Articles and Reviews

Seven single-ended 300B amplifiers: rated specifications, circuit solutions, speaker compatibility calculations and impedance requirements.

A ranking of legendary reel-to-reel tape machines: Studer A820, Ampex ATR-102, Technics RS-1500, Revox B77 MkII, etc. Verified specifications and secondary-market prices.

Choosing a speaker format through Hoffman's Iron Law, room modes and dynamic compression. Tables by room area, the economics of the decision, five scenarios.

Generator physics, load matching, tonearm resonance calculation, stylus profiles and cost of ownership. Verified published specifications for three benchmark models.

A step-by-step guide to loudspeaker placement: room modes, SBIR, the equilateral triangle, toe-in, the 38 percent rule and treatment priorities.

The eternal audiophile question: which amplification topology is better, tube or solid-state? The short answer is simple. If your loudspeakers hold a stable impedance no lower than 6 ohms and a sensitivity above 90 dB, a tube amplifier is worth considering. If your speakers show impedance dips below 3 ohms, that approach will only harm the system. Like it or not, tube and solid-state designs differ first of all in their nonlinear distortion spectrum and their output impedance, and every other parameter turns out to be a derivative of those two figures.

The listening room accounts for more than half of what your system sounds like. Optimising the sound of a room you already live in is far harder than getting things right in a new one from the start, so we have put together a full guide and checklist for choosing a listening room. It will help if you are house-hunting: follow it, and even entry-level Hi-Fi will take an audible step up in quality.

What is the actual difference between an active and a passive loudspeaker? We are willing to bet you will get it wrong. The widespread belief that the difference lives in built-in amplification is simply not correct. Built-in amplification is a consequence, not a cause, and there are active systems on the market that use external amplifier packs. The real difference sits in the crossover: specifically, whether it does its work before amplification or after it.

The opening day of the Hong Kong High-End Audio Visual Show 2026 was a resounding success, and we invite you to view our exclusive photo report from this major event. As the region's largest international exhibition for premium audio, the show is taking place at the HKCEC and features over 130 renowned audio brands.

The subwoofer in a two-channel system is a perennial talking point that has seen many a lance broken. While the debate rages on, the market for these devices keeps growing - and a consensus is gradually taking hold that the modest low end of bookshelf or slim floorstanding speakers can well be extended with a dedicated bass module. Modern subwoofers integrate into a system beautifully and guarantee seamless sound with far greater scale and sense of air. We have prepared a ranking of the best music subwoofers as of August 2026. As usual, the article starts with the affordable models and ends with the flagships - so you can pick a unit for any taste and budget.

If you want large-scale sound and a wider choice of amplification, all roads lead to floorstanding speakers. Oddly enough, the sensitivity of such loudspeakers is usually higher than that of bookshelf models - which means you can save on electronics. And the sound will be more expansive too. So if your listening room allows it, the choice is obvious. Here is our expert ranking of the most impressive floorstanders of summer 2026. As usual, the list is sorted in order of increasing price.

Bookshelf speakers are arguably the hottest product today. Their dimensions allow them to fit even into small spaces, their sound quality is almost on par with their larger floorstanding counterparts, and the number of new models is skyrocketing every month. To help you navigate the sea of ​​new products, we've prepared a fresh guide to compact speakers as of July 2026. As usual, the rankings start with affordable speakers and end with high-end models, so you can find speakers to suit every taste and budget.

The Cayin Jazz 100 integrated tube amplifier currently sells for under three thousand euros. Yes, really: for a tenth of what many rivals charge, you get a single-ended design built on 805A directly heated triodes, pure Class A operation and an impressive 2 x 46 W of output power. A bargain this generous naturally invites skepticism - so we spent enough time with the Cayin Jazz 100 to bring you a detailed review of the model. With all its strengths and weaknesses.

Tube amplifiers are becoming a cult again - their not-too-high power is offset by a warm sound, while a certain right kind of nonlinearity, with its emphasis on even harmonics, guarantees a magical delivery that is very pleasant to the ear. With the right choice of speakers, a tube amplifier with an output of 2 x 8 W easily runs rings around 200 W of digital amplification, and that is no joke, which is why the segment keeps growing year after year and new brands keep appearing. In our new expert ranking we have gathered seven of the most interesting modern tube amplifiers priced up to twenty thousand euros.

Just ten years ago planar headphone technology was an exotic luxury available only in the High-End segment. Today the ice has broken - the pioneers of the field, together with a host of new names, have cut the price of a planar headphone almost tenfold and brought such models into full competition with dynamic-driver headphones. This is exactly the kind of technical progress we value: HiFiMan developed StealthMagnet and the Asymmetric Magnetic Circuit, Audeze created Fluxor, Dan Clark Audio gave us AMTS and V-Planar, and together all of this solved most of the problems of planars and made the technology truly mainstream. Today the entry ticket into the segment costs from EUR 129 - not bad, right? So let us get down to studying the lay of the land in the planar headphone market in 2026.

In our new expert feature we have studied MC cartridges - the most precise and audiophile type of all - but limited the contenders to a price range of €500 to €1,150. This is not yet High-End, but it is the sweet spot, where you get truly luxurious sound at a price far below true high-end territory.