Stereophile arrived the other day. It was fat, 204 pages, 116 of which are advertisements. Sounds like companies are lining up to spend money with them. What about the content of the mag?

I was a bit disappointed to see some B&Ws and SVS’s on review- that were just in British hi-fi news recently. They are sister mags and unfortunately for those of us who subscribe to both, share merchandise. They only do proper reviews of about five products per month. When you’ve already read about two of them, there’s not a lot new here. But let’s give ‘em a chance.

Discussions

P3

-Discusses not pitching your physical media. I agree with them all the way. Keep it. Play it! Don’t waste your time trying to record it.

P25

-Reading about Cyrille’s Farm was interesting due to the odd ball system. I’m game. There’s also an interesting photo complete with a big complaint I have with Stereophile. They have weak photos and even weaker, or NO captions. Hey boys, a photo is worth a zillion words. Stereophile continues to be the worst looking magazine on the newstand.

P29-33

-A history lesson on Fairchild carts. I could have gone the entire afternoon without contemplating this navel, but I know Stereophile is vinyl centric.

P35-38

-A discussion of cart/stylus alignment. We’ve just gone 7 full pages of anal retentive playing in the sandbox. Way too much time wasted on this. Further, a respected source is quoted as saying horizontal alignment isn’t important. That’s so stupid I have to hang up the phone.

P41-121

-Recaps of their product commentary. I understand people like lists and ratings, but this is all old news for regular readers.

P123-133

-Gawd save us. Ten pages devoted to towers made in China like they’re real science, instead of a pile of sandwich drivers in a heavy box.

P135-143

-Review of new Hegel H400 streaming integrated, made in China for $7k. I’m sure it’s a decent piece. But even the reviewer realized their app is a mess. I would instead appraise you of Atoll’s SDA300, $5500, made in France with a grittier, heavier sound than Hegel, and an app that actually works MUCH BETTER!

P149-157

-Review of B&W bookshelf speakers for over $15k with stands. The 6” mid is a woven fiber cone with a fancy sales word “continuum.” The tweet is their clean sounding, very delicate vapor diamond deposition design. This is some fancy money for what’s basically a Kevlar/ish 6” and composite tweeter. I will happily put our Atohm GT1 stand mounts up against them for $4500 per pair. The Atohms image incredibly, are smooth, and hit like a center linebacker! I’ve never heard a B&W stand mount that was the least bit TOUGH and powerful.

P159-165

Here’s a review of Burmester monoblocks for $100k. Please guys… almost every month you do this, waste a good chunk of space on yet another pair of unaffordable space heaters. This is just filler, like the $200k French amps a couple months back.

P167-173

Next is a lengthy review of an $1800, Chinese built, 25×2 Class A integrated amp. The concept is interesting because it is affordable. But… a Class A amp is guaranteed to run hottt (140d in this case) and to basically RECOMMEND this amp is folly. This is a niche piece that isn’t built nearly well enough to waste time on for the mass public. It CAN’T be reliable.

There are six more single page discussions of albums or business. I enjoyed reading about Louis In London, Jerome Subbagh and Gloomy Sunday. The rest… no thanks.

I for one, am not won over by musicians who really aren’t very good, who earn disproportionate fame due to a drug induced early death. They’re invariably addicts who had a few shining moments in a train wreck of a life.