Premiere Design

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Premiere Design
Purevox PV-Flagship Turntable
Scott Wilkinson  |  Mar 29, 2010

According to <A href="http://www.pure-vox.com">Purevox</A>, the company is "a new brand, a new guy in the hi-fi industry." If so, it's initial offerings are mighty impressive, at least in terms of design and price. Take, for example, the PV-Flagship turntable, which employs magnetic suspension to levitate the belt-driven main platter 2 centimeters above the subplatter, eliminating any friction between them.

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Premiere Design
Qsonix Q2 Music Servers
Scott Wilkinson  |  Jul 07, 2010

Audiophiles know well the name Wadia Digital, a Michigan-based company that has been making high-quality digital-audio products for over 20 years. Now, Wadia has teamed up with California-based Qsonix to create the Q205 high-end music server, which joins the Q210 in the company's new Q2 series.

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Premiere Design
Quantum Sound
Scott Wilkinson  |  Apr 01, 2010

One of the hallmarks of twentieth-century physics is the development of quantum mechanics, which describes the properties of matter and energy at very small scales. At its heart, this highly abstruse and esoteric branch of physics is actually quite simple: all matter and energy ultimately consists of discrete units or "packets" called quanta.

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New ProductsPremiere Design
Reaching Nirvana: Pioneer SE-MASTER1 Headphone
Bob Ankosko  |  Jan 27, 2016
When I picked up Pioneer’s SE-MASTER1 headphone at CEDIA Expo in October, I knew it was special. Substantial yet lightweight and exceptionally well crafted with scrupulous attention to detail, right down to the contoured ear cushions and engraved serial number. (Sorry, S/N 00001 is already spoken for.) If you were to crack open the ear cups, you’d find the same commitment to excellence in the form of a highly refined ceramic-coated aluminum diaphragm surrounded by a ribbed ring, designed to reduce distortion, all framed in a sturdy aluminum alloy to minimize resonance.
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Premiere Design
Reader Request
Scott Wilkinson  |  Aug 03, 2009

Reader F. Teixeira suggested that I profile a high-end <A href="http://www.vandersteen.com">Vandersteen</A> home-theater speaker system in this blog, and I'm more than happy to oblige. Vandersteen has been among audiophiles' favorite brands for over 30 years with good reason&#151;they sound spectacular!

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Premiere Design
Realer Than Real
Scott Wilkinson  |  Apr 13, 2009

If you thought 1080p is as good as it gets, think again. Long known for its reference-quality audio products, <A href="http://www.meridian-audio.com">Meridian</A> now offers a video projector with <I>five times</I> the resolution of 1080p. Dubbed the 810 Reference Video Projector, this 140-pound behemoth uses three D-ILA panels, each with a resolution of 4096x2400 for a total of nearly 10 megapixels.

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Premiere Design
Red Dragon Leviathan Signature Monoblock Power Amp
Scott Wilkinson  |  Jul 12, 2010

Founded in 2005, Utah-based Red Dragon Audio is dedicated to class-D power-amp technology. It's flagship product is the Leviathan Signature monoblock, which is designed to look—and feel—as good as it sounds.

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Premiere Design
Red Dragon Leviathan Signature Monoblock Power Amp
 |  Jul 13, 2010

Founded in 2005, Utah-based Red Dragon Audio is dedicated to class-D power-amp technology. It's flagship product is the Leviathan Signature monoblock, which is designed to look - and feel - as good as it sounds.

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Premiere Design
Red Wine Audio Isabellina HPA LFP-V Edition Headphone Amp/DAC
Scott Wilkinson  |  Apr 18, 2011
A couple of months ago, Steve Guttenberg wrote a short review of the Isabellina HPA LFP-V Edition headphone amp from Red Wine Audio in his Audiophiliac blog, implying that it could be the world's best. With the recent launch of InnerFidelity, our new sibling site devoted to headphones and other personal-audio products, I thought it especially fitting to profile this little gem here.
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Premiere Design
Remaking a Classic: The B&W 800 D3 Speaker
Bob Ankosko  |  Sep 28, 2016
My first encounter with B&W’s coveted 800 Series speakers is ingrained in my memory. It was the summer of 1981 and a musician friend invited me over to see and hear his newly acquired pair of 801s. As I entered the rehearsal space in his finished basement, I remember thinking how unusual they looked compared with my boxy Fishers. Minutes later I was sinking into a cushy chair at the apex of a triangle formed with the speakers, listening to the White album feeling that I had somehow been transported into the studio during the making of a great album. The sound was authentic. I felt closer to the music—music that was very special to me. Today, more than three decades after John Bowers proudly unveiled the original 801 in 1979, B&W has reinvented its flagship under the aegis of Martial Rousseau, head of research. Here Rousseau shares the story behind the remaking an iconic speaker.
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Premiere Design
Revel in Luxury
Scott Wilkinson  |  Apr 09, 2009

As part of megaconglomerate Harman International, <A href="http://www.revelspeakers.com">Revel</A> has access to some of the finest speaker-design and development facilities in the world. And yet it retains its identity as a separate, relatively small company whose sole focus is producing the best possible speakers without compromising or cutting corners.

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Premiere Design
Rockport of Ages
Scott Wilkinson  |  Nov 24, 2009

In these days of outsourced manufacturing, it's refreshing to find a company that builds its own products right here in the USA. Of course, it helps if those products are high-end, high-cost items with no expectation of high-volume sales. Take, for example, <A href="http://rockporttechnologies.com">Rockport Technologies</A> in Rockport, Maine, whose speakers are hand-built for an exclusive clientele rather than the mass market in a facility that looks more like a house than a factory.

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Premiere Design
Runco D-73d 3D DLP Projector, Part 1
Scott Wilkinson  |  Mar 28, 2011
Normally in this blog, I profile extreme products based solely on information provided by the manufacturer, not on personal experience. However, the D-73d projector from Runco is a different story—I got to spend an entire day with it at the company's training facility near Portland, Oregon, where Runco moved after being acquired by Planar. Helping me was Erik Guslawski, eastern regional product specialist, and Bob Williams, chief product architect and recent guest on my Home Theater Geeks podcast.

Because there's so much to write about, I'm going to split this report into several parts. First, I'll cover the features of the D-73d, then I'll focus on my experiences with the projector at Runco, including measurements and watching real-world content.

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Premiere Design
Runco D-73d 3D DLP Projector, Part 2
Scott Wilkinson  |  Mar 29, 2011
In Part 1 of this report on my visit to Runco to see the D-73d 3D projector up close and personal, I described its LED illumination and use of linear polarization to isolate the left and right images. Now, I'd like to discuss the alignment of its dual projection engines, its color features, and its outboard video processing.
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Premiere Design
Runco D-73d 3D DLP Projector, Part 3
Scott Wilkinson  |  Mar 31, 2011
In Part 1 and Part 2 of my report on the Runco D-73d 3D DLP projector, I covered its features in some detail. Now, it's time to reveal what we measured while working with it at Runco's training facility near Portland, Oregon. Helping me was Erik Guslawski, eastern regional product specialist, and Bob Williams, chief product architect and recent guest on my Home Theater Geeks podcast.
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