Mobile Fidelity's double 45rpm reissue of Aretha's Gold (originally issued in 1969 as Atlantic SD 8227) gets off to not such a great sonic start because though "I Never Loved A Man (The Way I Love You)" and "Do Right Woman-Do Right Man" are musical classics that belong at the head of the hits lineup, the Rick Hall engineered recordings at his Fame Record Studios in Muscle Shoals, Alabama pale in comparison to everything else in this molten set recorded at Atlantic Studios in New York City.
In a July 2nd story, we announced four new costly arms from SAT(Swedish Analog Technologies): two models each available in 9" and 12" versions. The least expensive of the four, the LM-09 was reviewed in the just shipped October, 2018 Stereophile.
As usual Pro-Ject introduced many new analog products at The Consumer Electronics Show, including the wall-mountable turntables shown in the photo. There's one for right handed vinyl fans and one of "lefties".
The longevity of Denon's 103 cartridge series, first introduced in the 1960's and still in production speaks to the design's enduring popularity. The design's weak point is its flimsy mounting system. As my colleague Art Dudley put it in the December 2007 issue of Stereophile: "The most common complaint about the DL-103 is also the truest: Its good motor is compromised by a too-flimsy mounting arrangement, with open-edge bolt channels that prevent the cartridge from being rigidly fastened to a head shell."
Nishikawasan explains the significant upgrades to his Air Force One turntable that resulted in a new "Premium" version costing approximately $40,000 more than the standard $100,000 Air Force One (shown with SAT tone arm).
We started lobbying Allsop to bring back the Orbitrac almost as soon as its demise was announced. We got no response so started a campaign on musicangle.com to no avail.
Channel D, purveyor of Pure Vinyl vinyl ripping software (actually the program does far more) also manufactures a line of phono preamplifiers. At AXPONA 2016 Channel D introduced the Seta Supreme, the company's most ambitious and costly phono preamplifier.
In 2017 most consumers know Mark Levinson as a car audio brand. Audiophiles know it as a luxury home audio brand and older audiophiles know Mark Levinson the man.