Nakamichi Rival, Sony TC-K 555 ESX Cassette Deck

The Sony TC-K 555 ESX is a very smart looking unit with excellent ergonomics. On the right section are the function control buttons & tape counter display, and on the left are recording settings and peak signal display. The cassette well in in the middle, but in this case, it's not motorized. Later units from the ESL model onwards are motorized. 

Sony was in top form during the 80's and the Sony ES series hifi components represented their state of the art in audio philosophy, technology and execution maturity. The Sony TC-K 555 ES series had a long production run which started since 1982 - 1994 in various guises from the early ES, to the, ESG, ESX, ESR & the ESA plus ESJ are being the last 2 versions released in the early 1990's. The Sony TC-K 555ESX as seen here is made for 1987-1988 year, before being replaced by the ESR version in 1989. The last version, ESJ was released in 1992 and continued to be made well in to 1994.

The Sony TC-K 555 series is the state of the art of the Sony ES series cassette deck of the era, being on top of  TC-K 333 series in various guises over the span of 8 years in production. Both models share common design themes such as centrally mounted 3 head, dual capstan, 2 motor transport, made in house by Sony. A two display system is also used in the styling of the deck, the left window being a dedicated tape counter and a right window being peak level meters. The TC-K 555 builds on from there with remote control capability and a higher dynamic range(120db) audio circuitry design. Like the European range topper TC-K 700 from the same year, the tape door is dampened when ejected. Later models from ESL onwards in 1990 have motorized tape door. I must say the styling of the Sony ES series at that point has a serious business like look to it.    

The back panel is as per usual with line in and line out RCA jacks 

This is the original remote supplied by Sony at the time, as optional. So not many owners bought them with remotes back then. Hence the original remotes are super expensive these days. However if you get a unit from Oh, he has a compatible programmed remote supplied. Not very nice looking, but functional nevertheless!  

My own experience with Sony cassette players have been mixed over the years, as I loved my Sony Walkmans, car cassette stereos but with their hifi decks, not so great experience until now. My previous entry level Sony cassette deck, can't remember the model no. came with very high wow & flutter straight out of the box new! I rmembered sending it to the Sony service center & other repair shops many times It could never be fixed.

My buddy Oh told me that I had not experienced the best of Sony cassette decks, I should try an ES series unit. He offered me a TC-K 333 ES unit to play with, but I wanted something a little better, with remote! And so 2 weeks later I picked up this restored TC-K 555 ESX from Oh.

I plugged this unit in to my system, replacing the Kenwood KX-880G unit and from first music played, I heard a similar clarity in sound, slightly wider band width, more refined highs, with a neutral tonal quality, all hallmarks of a great hifi cassette deck. The Sony also had other less positive traits, the scale of music imaging was smaller, less big boned, or probably gave a presentation of mid hall perspective, compared to the rather forward sounding Kenwood, which gives a first row seat impression. The Kenwood also struck me as being more musical of the two, despite having slightly higher wow & flutter audible.

Both the Sony & Kenwood players are highly dynamic tape decks and both have tight bass lines which I like a lot. The Sony TC-K 555 ESX spent about 2 weeks in my audio cave and I never had a dull moment with it. Not sure why, but the Sony tape heads tend to require cleaning more often then my other tape decks. 

All Sony TC-K 333/555 ES models shared the same well spec Sony TCM 110 mechanism, which is a 3 head, dual capstan, 2 motor design unit. 

The Sony TC-K 555 ESX playing in my system, if only for 2 weeks!

Overall, the Sony TC-K 555ESX provides a very positive experience for cassette deck ownership, and has managed to redeemed it's past failings. If anything, it reinforces Oh's comment that if playing with Sony cassette decks, it must be ES series, not anything less. And so far, my experiences with Sony ES series components have not disappointed yet, be it CD player(my CDP-X7 ESD) or cassette deck, and now that makes me itching to try out their ES series amplifiers!

Currently in Malaysia, there are only 2 brands of cassette decks in which people would pay top dollar, (or should I say Ringgit?) without second thoughts. Hence in the context of today's used market place, the Sony ES decks do rival the Nakamichi units on offer. First the Nakamichi cassette decks in which the brand had built such a strong image & sound quality that it's almost bullet proof in resale value for a good working condition unit. 

