It is with great pleasure that we are announcing the latest addition to the Audiofreaks porfolio of distinguished brands - ROGUE AUDIO INC. from the United States of America! As of the 1st January 2008, we have been appointed as sole and exclusive distributors of Rogue Audio electronics for the United Kingdom and are already in process of establishing a small, but effective network of retail consultants to get acquainted with this impressive range of very affordable valve electronics.
While still extremely happy with the performance and market influence of conrad-johnson and Karan Acoustics brands as our main choices within the domains of valve and solid-state electronics, it has been for some time that we felt a serious, good sounding audiophile grade entry level valve amplification was needed to make the mosaic complete. Our usual standards of evaluation and selection did not help making the task any easier and, in the end, Rogue Audio products emerged as clear favourites for all mentioned reasons - and more. Let us hope our association with Mark O'Brien and Rogue Audio is just the beginning of another long-term relationship for many years to come. We expect to be in a position to supply Rogue Audio products on a consistent and regular basis from our warehouse as of early February 2008 while advertising, reviews and other announcement will follow suit. In the meantime, please do visit Rogue Audio's web site on www.rogueaudio.com or through a link generated within the Audiofreaks web site.
The latest addition to the Karan Acoustics range of solid-state electronics has been with us since the beginning of December 2007 - the lovely 'little' (one box) KA L line remote preamplifier. Priced competitively in the UK (and elsewhere) at £3,600 inc VAT it is, like all other Karan Acoustics designs, a true differential (balanced) circuit with generous RCA and XLR input/output facilities as well as the level attenuation (volume) remote control. The performance of the new KA L has comfortably exceeded our expectations and we are very pleased to report an excellent international demand for this product within the first few weeks of its existence.
conrad-johnson design showed the new ET-2 valve remote line preamplifier and a pre-production sample of their CD/SACD player which will incorporate a valve analogue section as all CJ digital products do.
Cardas Audio kept loyal to their tradition never to announce anything and always turn up with something new. This year it was a prototype of a new flagship loudspeaker cable (copper conductors) which is much, much bigger in diameter than the current leader Golden Reference, should sound much, much better and should also cost - hopefully not much, much more. Looks as good as all George Cardas' creations and we cannot wait to get our first sample to listen to. Should be soon.
Zanden Audio were, once again, noticed for an excellent performance of their 2000/5000 CD combination, but also presented the new Model 9600 power amplifiers which, like the 9500Mk3 predecessors, employ KR 845 output valves - this time to give an amazing 80W per channel of highly musical power. We hope to have our pair of the new 9600 mono amplifiers in the UK within the next couple of months. Yamada-san also gave us a sneak preview of the production sample of his eagerly awaited Model 2500 single-chassis CD player which will be with us before too long - as soon as the last stage of sonic fine tuning has been accomplished and the product has been signed off for manufacturing and shipping.
Kuzma was at the CES with its leader Franc Kuzma launching and demonstrating the new 4POINT tonearm in person! What is a 4POINT? Well, as the name suggests it is a traditional type of an arm (as far as the manner in which the cartridge follows the groove is concerned), but otherwise of a totally new concept - using sharp points (2 in lateral and 2 in vertical plane) instead of ball bearings for all movements of the arm itself!! Not only, its effective length is just under 12 inches and has an equally unique locking mechanism for a detachable headshell. Last, but not least, 4POINT brings another solution for the very first time - tonearm bi-wiring!!?? Two sets of internal arm wires are connected to the cartridge pins and run all the way into a beautiful output box. This box has two RCA output sockets which use one of the two sets of the internal wires. The 2nd set continues (uninterrupted) through the output box and ends a meter or so later with its own pair of RCA plugs. So, if you have 2 inputs on your phono preamplifier you can perform genuine A-B comparisons between the arm cable used by Kuzma and any other cable of your choice! Even if you don't have 2 phono inputs, comparisons are still possible in a simple and quick fashion! Truly unique! If you thought this was all, you are very wrong. Kuzma 4POINT tonearm can be fitted to a vast majority of the very best turntables as if it was a standard 9-inch long item! Thanks to a very original solution incorporating the VTA tower which, at the same time, becomes the mounting pillar of the arm onto the arm base of a turntable, it is not necessary to have a large turntable as one would normally need for 11-12 inch tonearms. Practical indeed. We have been living with one of the first definitive samples of the Kuzma 4POINT tonearm since late December 2007 and its performance is absolutely majestic in every possible aspect of sound appraisal and analysis. We expect to have first supply of 4POINT arm in the UK in early May and the UK RRP inc VAT should remain below £4,000.
NB. All photos from the CES2008 are courtesy of Marko Pus, our good friend and influential audiophile and reviewer from Slovenia.
New flagship speaker cable from Cardas Audio - big, blue and beautiful!