Nearly halfway through covering the analog side of AXPONA, I switched hats to covering digital sources. You may ask yourself, why is the person versed in our hobby about analog covering digital? Well that is ...

Following on the heels of last year’s success, AXPONA 2019 was even more upbeat and enjoyable for showgoers and exhibitors alike. The available space was expanded to accommodate more offerings and, as a result, the ...

Graham Engineering has been making tonearms since the mid-80s. Throughout that time, company founder and designer Bob Graham has been refining his designs for better performance. After starting with the original unipivots (the Excalibur and ...

The Greek word tessera refers to the number four. Zesto Audio uses that definition (tessera; τέσσερα) to name its latest phonostage. The word is fitting in function since the Andros Téssera ($12,000) phonostage supports four ...

The Ortofon MC Windfeld Ti is the newest version of the original MC Windfeld cartridge. Ten years ago, Ortofon’s chief engineer, Leif Johannsen, created the original MC Windfeld as a tribute to Ortofon’s former longtime ...

AXPONA 2018 starts out with a new location and a new attitude. The new location is the Renaissance Schaumburg Hotel and Convention Center in Schaumburg, Illinois, which is a 15–20 minute ride from O'Hare International ...

At AXPONA 2016 in Chicago, I met the man (A.J. van den Hul) himself. In addition to introducing two new cartridges at that show, the Crimson and the Colibri Stradivarius (both precursors to the cartridges ...

The old Chinese philosophy of yin and yang may not apply completely to this pairing of Cardas Audio Iridium and Morrow Audio 5 series of interconnects and speaker cables, but there are some correlations. I’m ...

This was the fourth (and final) year for AXPONA being held at The Westin Hotel in Rosemont, IL, right next to O’Hare airport. While this is the last exhibit at this location, it’s not the ...

The Accuphase brand was originally marketed under the company name of Kensonic Laboratory, Inc. in 1972. To celebrate its tenth anniversary, the company changed its name to Accuphase Laboratory, Inc. The name Accuphase was chosen ...

The four Hana cartridges reviewed here (EL, EH, SL, SH) are designed and manufactured by Excel Sound Corporation of Japan. According to its website, this 45-year-old company has more than 50 years of cartridge-making experience, ...

Phoenix Engineering RoadRunner Tachometer and Eagle PSU $235/$525 The RoadRunner digital tachometer can be used on any ’table to precisely measure the speed in real-time for each rotation of the platter during normal operation. The ...

Bill Carlin of Phoenix Engineering, LLC, has created two very useful accessories for turntables. The first is the RoadRunner digital tachometer ($235) which can be used on any ’table to precisely measure the speed in ...

While the Pear Audio Blue Kid Thomas turntable ($5995) has a unique look, there are some things about its appearance that may seem very familiar. There is good reason for this because the Kid Thomas ...

I first laid eyes on the $175,000 Gauder Akustik Berlina RC 9 loudspeakers at CES 2015. They were part of a system put together by Axiss Audio that included Air Tight reference tube electronics and ...