Next up are the Sony ES series units. I know many who personally import these decks from Japan, despite being rated 100V for Japan domestic market voltage, instead of 240V for local Malaysia spec. This is due to the Sony ES deck's scarcity in the local market. In Malaysia, they were priced out of affordability back then in the 1980's. And if anyone had the money, they would've certainly gone for the well renowned Nakamichi then.  

My buddy Oh also brings them in from Japan, converts them to 240 V and restores them to original spec. At point of writing, he has already sold a couple of units, and he still has limited units left. So please contact him pronto at 012-206 0888 if you're keen to get your hands on a Sony ES cassette deck.

After being with me for 2 weeks, Oh tempted me with another top spec cassette deck, this time a Yamaha K-1X. Stay tuned for that one!  

A kick-ass hifi system for under RM3000

This is something I always have in the back of my head of what is possible if I put my budget just below RM3000 but I want to have streaming, local media play back and a little bit more if I wanted to have CD player to be added to the mix. Well hifi system can be very simple as one amplifier with one pair of speaker and you are done basically. In the old days, usually be CD player or cassette or even a minidisc player. In more recent times of course digital media is kind of the main stream. Keep that in mind, I just wanted something very simple and affordable which I can just set it up to listen in my living room area. It can be family entertainment and as well as for guest coming to visit.

Now to be realistic with limited budget , it is quite obvious to look into the used market. After all, used hifi gear does have quite many variety to offer. Since this is going to be in the living room area I will pick something not too space consuming. So for speaker, the ideal choice is a bookshelf speaker. It's quite a bit of searching for something that I like and need to be low cost. After some months of going through the search, I came upon a nice pair of Monitor Audio Gold 7. This speaker is the top bookshelf back for its days back in the 90's. Definitely is a very old pair of speaker. The speaker is discontinued back in 2009. I like this speaker very much for the high which makes vocal in music very prominent and not ear piercing at the same time. Well being a bookshelf although the lower end is not comparable to floor stander but it does it very well. The condition of speaker is really good given the years this speaker has seen. I got a good offer this pair for RM600. Quite a fair price to pay.

After picking up this pair of speaker , than the next important part is the amplifier. What should be a good amplifier for it. Being a British speaker is also means is quite the warm sounding speaker. Of course the gold metal tweeter is a bit more forwarding. Probably I am thinking of some British amp probably or even Japanese amp which is more neutral. The selection for me is, I wanted an amplifier that has everything in it with DAC, USB, Coaxial, Optical, RCA. Most old school amp will be rule out for sure. Have to be something a little into the millennium to fit the bill. Most newer generation amp with all build in doesn't come cheap and also not many choices as well to fit the budget. After some long searching, decided to get this little amplifier. The Sony UDA-1  USB DAC amplifier. This unit was launch in 2013 and is discontinued back in 2018. This is a shoebox size amplifier. Is has 2 USB input, one in front and one at the back. The DAC can support up to DSD128 and support hi-res as well up to 192khz. The back it has another USB, with coaxial, optical and 1 pair of RCA input. There is also a pair of RCA output as well. The standard speaker binding post can be use with bi-wire or banana plugs. It has a credit card size remote as well which is pretty cool. This little cost me RM1300.

Now the final piece will be the speaker cable. I am keeping in mind that the speaker is kind of forwarding with the metal tweeter and now with the Sony amplifier it will be on the neutral side. I was thinking a little bit of mix in the cable with copper and silver should be nice. I found this used unit of DH Labs T-14 speaker cable. It is copper cable with silver coating to it. I have this similar cable for my home theater setup which I really like the vocal the cable produce which is clear and sharp. The cable is 2.5 meter pair and it cost RM500 for this pair. Is probably quite a bit of spending here. 

With amplifier and the speaker, I can simply hook up a laptop or even my Ipad / Iphone to the USB and I am ready to play some music. The good thing is it can support hi-res which is good for me as I am using Apple Music which recently have launch the hi-res audio. The total cost of all 3 components cost RM2400. Pretty much it is ready to rock and roll. To make things a little more , I have added into the mix a Asus Tinker board S (Single Board Computer) install with Volumio player as a media player which I can use for streaming spotify, apple air play or even listening to internet radio. This little unit cost less than RM500 which will bring my total cost to RM2900. 

Overall, I am very happy with this setup. It fulfilled all I wanted to get it for listening to music with different sources. Probably I can add in CD player in the future. For now it is covering all that is needed. The overall sound quality is pretty awesome. A short recording of the sound. Recording

CD Transport Replacement, Sony CDP-X7 ESD

As mentioned in my previous introduction of the Sony CDP-X7 ESD, I had suspected the CD mechanism & laser head was at the end of it's long 29 years service life since new! The symptoms were there, the long disc loading times, some disc unable to detect TOC, or some disc won't either play at the first or last track, and most of all, if I had to skip or reverse a track, it will take a long time to cue, then play. I was looking around for a replacement KSS-190A CD mechanism if I could. I didn't just want to replace the BU-1D laser head only. Yeah...... you can say I like my spare tire!

Found a brand new NOS unit in eBay, to be shipped from Germany, but they wanted some thing like close to 700 Euros and shipping cost have not been factored in yet! I had to turn to my next most trusty source, my sourcing buddy in China. If it's made or available in China, this guy will find it!

And found me a whole KSS-190A unit he did! Bless him..... It's a refurbish unit, come with a test video of the mechanism sent via Wechat too! 2 weeks after that, I got my package from the courier and my replacement project can commence.

Here is a step by step pictorial guide with caption to help someone if any one wants to embark on a similar exercise.   

As mentioned, the Sony is very well built, and like the Marantz CD7 I rescued from the past, one needs to remove the top & bottom cover to access the CD mechanism, and everything inside! The CD mechanism is best accessed from the bottom but some action needs to be approached from the top too! Here you see the Sony up side down, awaiting surgery!

Before the KSS-190A mechanism can be removed, we first need to dislodge the CD puck holder from the top, pull the tray out, then turn the unit back to up side down position.

A close up of the full aluminium die cast CD tray. Very few CD players of today will use this very expensive way to make a CD tray. It's mostly made from plastics of varying quality.

Next the cable loom running thru just beneath the CD transport needs to be unclipped for easy access & removal. Note the 4 springs on each corner of the KSS-190A CD transport! Just like the Philips CD Pro on my previous Marantz CD7! 

The springs do provide the CD transport some degree of suspension from external vibrations.

Now we remove the main ribbon cable for signal, clipped with the white plastic finished locking cover.

Due to age, the handling of this ribbon cable is delicate to say the least!

With the original CD transport out from the Sony, can you spot the new vs the original? Neither could we! What, you think that I would be crazy enough to attend to something like this on my own??? Like I always do, I consulted Wong sifu! 

We couldn't spot the diference between the out going and incoming KSS-190A, until we found this little dot of solder which acts like a shorting plug for transport! The little solder dot needs to be removed before plugging in to the Sony. You'll need a heat controlled solder gun, and very steady hands for this job. Too much heat or too slow hand motion and the ribbon cable melts along with the solder lead! I left this step to capable hands of Wong sifu!

With the ribbon cable prep step done, the replacement CD transport in re-inserted back to it's proper place, be mind full of the cable loom running just over the transport, carefully aligning the cables back in to the white plastic twist clip to hold it in place.

Now it's done, that's how tidy things should be when doing cable management! While working on the CD transport, we also took the opportunity to replace the CD tray drive belts, by removing the little Mabuchi motor and cover assembly on the top right of the picture. Sony's attention to details is that they even cover all moving parts with a stamped steel cover, with the belt & transfer gear vaguely visible on the top right of the picture.

Note the super thick sliding rails on which the BU-1D laser head assembly sits on! The degree of over engineering evident here is astounding! Also note the green coated spring on the bottom left of picture, the other 3 springs are just plain finished, not sure why, but some thing to keep in mind in order to replace in the same position after removal. Also note the transport locking screw just above the green coated spring! be sure to unlock the screw after installation, otherwise the transport won't work during testing, and we found out the hard way!

Speaking of the CD tray belt change, the esteemed Mr Oh supplied me the necessary rubber belts. Bless the man & his treasure chest of audio spares! The small belt is the one you saw on the picture above. The bigger belt is buried much deeper inside the CD transport. 

Now that the CD transport replacement work almost complete, it's time to turn the Sony right side up and run some test. First, the CD tray in/out test, checked & super smooth! 

And now for the CD test, using my favorite CD, Pink Floyd's Dark Side Of The Moon!

Great results, TOC detected, the CD plays well, skip & reverse tracks work fast and paused checked!

With one final naked shot, see the twin XLR output trannies towards the back of the player? Sony never did balance audio signal on any CD player like this anymore! Just too expensive now days...... We proceed to close both the top and bottom covers and call it a day!

