Articles, Reviews and Measurements of Audio Products

This is a review and detailed measurements of the FIIO R7 DAC, media player, headphone amp and streamer based on Android operating system. It was sent to me by the company and costs US $700.

As you see, you have the equivalent of a normal Android phone screen. It is impressive in size compared to typical small displays we see in audio gear. Physical controls are limited to power on/off, volume and selection of which ports are active (headphone, line out or both). The touchscreen itself is responsive enough. Here is the back panel:


There is a lot in there that I won't get into. I suggest seeking other reviews for all the feature set.

For now, the R7 has a different operational paradigm than I have seen in...

This is a review and detailed measurements of the Topping "TP" RD3 balanced stereo USB rackmount DAC with Bluetooth. It was sent to me by the company and costs US $229.

The unit sports a gorgeous, white segmented display with highly responsive control. It is a joy to use. A remote control is provided as well. Back panel shows what we expect including the now standard trigger support on Topping products:

Power supply is built-in which is very nice as well.

I prefer this form factor to desktop products as it looks more "serious."

Topping RD3 TP Measurements
As usual we start with our dashboard:

This is excellent performance and just a...

The passive version of this speaker was measured and reviewed here: https://www.audiosciencereview.com/...ontrol-x-review-indoor-outdoor-speaker.24852/

I noticed JBL made a wireless version of this speaker and thought it would be interesting to measure. It is now discontinued, but it was $499 for a pair. Using the method here by @napilopez, I conducted quasi-anechoic measurements and generated the spinorama data.



Measurements were taken at 1m with about a 6ms gate providing resolution to 176hz. The remaining response was spliced in from hyper near-field measurements after baffle step adjustment. I utilized a minidsp UMIK-1 and REW...

This is a review and measurements of the Classic Audio MC Pro by Michael Fidler. It was sent to me by the company and costs US $850 (£650/€750).

As non-fancy enclosures go, this is pretty nice looking and with some unusual features such as low frequency blending to reduce noise, mono switch and selectable gain. Back panel shows another unusual feature: balanced XLR out:

I like balanced output as audio gear has its only ground loops which we don't want to add the heap that phono stage may bring. As such, all of my testing was done using that output.

Check out how beautiful the insides look:


There should be a transparent top as an option for folks to enjoy looking at...

I had the bright idea to do a sum up review of all the ones done and posted hear during a week. Well, as soon as I got into the first review, I forgot I had to do half a dozen and wound up doing an in depth video on each, causing the video stretch to near an hour!!! Good news is that I watched it at 2X speed and it was still understandable so feel free to speed it up. Otherwise, set aside the same 1 hour I did to watch and here the story of each review between the lines:


ART USB Phono Plus Review: https://www.audiosciencereview.com/forum/index.php?threads/art-usb-phono-plus-review.46939/ Avantone
CLA-10 Speaker Review: https://www.audiosciencereview.com/...tone-cla-10-yamaha-ns-10m-clone-review.46954/
Cayin Mini-CD MKII & LINN MIMIK CD Player Review: https://www.audiosciencereview.com/...ds/cayin-mini-cd-mkii-cd-player-review.46960/
Tice TPT Enhanced Line...

This is a review, teardown and measurements of the Tice Power Conductor 2 vintage AC power cable. It is on kind loan form a member (cost unknown):


While the terminations are beefy, no self-respecting high-end audiophile would want to be near a cable looking like it was left over from Radio Shack store of 1970s! There is scant information on this cable. The bit that is there is in used market and states exactly the following on the function of the switches:



Makes perfect sense, no? Well, let's take the box apart:


Nothing in there but the switch. It seems at first glance that the neutral white wire is being disconnected in one orientation of the switch. This made no sense as you can't power the device that way. Meter confirmed that the connection remained even when the switch is in disconnect mode! So I took the ends off and it was then that I realized there were 5...

This is a review and detailed measurements of the vintage Tice TPT Enhanced Line Conditioner/enhancer. It was kindly sent to me by a member. I can't find its original cost (used is about $100):

Despite the use of dovetails on the sides, this is a very cheap looking box. The cord and termination are typical household products which today no one would be caught dead using.

There is very little historic information about this box. But there is a ton on how Tice got its reputation: modifying a Radio Shack clock to improve the sound fidelity in your room! The thing was called the Tice Clock.

The product here seems to just be something you just plug into to the wall in parallel with your cords (there is no outlet). The back box was glued but I was able to pry it off to peak inside:


Seems like they just wrapped the wire every which way and then poured some kind of goop and cured hard giving the unit some...

Review of

햇병아리 the member of our community kindly purchased it himself with his own money and asked me to measure it.

Common-
AMP at Mode ON (On - Off = plug-in/unplug)
Load 4 Ohms (for power sweep, a pair of 4 x 16 Ohms 1000 W as 4 Ohms 4000 W Load)
AC filters external AUX-0040
DC filters internal
DMM Keysight 34465A Truevolt 6,5 digit
Analyser Audio Precision APx525B

On-Off DC test with 4 Ohm @ Gain Med Ch.1



DC offset as 4.2 mV



Strange DC behavior after unplug(Marker 1). Over 12 Min to return to bottom voltage.

On-Off AC test with 4 Ohm @ Gain Med Ch.1

Peak around 4 mVrms


Stabilised(?) after 32 min from turn ON, bulge around 47 min would be my mistake.

On-Off DC-45k test with 4 Ohm @ Gain Med both Ch.1...

This is a review and detailed measurements of the Cayin Mini-CD MKII CD transport and stereo player. It is on kind loan from a member and costs US $279.

The unit comes with a good looking and feeling metal case. I like the large display but controls didn't seem very responsive. Below it is my circa 1998 LINN MIMIK cd player. It cost US $1,595 then which would be almost $3,000 today! I thought it would be nice to compare the performance of one against the other.

Back side shows the usual connections:

The external adapter is a bit of a buzzkill. They should have charged $299 and put the darn power supply inside.

Here are its specs: