label. As Gateway played, cool music full of clean musical detail flowed and floated in the space.

And that’s an official wrap on my High End Munich 2025 coverage. Let’s do it all again next year, in Vienna!

Author bio: Julie Mullins, a lifelong music lover and record collector since age 10 who takes after her audiophile father, is also a contributing editor and reviewer on our sister site, Stereophile, for whom she also writes the monthly Re-Tales column. A former fulltime staffer at Cincinnati’s long-running alt-weekly CityBeat, she programs and hosts a weekly radio show on WAIF called On the Pulse.

For even more High End Munich 2025 coverage, go here on our sister site Stereophile.