reviews

Good old Benz-Micro cartridges. They have been around for so long that we take them for granted. As Rodney Dangerfield might have said, they get no respect. After living with the Benz “Ebony” LP moving coil phono cartridge for more than a year, I suggest that this is a mistake. Let’s see if we can elevate the awareness of and respect for the Benz-Micro brand.

I do not want to make the brave new world of digital music appear more complicated than it is already, but this investigation into the audio quality of the Berkeley Alpha DAC Series 2, from Berkeley Audio Design, LLC, highlights the uncertainty that should be attributed to almost any conclusions for almost any digital component from almost any source.

The idea of using a step up transformer between a moving coil phono cartridge and an active phono preamplifier seems like an ideal solution for boosting the tiny voltage from the cartridge. A step up provides needed gain for the microvolts produced by a phono cartridge, and also provides the proper load for the cartridge’s impedance.

The new Bryston 2.5B³ "Cubed" power amplifier continues the evolution of the well-received line of power amplifiers from Bryston, Ltd., of Ontario, Canada. The 2.5B3 is the lowest power model in the current Bryston power amplifier lineup. If more power is needed, there are Cubed models with 200 WPC, 300 WPC, 600 WPC, and 1000 WPC.