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McIntosh to Bring Audio Magic to All-Electric 2024 Jeep Wagoneer S

Bob Ankosko | Jun 05, 2024

Future owners of Jeep's first all-electric vehicle, the 2024 Jeep Wagoneer S due out this fall, will be richly rewarded with a custom McIntosh sound system guaranteed to turn heads in the showroom — and make driving a more pleasurable experience.

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Ascendo’s Seismic Subwoofer Is a Modern Marvel

Bob Ankosko | Feb 25, 2020

There’s no denying the lure of powerful, deep, visceral bass. How it pulls you into the action. How it scares the living hell out of you. How it makes music real. We were so intrigued by the beastly 6-foot-tall SMSG50 super subwoofer designed and built by Germany’s Ascendo Immersive Audio that we had to dig deeper. We wanted to know what it takes to design and build a subwoofer of this caliber — one capable of producing peak levels up to 140 dB and deliver 105 dB of sound pressure at 5 Hz. Is a subwoofer that weighs 441 pounds and uses a single 50-inch (!) driver to plumb the infrasonic depths really better than a model of more manageable size with maybe a few 18-inch drivers? We caught up with Geoffrey Heinzel, partner and director of international sales and marketing for Ascendo, to learn more about this modern marvel.

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All Aboard: James Loudspeaker Steampunk Speaker

Bob Ankosko | May 02, 2018

James Loudspeaker sells just about any kind of speaker you could want—or imagine. You can choose among its dozens of high-performance models and buy “off the shelf” or have a particular model customized with a special finish or feature. Or, you can get creative and dream up your own speaker design. The California-based company prides itself on its ability to meet the unique needs of its customers, whether that means solving an installation problem or creating something special…and personal. James built more than 300 custom products in 2017 alone, but the Steampunk Speaker is perhaps its most interesting—and unusual—project.

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Jukebox Hero: Sgt. Pepper's Limited-Edition Vinyl 45

Bob Ankosko | Feb 26, 2018

Sound Leisure made headlines in 2016 when it introduced the ’50s-inspired Vinyl Rocket Jukebox, its first 45-rpm-record-playing jukebox in 20 years and, at the time, the only new vinyl-playing jukebox in the world. Last year, the U.K.-based company—one of two remaining jukebox manufacturers, the other being jukebox pioneer Rock-Ola—partnered with Apple Corps to build an “analog dream machine” that would memorialize the 50th anniversary of The Beatles’ 1967 masterpiece, Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band.

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Bang & Olufsen BeoSound Shape Wireless Speaker System

Bob Ankosko | Nov 14, 2017

You’ve gotta hand it to the design team at Denmark’s Bang & Olufsen. Always super creative and always thinking outside the box—the speaker box, in this case. What could easily be mistaken for wall art or a serious acoustic diffuser is a unique modular speaker system. Indeed, the BeoSound Shape is the only wireless speaker system we know of that is modular and customizable in terms of performance and aesthetics. In other words, it’s ridiculously flexible.

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Back to the '70s: Tannoy Legacy Series Speakers

Bob Ankosko | Oct 12, 2017

Do you feel like you’re back in the ’70s, when vinyl ruled and fashion was…well, let’s just say, questionable?

There’s a good reason for that: Tannoy’s new Legacy Series is based on the popular High Powered Dual (HPD) Series released in 1974, the year after Pink Floyd mixed The Dark Side of the Moon at London’s legendary Abbey Road Studios on a pair of newly installed Tannoy Lancaster monitors.

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Steinway Lyngdorf S-15 Speaker System

Bob Ankosko | Aug 23, 2017

It’s not new but Steinway Lyngdorf’s S-15 remains stunning in its aesthetic and technical design. Visually, this tiny treasure has little in common with your garden-variety box speaker—nor should it, considering its pedigree. For starters, it’s 10 inches tall, 8 inches wide, and only 3 inches thick—or about a half-inch wider and an inch thicker than the 1997 Webster’s New World College Dictionary collecting dust on a shelf in my office.

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Teac AI-503 USB DAC/Integrated Amplifier

Bob Ankosko | Jul 10, 2017

As much as it might look like it, this is not your father’s long lost amplifier—the one you remember sitting on a rack in the den next to the Dual turntable and AR-3s—recently discovered in a remote corner of the attic. Nope, behind those vintage VU meters is a thoroughly modern USB DAC/integrated amp designed for the post-analog age or, more specifically, the Age of Hi-Res Audio. Simply put, Teac’s mission with the compact AI-503 is to preserve the fine details and nuances of your carefully curated music collection, whether you’re pulling tunes off your home network, a USB thumb drive, or a digital audio player.

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Wrensilva Loft Record Console

Bob Ankosko | Jun 30, 2017

Stereo consoles were all the rage in the ’60s. Every major TV company sold them—some with an integrated 25-inch screen, some without. Many were imposing pieces of furniture placed front and center in living rooms across America. I have vivid memories of paying $3 or $4 for my first album at the long-gone Jersey-based chain store Two Guys and promptly replacing the Engelbert Humperdinck LP on the platter of our Zenith console with Abbey Road.

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Finding Sonic Paradise: HiFiMan's Shangri-La Electrostatic Headphone System

Bob Ankosko | Apr 26, 2017

HiFiMan founder Dr. Fang Bian has been crafting fine headphones for more than a decade, collecting numerous awards along the way. In the past two years alone, five of his designs have been designated Top Picks in these pages. Despite this incredible success, Bian wanted more. He had a lifelong dream to fulfill: To create the “world’s best-sounding headphone.” As he put it, “While HiFiMan has made many good headphones, and people certainly enjoy them, none has ever fully satisfied that dream.”

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McIntosh MT5 Turntable

Bob Ankosko | Mar 15, 2017

Go ahead, take a few seconds to savor the radiant splendor of the McIntosh MT5. Rolling Stone dubbed it "The Turntable of the Gods." Fitting, indeed, for one of the most striking turntables you'll encounter. Beyond the hypnotic allure of its mirror finish and luminous platter—not to mention the conversation it's sure to stimulate—you'll find a precision device that treats cherished albums with the respect they deserve, while extracting the goosebump-inducing nuances that define your passion for vinyl.

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Come Fly With Me: Sonus faber's Super Sexy sf16

Bob Ankosko | Feb 24, 2017

I was immediately drawn to the sf16’s neofuturistic styling. Its gentle curves reminded me of the iconic TWA Flight Center at New York’s JFK Airport—an aeronautic theme sustained by wing-like sound pods that sprout on command. Unusual and unique.

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Play Me a Tune: Meet Yamaha's Amazing Disklavier Enspire Wholehouse Piano

Bob Ankosko | Feb 07, 2017

I’ve been fascinated with player pianos ever since I visited the Alamo Saloon in Old Abilene Town years ago as a kid. The reenactment of Wild Bill Hickok’s famous gunfight was a hoot, but watching those cancan girls dance to an upright piano that was playing itself was downright mesmerizing. I recently visited the Yamaha Artist Services facility in New York to experience a modern, super-charged version of that old player piano—the Disklavier Enspire.

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Ultra Style: Samsung Serif Smart TV

Bob Ankosko | Nov 10, 2016

Once again, Samsung has partnered with a noted industrial designer to rethink modern TV. Last year it was the magnificent S9W, an ultra-wide 21:9 TV designed by Yves Béhar. This year it’s the modestly sized (and priced) Serif TV, created in collaboration with the Parisian design duo Ronan and Erwan Bouroullec.

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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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