Withe replacement a success, it's back to enjoying the music. It took almost 200 hours or so for the refurbished CD transport to run in and start to sound good somehow. May be I am experiencing psycho acoustics  again???

With that I had successfully resurrected another flagship CD player from the dead, and living in today's throw away world, it felt really good to preserve a historic milestone of Sony in it's golden era. Sony today is never the same greatness in commitment to hifi quality again. I sent my dead KSS-190A CD mechanism back to my buddy for refurbishment, waited about 2 months, and finally my original KSS-190A unit came back as my back up transport. I plan to keep this Sony CDP-X7 ESD in service for as long as I could.

I love the sound quality of the Sony. It had a warmish tonal balance, compared to today's high resolution, strictly neutral tonal balance. I would say the Sony does not suffer in terms of resolution, but rather presents it without that fake glare, over detailed feeling of today's player. In contrast the Sony sounds soothing, with an tint of rose hued tonal balance, and what I love the most about it, that bad ass fat bass lines. This player can really rock and plays pop recordings really well....... so well in fact, that when compared to another player from the same golden era costing at least 3 times the price when new, the Sony gives away little in terms of sound quality. The more expensive equipment may sound different, but it's really not much better either! Yes, it's a Sony & it's as good as strolling down memory lane 1988 gets.

Nothing Like It Again, Ever! Sony CDP-X7 ESD

Sony CDP-X7 ESD, what a mouthful..... Marantz marketing team is much smarter in terms of  product names.

Here we have a 2nd generation of Sony flagship X7 ES series CD players, launched without much fan fare in 1988. I am not sure of the logic behind the number 7 as flagship naming scheme for Japanese hifi manufacturers, but Sony, and my very own former Marantz CD7 is proof in point. All of Sony's flagship disc players leading up to year 2000, or Y2K Sony SCD1 SACD player, had the familiar X7 ES in various guises for nomenclature as name sake.

In 1988 Sony launched the limited edition of CDP-R1 & DAS-R1, a state of the art 2 box transport & DAC combo to an astonished world. Then towards the later part of the year, when the 2 box flagship combo was at the end of it's run, the CDP-X7ESD came about quietly, with a launch pricing of USD2500 per unit. Sony applied all their digital knowledge from the 2 box flagship in a simplified form, single box solution. Then added a twist in the form of a pair of coupling transformer output for the XLR analog signal, just like some traditional MC phono stage output design! Truly inspiring Sony........
 
     

The internal build quality is first rate, this was the time Sony believed in making things last a life time, and giving their best! Just a few years later, with the demise of Akio Morita, founder of Sony, the bean counters ran wild & took control of the company and Sony's fortunes headed south, slowly but surely.

On the technical side, this CDP came with then flagship KSS-190A CD mechanism and BU-1D laser tracking head combo, which are now extremely hard to find, and worth it's weight in gold if you do find one for sale! On the DAC side, a pair of 18 bit Burr Brown PCM53 is used in balance, dual mono configuration, with 8 times oversampling filter giving a claimed 45 bit resolution(honestly, I am not sure how the math works). The balanced XLR output is very special and rare among CD players, and I believe it was never repeated in any other designs, Sony or otherwise. The RCA output was of normal FET circuit design. So to hear this Sony at it's best sound performance, use the XLR output with balanced cables to pre amp is mandated. I know & read many reviews or audiophiles commenting about this player's performance without checking out the XLR output, which would've entirely mis-represent what this Sony is all about, sound wise........

The Sony KSS-190A CD transport, built in the same mold as Philips CD Pro transport.

The KSS-190A, when stripped off it's metal casing reveals that it's even better built than the Philip CD Pro, with thicker tracking alignment rails, encased laser read head, and heavier built CD puck.

The build quality is a reflection of the WWII era Japanese Naval architect philosophy in line with Yamato class battleship standards! Double layer and in some cases triple layers copper chassis with beam & frame design for maximum rigidity was employed, resulting in it's 18kgs of heft. The off centered CD transport is something that later X7 series designs will gradually be moved to centralized position within the chassis. On the left side is 2 potted power supply tranny for analog & digital requirements. Lots of over sized reservoir capacitors post rectifier stage for storage capacity. The capacitors are all dampened for sound tuning. I tried removing and putting on the dampening hard rubber rings again a few times, and the CD player does sound somewhat different with or without them. Those damn things do work, for better or worst!

