Shanling's planarmagnetic – It's the HW600 [€1'100] whose 110x86cm 0.8µm thin polymer film with serpentine silver-plated aluminium traces is powered by a total of 14 dual-sided magnets for 1.8T of magnetic field strength in the wide air gap. A 2 x 3.5mm detachable 4.4mm terminated cable is standard. Impedance is 30Ω, claimed sensitivity 104dB. Weight is a substantial 480g. Finish is black as shown.

Bloom not boom – From Lithuania's Silent Pound speaker house now comes the Bloom monitor, a dual 10" 3-way with 6" coax and 1.4" compression tweeter. The woofers orient as a dipole whilst the dual-concentric main driver vents laterally on each side to add cardioid dispersion to its bandwidth. This conforms with the firm's design ethos of controlled directivity for reduced room interactions. Claimed reach is 33Hz, sensitivity 86dB/4Ω. Size is 30 x 28 x 110cm WxDxH, weight 40kg/ea. Standard finishes will be the white frame with black inlay as shown; or all black. Custom finishes factor too. Pricing TBA.

Re:Vox– Regarding 'vox', our sector has Supravox, Voxativ and Kevin Scott's mighty Vox Olympian. But arguably the granddaddy of them all are Revox and their open-reel decks. Now the B77 makes a triumphant return in rebooted MkIII guise "The entire electronics have been optimized with the components and simulation options available today. Proven components are still used such as improved original Revox pickups with a considerably longer service life and the unique Revox motors. The result is this outstanding new version. All the new details, such as the audio technology for even better sound reproduction and recording quality, the precisely manufactured high-quality Revox pickups, a digital counter, the ability to play all common tape standards, a wide range of connection and optional expansion options have been perfected by our developers, technicians and designers. The B77 MkIII is made in the Revox factory in Villingen."

LHY OCK-2S -This alphabet soup breaks down into a "high-end master clock generator" from the Jay's Audio subsidiary. Three 10MHz BNC outputs at 50/75Ω each are preceded by an oven-controlled crystal oscillator with a claimed phase noise of -110dB/1Hz. Finish options are silver or black.

Solid Stereo – it's the name of Ancient Audio's new 40/70wpc into 8/4Ω class AB stereo amplifier with dual-mono power supply, 94'000µF of fast high-current capacitance, Teflon-insulated Kimber hookup wiring, a mineral-glass/aluminium chassis of 35x35x6cm and 9kg and 0.6V input sensitivity with an 68kΩ input impedance. Price is €5'000. Global launch is at the upcoming Warsaw Audio Show.

D3V – It's Adam Audio's new all-in-one desktop solution so a pair of active 3½-inch two-ways with horizontally opposing 3½" passive radiators and full DSP. -6dB bass extension is a claimed 45Hz. The tweeter is the company's own AMT, the mid/woofer a one-piece aluminium cone. A USB-C input shakes hands with a PC/Mac or tablet, balanced ¼" TRS pro-audio inputs expect analog signal which gets processed as 24/48 digital. The master speaker has a front-mounted volume knob and 3.5" headphone output plus a 24V/2.5A power input and 4-pole connector for the included 2m link to the slave speaker. Finish options of the ABS cabinets are black or white and a swivel plinth for angled table-top use is included. Internal class D power is 70 watts to the dynamic drivers, 30 watts to the pleated tweeters. Channel allocation is selectable. A threaded insert on the bottom can take a taller floor stand. At €329/pr, this complete desktop solution promises a lot of tech IQ in a sleek easy-to-use package.

Burning Man Amp – With many manly men expected—those who can solder, screw and follow instructions—2024's Burning Amp Festival returns to the Petaluma Community Centre in Northern Californa, home also to guitar-amp legend Mesa/Boogie. The dates are October 19-20th and the weblink has the specifics. 25-30 seats are available for the Saturday amp build based on a new Nelson Pass and Mike Rothacher design. There's also a speaker camp with an ultra-compact 2-way cube project. Sunday is for auditions, presentations, a food-truck lunch, an auction and a raffle.

A rose without thorns? – The prototype Hifi Rose RD160 DAC [€5'299] flew a display that looked like a circuit schematic. Apparently the firm took feedback to heart to rethink that; or offer an alternate scheme. Et voilà, a still super-busy fascia now occupied by succinct performance parameters whose font size for the key data should be nicely visible from the seat. If the display blacks out, the user can still simplify the appearance. After all, once we've selected our desired input, there's no need to keep looking at 'coaxial' in big letters, is there? On the other hand, in amp-direct mode, seeing a numerical volume setting from across the room is ace. That volume is defeatable. Max output is 9V. In 'sound wave' mode, the display shows the signal's real-time waveform. On-board digital chips split duty between 2/ea. AK4191 receiver/filters and AK4499EX DACs in fully balanced configuration. The CPU runs off a quad-core Cortex A7mp LSIC. Three linear power supplies each with its own potted toroid segregate voltage feeds. Back-panel connectivity covers one each AES/EBU, Toslink, USB, I²S/HDMI and SFP fibre, dual coax, 50Ω and 75Ω 10MHz clock inputs and RCA/XLR analog outputs. There are also trigger i/o and a circuit breaker in lieu of a sacrificial safety fuse. Colour options are black or silver.

