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Reviewer:
Marja & Henk
Financial Interests: click here
Sources: PS Audio PWT; PS Audio PWD; 2 x Thorens TD160; Thorens TD124
Streaming sources: Foobar2000; XXHighEnd
Preamp/integrated/power: Tri TRV EQ3SE phonostage; PS Audio Trio P-200;  Audio Note Meishu with WE 300B (or AVVT, JJ, KR Audio 300B output tubes); Yarland FV 34 CIIISA; Trends Audio TA-10; WLM Duo Amp; NuForce Icon Mobile; RSA Predator; Qables iQube V1
Speakers: Avantgarde Acoustic Duo Omega; WLM Grand Viola Monitor Signature + Duo sub; Podium Sound Podium1
Cables: complete loom of ASI LiveLine cables; full loom of Crystal Cable cables; Audio Note AN/Vx interconnects; Audio Note AN-L; Siltech Paris interconnects; Gizmo silver interconnect; Nanotec Golden Strada #79 nano 3; Nanotec Golden Strada #79; Nanotec Golden Strada #201
Power line conditioning: Omtec PowerControllers; PS Audio Powerplant Premier; PS Audio Humbuster III;
Equipment racks: Solid Tech Radius amp racks; ASI amplifier and TT shelf
Sundry accessories: Boston Audio Design Mat and Tuneblocks; Furutech DeMag; Nanotec Nespa #1; Exact Audio Copy software; Dell server and laptop w/Windows Server 2008, Vista and XP; iPod; wood, brass, ceramic and aluminum cones and pyramids; Manley Skipjack
Room treatment: Acoustic System International resonators, sugar cubes, diffusers
Room size: old: dedicated listening room ca. 4.00 x 5.50m with open extension to a 30 sqm living and open kitchen. Ceiling height is 2.50m, paneled brick walls, tiled concrete floors. New room ca. 14.50 x 7.50m with a ceiling height of 3.50m, brick walls, wooden flooring.

Review component retails: ASI resonators $200 for a Basic to $2000 for a Platinum; LessLoss Blackbody $959; Shakti Stone $115, Shakti On-Line $50/pr


On the human evolutionary history scale, electricity was an unknown phenomenon until very recently. It appears that a certain Thales of Miletus was the first to publicly announce the discovery of electricity. Thales also was the first Greek philosopher to kick off Western philosophy in general. He attempted to explain natural phenomena without falling back on mythology. He stumbled upon electricity when noticing that rubbing an amber object attracted light objects to it. He called this force electricity after the Greek word for amber - elektron. This was around 500BC or some 2500 years ago. It took a whopping 2100 years more to get us to 1675 when German Otto von Güricke invented the first Elektrisiermachine or electrostatic generator.


This machine that converted mechanical into electric energy started a new area of research. It could produce very high voltages but delivered very little current. It was Aloisio Galvani who created a machine that could do work by producing sufficient current. Galvani did not fully understand his discoveries but Alessandro Volta did whose subsequent work led to a functional battery. Now electricity could be used as a steady source rather than individual sparks. In his honor the unit of electrical potential was called volt. At the same time Michael Faraday was working in the UK with then new electromagnets. He could not have a bright light-bulb idea yet as Edison’s first light bulb would take another 50 years but something similar must have happened. His idea was that if electricity could create magnetism, then the inverse should work as well. Magnetism should be able to create electricity. He was correct. Thomas Edison took over the lead with his lighting devices and electric motors.


Today that single inventor’s monopoly on electrical development is over and more and more people contributed various applications for electricity. Now we cannot even imagine a life without electricity. It’s when the monthly energy bill hits the doormat that one wonders. From the beginning our and all other species were adapted to the naturally occurring electrical—read electromagnetic—fields that surround us. We can see because we are sensitive to EM radiation in a particular frequency band. We feel warmth from the infrared band and so on. Our planet protected us and all other flora and fauna from damaging cosmic rays and naturally occurring nuclear radiation; until technological advances had electricity take over our daily lives.


With the onset of advanced technology more and more EM radiation is man-made. There is no protective field inside the earth’s atmospheric shields. Hence we are constantly exposed to the radiation civilization generates itself. The intensity of radiation exposure increases daily. We know that when a cable carries an electrical signal from point A to B, it generates an EM field that surrounds the cable. How big that field is depends on the amount of current carried. Huge overhead power lines create strong and wide fields. Bundles of smaller cables do the same on a reduced scale. The point is, we can if we like avoid places where such cables are if we don’t find that living beneath massive power lines is advantageous. However, a few years ago wireless communications became near ubiquitous and have since replaced hard-wired solutions. More than 80% of the Western population now owns a mobile phone that is wirelessly connected to a giant web of antennae and associated amplifiers all working in the 800MHz or 1900MHz range. This amount of transmitters and relays vastly exceeds TV/radio transmitters.


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