On the right side of the CD transport is where all the DAC and analog output circuit resides, including those coupling output transformers mentioned earlier for the XLR signal. Talking about the CD transport, how many CD players have acoustically sealed(a rubber band around the chassis opening for the tray dampens the CD tray from vibrations of any kind) die cast metal CD tray sliding in & out? Ahem......

Even the 4 footers at the bottom of the chassis are the real McCoy, made from potted high density ceramic, and each feet does weight a few hundred grams on it's own! None of those nasty empty plastic jobs here. For this model, Sony left nothing to chance, no technical stone un-turned! If there was a better way of doing things, Sony had already applied it here.

While being the technical tour de-force, 30 odd years or so later, I am somewhat surprised about the collectors reception to this CD player, comparing it's present sale value against it peers in the CD player collect able markets. I feel the Sony marketing department is the weakling here, compared to the more international looking Marantz marketing team. Even Philips LHH series CD players fared better in terms of used collectors value. However, for those who are keen to explore Sony's golden era, here is an opportunity at a low entry price of about USD1000 a pop. Worth every penny and I believe it's value proposition can only improve with years, provided if it's still a mint working unit!

The high density ceramic feet! No plastic con jobs here either.

At the time, circa 2018 in my search for a vintage Japanese flagship Denon CD player, this one somehow landed on my lap through a long lost contact. It was in well kept condition, considering it's 29 year constant usage. The top plate & remote looked well worn, but those are minor issues as they can be fixed or restored.Yes, restoration was my game plan the moment I laid eyes on this pretty boy!

The worst part, YES, there is always a worst part! All part & parcel of playing with classics, be it hifi or automotive, always needs some kind of blood, sweat & tears effort, or elbow grease as they say, to make things right. The KSS-190A transport was in it's last legs of service life. Since Sony no longer produces CD players, they have stopped all CD transport production and closed the factory! It would be near impossible to source for a working unit. That was the numero uno hurdle to this restoration project, that I've now decided to under take!

Ah..... no pain, no gain as they say, and my wonderful journey with this Sony CDP-X7 ESD begins!

Stay tuned...........

Re-Introduction To My HiFi Circa January 2019

My simplified 2 rack HiFi system, circa January 2019, to start my journey again after a 3 year plus hiatus

Let me tell you about my reintroduction in to HiFi again, circa January 2019. With a remodeled home many things have changed, except my man cave, whic remains untouched at the same 12ft x 10ft x 9ft(L x W x H). Small room, and the urge to make it 14ft x 10ft x 9ft(L x W x H) was there, but I had resisted as I loved the way the speakers loaded my room, sound wise. So all it got was a fresh new coat of paint & some LED strip lighting. I started with the room because over the years, my HiFi philosophy have come to embrace the room as the starting point, followed by speakers, amplifiers & lastly sources in the order of hierarchy in the degree of sound influence. Allow me to further explain why it all starts with the room. The room as we choose to house our HiFi system in to, will determine how big a speaker pair allowed, which will in turn tell you how big a power amplifier should be, then comes preamp to be the source switch and volume control plus maybe, just maybe add sonic flavours to your source, which ever you choose. Make no mistake, the job of the source is to extract as much musical information from the media medium as possible. My hifi set up reflects just that philosophy as above and a little more as we go along. 

This set up consisted of items that were mothballed from the past, such as my PMC IB2i speakers, ATI Reference 6004 power amp, Kuzma Stabi S turn table and lastly Torus Power conditioner. Add in some new elements such as the Aesthetix Janus preamp/phono stage & Sony CDP X7-ESD CD player. 

PMC IB2i speakers

The PMC IB2i have been in my past system before. They came in to the picture as replacement to the pair of PMC Fact 8. I fell in love with this pair of speakers at the time of it's review in these pages. At the time, budgetary issues prevented them from being mine. However as PMC introduced a newer model in the form of IB2 SE, this pair made it's way from the showroom to my place with some discount. My HiFi philosophy also dictates that speakers should always be British, especially variations or students of the past BBC Technical Dept designs. Those guys really did much research in to all that make great speakers.