Tuscan spin doctor – It's Gold Note's new entry-level and half-width CD-5, a tray-loaded player with AKM AK-4493 DAC and Austrian SUOS-HiFi mechanism. Analog outputs are on RCA/XLR, digital outputs for transport duty on coax and Toslink. A remote control is standard, the external PSU-10 Evo power supply optional. For this press release, pricing too is (cough) optional.

Leema land on the moon – Not quite. But the US will do. The British brand just signed a distribution deal with California-based Source Systems. Check out the two websites to learn what type of product is soon crossing the pond to mix it up on the American market.

Lumin appdates – Available immediately for Taiwan, Hong Kong, Japan, Singapore and Malaysia, for Lumin's P1 Mini, T3, D3, U2 and U2 Mini, is the KKBOX streaming service for access to 100'000'000 songs with up to 24/192 resolution. And, all Lumin models are now QPlay compatible to integrate China's largest music-streaming service as a joint venture between Tencent and Spotify. Just update your Lumin app to add these new bedded-in features.

MusikBoxx – From Germany's Michael Wydra of ModalAkustik, home of the standalone 10" Ripole subwoofer shown, now comes the MusikBoxx [€4'899/pr]. It's a sealed monitor companion based on the same tension-bonded ribbed acrylic construction. Its €2'299/pr outboard crossover and €899/pr low-mass stand complete the concept and separate binding posts for the Mundorf dipole AMT and Accuton mid/woofer allow the use of an external active crossover in lieu of the stock passive version. As is true for the sub, finish options are black or white.

Two new aequestrians – Æquo Audio tease their new Adamantis and Ensium models, two 3-way floorstanders, one classically passive, the other partially active with the company's proven all-analog zero DSP room-compensation electronics. Both models leverage the Diluvite nano material which co-founder Ivo Sparidaens has worked on for the last four years. In cast clamshell form, it allows for organically curvaceous styling whilst promising acoustically invisible cabinetry which turns input vibrations to heat. With port tuning below room resonance, both models promise 20Hz-45kHz bandwidth.

Striptease, again – To counter any blowback over their €8'000 Susvara Unveiled, HifiMan now bow their $2'699 HE-1000 Unveiled. It arouses would-be shoppers with 8Hz-65kHz bandwidth, 95dB sensitivity, 28Ω impedance and 450g of weight without cable or magnetic protectors. The latter solid plates snap on when this open-backed headphone is not in use. It prevent the powerful row magnets from sucking in nearby small metallic objects that might tear the micro-thin membranes. Whilst listening, going sans back grill so nekkid promises still higher resolution and linearity from improved airflow with fewer reflections. That's the strip part. Is it just dare to bare so optional? Not. It's a mandate. Listening with the solid protector plates on isn't on. Those seriously impinge on the response. Shoppers will thus want to practice safe sex. Put the plates back on when not wearing these. That's particularly germane should we listen on a desktop that's littered with paper clips, tiny screws, screwdriver tips and other such bits. You'd not want to set the nude headphone down amidst their lot. Fashionistas already took note that the 'veiled' HE-1000's wood veneer is a thing of the past. Like Susvara Unveiled, HifiMan have overhauled the appearance to be more on trend. And whoever didn't care for the camel-leather brown of the range topper will applaud the return of plain black headband and pads.

Intro special – From direct-selling Shanghai brand Le Son whose pricing includes all customs fees comes the new SL1 MkII high-output moving coil cartridge [$499]. Its 2.5mV output is designed to work with any MM phono stage, no MC step-up required. The stylus is a line-contact type, the cantilever made from boron nitride and the 6N copper coils present a 56Ω output impedance. In its acrylic body, this pickup weighs 8.7g.

Giant steps – That's the name for the forthcoming LessLoss equipment footer finalized after 40 prototypes. Its hollow low-rider barrel of resin-infused Kraft paper with 1mm thick brass accent ring creates the contact patches for our kit and support surface. The real focus is on what the footer encases – an inset Entropic processed crystal core with laser-cut spiral. "This footer doesn't mainly work in the physical realm like a shock absorber whose purpose it is to damp existing vibrations. With this design we're far beyond any such all-too-late reactive solutions." The Giant Steps measure 50mm in diameter and are just 17mm tall. There's no weight limit, thread or bolt.

