Got to say amen goFab,

Stereophile would have had one notable review if I had been
writing one on the most expensive amp. If it were an inexpensive
product, I would simply say it broken. If it had been this one
for $350K and it was apparent they meant it to be this way,
the review would have redefined the term scathing.

I believe I recall some part of the review mentioned, "a listening
experience like no other, a way of hearing the music different
than any other". I should think so, considering the broken
manner it was operating most of the time. To be very generous
and say higher levels of second harmonic only aren't too bad,
wasn't it like sqarewaving at 10 watts?

JA did comment on it in the "AS WE Hear It" section. Commenting
on a very expensive system that was so good, and would have
left one with enough money for some very expensive cars too.

I just wonder if JA still owned the magazine rather than working
for a large publishing owner, would he have said differently? More
assertively declared the amp broken as designed.

I know he reads this newsgroup. But cannot think of how he
could defend that product or the review of it. If he said he
has an employer to satisfy I would accept that, but don't think
he would admit it. Otherwise, I see no defense for it.

When learning electronic circuits, I built a simple pre-amp
circuit on a bread board with a decent power supply on it.
It had one jfet, cap coupled at both ends. Was
operated single ended. Cheap bulk jfets being what they are
it only had about one volt of clean output before heavy
second harmonic distortion set in. I even experimented
with using it that way, and padding down the output to hear
different amounts of second harmonic distortion. And it
sounded surprisingly good even when you could see the
distortion on an o-scope. But it wasn't high fidelity and it
wasn't an improvement. And I could have paralleled a few
of them and put out the power that darn $350k amp would
with similar operating characteristics although I don't suppose
it would have the voltage swing to keep putting out the higher
voltage and wattage levels well past the point of heavy distortion.

I have been unhappy with Stereophile, and that pretty much
does it for me I think. Lunacy for sure.

Dennis

"goFab.com" wrote in message
It's all true! The "cult of Harry" is as weird as ever.

Unfortunately, Stereophile also grows progressively less readable with
each
passing issue, IMHO. Part of the problem is that Mr. Atkinson seems
reluctant
to exercise his editorial prerogatives; there is a definite sense of an
absence
of strong leadership and the absence of an adult, guiding hand. As a
result,
writers like Dudley, "Aural Robert" and certain others are devoting
seemingly
ever-greater portions of their columns to political rants, domestic soap
operas
and the like. Stereophile writers shouldn't write about irrelevancies
such as
politics for the same reason IBM shouldn't diversify into making truck
tires --
readers and shareholders can diversify their magazine and newspaper
purchases
(or stock holdings) a lot more efficiently than an audio reviewer can
learn
enough to become a value-adding political pundit (or even an entertaining
writer), or computer makers can learn how to make treads. But Mr.
Atkinson lets
it all continue. I increasingly value writers like Damkroger who stick to
the
knitting and do a really fine job, minus the doo-dads.

In addition, the equipment reviews seem have become, at last, totally
unmoored
from reality. A recent review of an absurd $350,000 tube amplifier from
Wavac
results in the predictable "takes things to a whole new level of
heart-stopping
reality" praise from the reviewer. We then find out in Mr. Atkinson's
technical
sidebar that this amplifier, costing as much as 3 Porsche 911s and rated
at an
already-modest 150 W/ch, actually only reaches 2 W/ch before clipping.
There
are some other eye opening measuremens as well, reminding one of Mr.
Atkinson's
comment in another recent review (I believe about an amplifier Dudley was
raving
about) that amplifiers that test like this are usually described as
"broken."
Yet the Wavac review is unreservedly positive in recommending the
expenditure of
readers' $350K. My point is not that this amplifier has nothing to
recommend it
-- no doubt it is a real work of art if not of engineering. But if a
review of
the most expensive home audio component in the world (?) is all sweetness
and
light when the thing can only put out 1/75th of its rated power before
clipping
and has no other obvious severe measured flaws, one wonders if equipment
reviews
have any function at all -- besides providing backing pages for
advertisements.

Oh, well. At least Stereophile publishes Mr. Atkinson's sidebars so that
the
intrepid reader can see the foolishness of the accompanying review -- with
the
Absolute Sound we have nothing but the Golden Ears to trust (you know, the
ones
that declared any number of products -- e.g., the Hovland premamp, the
Hurricanes -- to be the Second Coming of Christ, only to run away from
those
claims very rapidly because a few capacitors or some such were changed).

I'm growing to appreciate the British style of audio journalism a bit
more. On
the whole, it seems decidedly more analytical and less emotional than its
US
counterpart. There's a good degree of skepticism, and a feeling of
balance in
the reviews. There's also less of a feeling of outright hostility toward
the
readership. It isn't hard to detect in both the Absolute Sound and
Stereophile
a real kind of "f*** you" attitude towards their readers, whether it be in
responses to letters in both magazines in which notable reviewers
routinely
display childish pique, the tone of Mr. Pearson's periodic descents from
Valhal
-- er, Sea Cliff -- or in Stereophile's recent arrogant response to
numerous
reader complaints about too much Musical Fidelity -- "you don't like
Musical
Fidelity coverage? Here's tons more!" -- including paragraphs spilled
reviewing
Musical Fidelity's first watch. Yes, wris****ch. You read that right.

Sorry to take this thread so far afield! Cheers.