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On chaotically rampaging free Jazz the mood will be too relaxed perhaps to diminish some unplugged excitement with a lower energy transfer than I get from my Ancient Audio Air or vinyl. On other music however this could be the player. The only pity is the lack of digital inputs. Those would transform this into a splendid center section for an advanced hifi.
Description: The Fonel is a low rider but very deep machine and heavy thanks to its thick metallic plate construction. Inside braces reinforce what’s already quite the tank. The front combines metal and wood. The latter continues on one cheek. Though I often find excessive wood appliqué depressing and a sign of lack of design originality elsewhere, the sparseness and quality execution here were to my liking. The CD tray and cover continue the wooden theme.
Next to the disc tray is a very large dot-matrix display in a ‘tube-type’ amber tint. This gives all relevant disc data and volume level, the latter both alphanumeric and as a circle with traveling dot. Unfortunately the player won’t read CD text messages although the display would be sufficiently large to do so. On that count it would be nice also to reprogram it to add Luxman’s ‘zoom’ function which enlarges a particular element of the display over its entire area.
On the back we get the obligatory IEC power inlet with mechanical power switch, RCA/XLR outputs and coax/optical digital outputs.The RCA sockets are nice but not on par with WBT or Furutech precision connectors. The XLRs are gold-plated as are their dress plates. Two JR-45 sockets allow for bi-directional communication between associated Fonel gear.
Inside are a few surprises. The first one is the drive. It's a basic computer DVD-Rom affair mounted to a thick plate and covered by another thick plate under which there is additional foam vibration damping. This is exactly how the Unico CD players from Unison Research are put together. The Italian motif thus continues.
Next to the drive are many DSP chips including a powerful Atmel processor. The PCB is inscribed New Concept Electronics, presumably Fonel’s subcontractor. On the back the input PCB routes the signal via computer ribbon cable to the Crystal CS8406 receiver via S/PDIF. Next to the digital receiver are two Cirrus Logic CS4398 hidden beneath a small shield. Not spotting separate volume control circuitry, that must be either hidden beneath the shield or occur digitally inside the Cirrus converters. Behind those comes a passive filter and then the three 6N23P Russian double triodes (military-grade E88CC/6922 equivalents). The signal then encounters two transformers from British Sowter to couple to the outputs. The mother board doesn’t bolt directly to the bottom plate but encounters rubber absorbers for decoupling.
On the same PCB are four complete power supply circuits - for the left/right channel tube anodes, tube heaters and DACs. The remainder of the power supply is shielded behind a brace with a big toroidal transformer for the analog section and a small one for digital. This PSU PCB also houses three rectifying bridges. The lovely remote control is wooden with quite sensible ergonomics.
Technical data (according to manufacturer):
Frequency response: 20-20000Hz
SNR: >94dB
Volume control: 0-80dB
Dimensions: 430 x 390 x 89mm
Weight: 20kg