Sealed Aune – They're the new SR7000 [€639] of the Sea Reference line which combine a 50mm dynamic driver with ceramic-coated polymer diaphragm, acoustic meta material to absorb the rear wave, a heavily tilted driver position and slow-rebound foam with 55Ω impedance and 390g of wear weight. Claimed bandwidth is 5Hz-45kHz.

Pick yer poison – With the Satri Circuit Labs AMP-8510A which is Bakoon Products rebranded—Bakoon Int. became Enleum—the buyer has a very unusual choice of output device: Mosfet, ultra-low impedance Mosfet, SIT or GaNFet. This 10wpc class A amplifier [~€4K depending on parts choice] claims bandwidth to 500kHz, direct coupling, 0.025% THD and comes with a 0.5dB-step attenuator to change the gain of its current-mode discrete opamp. The amp measures 32 x 35 x 13cm WxDxH and weighs 7kg.

Go to the Mét – Curious what Métronome Technologie have been up to? Then earmark your calendar for show time in Dubai (Sep. 27/28), Budapest (Oct. 5/6), Toronto (Oct. 18-20) and Warsaw (Oct. 25-27). The French digital experts will participate at all locations and among other things show off their new DSC Mini, a compact DAC/Streamer model.

Budget wonder – It's Shanling's new CR60 which for just $269 combines a CD transport/ripper with coax, optical and USB outputs, a Philips CD drive and Sanyo laser. The deck is just 20x18x5cm, comes with a remote and is USB-C powered though can also be run with a 12VDC external power supply. The Eddict Player app helps rip CD to Android smartphones or Shanling DAP with all the necessary tags for proper library organization.

Plug in – Ferrum Audio's new plug-in allows owners of their Wandla DAC to convert it to the GoldenSound Edition co-developed with reviewer Cameron Oatley. It's a reallocation of the onboard DSP to defeat certain features but activate new ones. That license is €595. The plug-in can also be reversed again to allow a user to decide which version to use at any given time.

X the act – It's XACT's new S1 Evo music server [€16K] and Phantom USB/LAN cables [€3K/1.2m]. The latest server incarnation benefits from a new oven-controlled master clock; and ceramic/aluminium isolation footers dubbed Immotus. The hand-made LAN cables use Telegärtner plugs.

M for Matrix M Series – It's the company's new flagship range made up of the MS-1 streamer, MP-1 preamplifier and MA-1 power amp/s. The streamer's extensive digital inputs include I²S i/o on HDMI, twin coax, Toslink and USB, dual USB3 host ports, LAN, SFP and 10MHz clock input, RCA/XLR analog inputs and phono plus dual XLR and single RCA outputs. The OS is a proprietary Linux platform controlled via app. Sample rate support for PCM 768 and DSD 512 includes on-the-fly resampling to DSD. The preamplifier stage uses cascaded op-amps, the DAC dual AK4191/4499 chips. Volume control is by 64 precision resistors switched via 32 sealed reed relays controlled by MCU. An NVMe SSD slot can store local music. The MP-1 is a fully differential class A affair with 60V power supply and DC servo to avoid coupling capacitors. The MA-1 is a 250/450wpc class AB stereo amp bridgeable to double power using 10 On-Semi bipolar transistors per channel. Switchable voltage gain is 24/30dB, the ±80V power supply augmented by 190'000µF filter capacitance. Convection cooling is augmented by a 7.4" ultra-quiet fan which kicks in when triggered by temperature sensors.

Vinshine + Laiv – Alvin Chee of Singapore's audio portal Vinshine Audio has just taken on new brand Laiv Audio for his catalogue. His appointment covers markets which presently lack their own representation of the brand.

Laiv HP²A – From Singapore comes the brand's second model, the HP²A [$2'700] head/preamp in silver or black with matching FMJ remote. A discrete unity-gain class A preamp buffer stage drives a 12dB fully balanced headphone stage with four high-bandwidth lateral Exicon Mosfets per channel. Volume control is by discrete dual-mono balanced resistor ladders via silent opto coupler. With a 4Vrms input signal standard with balanced DACs, headphone power into 16Ω is 14.8wpc balanced, 5.9wpc into the 6.3mm output. 32Ω does 12 + 2.9wpc, 80Ω 4.8 + 1.2wpc, 300Ω 1.2 + 0.32wpc. There's one XLR line-level input, XLR/RCA preamp outputs and 4.4mm, 6.3mm and XLR4 headphone outputs. The optional LExt extender adds more inputs and a phonostage via multi-pin umbilical. The remote control's pairing with the Harmony DAC and HP²A is easily switched by slider on the wand and the HP²A's dimmable and extinguishable display shows chosen input and volume setting whilst a front-panel toggle switches between preamp and head-amp modes. Shipping is Singapore direct via the brand's own web shop.