In theory, the pair of IB2i speakers are somewhat over sized for my room dimensions, but with careful placements of not only the speakers, but also my throne in avoiding room modes, made it a possibility in practice. These are speakers with a big sound and real beefy bass. Being a 3 way design with a dedicated silk dome mid range, the magical vocal is always there, ever present when playing music. The highs are not extended like newer speaker designs, but that's OK, as with the right source material, it can still relay the amount 'air' required for 'live' recording that is so dependent on the illusion of being there. The Achilles heel of having such a big speaker is the requirement for an equally big, beefy amp, which is the subject coming next!
     

ATI Reference 6004 power amp

ATI is not a new HiFi manufacturer as they have been doing that for other big American high end brands since 30 years or so ago. ATI amplifiers are designed by Morris Kessler, even if not as famous as Nelson Pass, Mark Levinson, Dan D' Agostino or John Curl, he is definitely in the same technical prowess when it comes to amplifier designs. All good designers but different design philosophies & technical implementation. Coming back to my HiFi philosophy for amps, my choice would always be American muscle.

The ATI Reference 600X series is designed as a multi channel high end AV amp. It can be configured for 1-7 channels in a single chassis at time of purchase. I wanted a four channel 350W amp, so I got an ATI Reference 6004, the last numerical denotes the number of channels in a single chassis. Why 4 channels you ask? Bi-amping, ever since I did that with a pair of stereo Magnet amps, I can never go back to normal stereo. So each one of the PMC IB2i speaker is powered by one channel for the bass driver & one channel for the mid range & tweeter.

I found the ATI Reference to be extremely transparent & powerful for an AV multi channel design. Which is all one needs for HiFi, gain on a wire. Some may accuse it of not being the last word in refinement and I agree, but it has a certain mid range texture that's invariably missing on those over refined amp designs too. So in HiFi, you always win some, lose some. It's just what parameter is more important to win or lose only, your choice determines the brand and design.

Asthetix Janus pre-amp, comes with built in phono stage. It is basically a simplified Calypso & Rhea rolled in one box for those who needs to de-clutter their HiFi!

The Aesthetix Janus represents another American amp choice for me even if it's a tube based design. We reviewed the Aesthetix Calypso in these pages before and liked it quite a bit. I felt it's performance came closest my pre-amp reference of sorts, the Audio Research Reference 3. Many argue that this is a decades old design, but to me this tube based pre-amp struck a balance between  being transparent & the way it adds a tinge of golden rose hue to the tonal color of music is nothing short of magical. Newer ARC Reference designs have since improved on linearity, lowered noise floor & higher resolution capability, but lost it's musical soul in the process.

Sorry if I digressed, but the Aesthetix Janus represented just that, as in the very slight tinge of rose gold hue added in to the tonal color does wonders to lift music, give it soul, make it just a little bit more humanized. Partner those sonic qualities with a full function remote and high quality phono stage, then is it any wonder why it deserves to be here?

I know Jim White as an excellent phono stage designer. If one can excel at making 1000X amplification,  preamp design would seemed like childs play, wouldn't it?   

Sony CDP X7-ESD CD player, the best of Sony circa 1988!

The 1988 Sony CDP X7-ESD is a special breed indeed, if you didn't know that? I have not come across another CD player that comes with transformer coupled XLR output! The X7-ESD is the first ES series CD player to include XLR output, and Sony went all out to make it special. While the BB PCM 53 DAC chip is one generation before the best, PCM 63, the sound from this Sony unit is truly something else. I used to have the Marantz CD 7, which was a truly magnificent CD player, if not for it's sound quality, then at least for it's collector's value.

The Sony is from a decade before the Marantz, yet will not lose out anything in terms of sound quality, shows that Sony as the CD format's co-developer was truly ahead of the curve at the period of what could be called the Golden Age of CD players, which is from the late 80's till late 90's. I would almost always favor high end Japanese CD players(the other exception being Philips CD players) as they made the transports, and built them to last a life time. I know mine did, it's more than 30 years now and still plays music like as if it was new!

Kuzma Stabi S, or baby Kuzma as many would come to call it!

This Kuzma Stabi S replaced my Linn LP12 turn table sometime after this pages probably in 2014. In terms of design the Kuzma is totally a different breed altogether. I liked the bare bones design of a solid high mass turn table equipped with a 12 inch unit pivot Stoggi arm, fitted with my trusty, long service Benz Micro LP cartridge.

For a small turn table, the sound is big boned & bold. The design is also very quiet in terms of bearing noise and that double thick cast iron platter gives equally big, ballsy bass. Never mind if it's the cheapest turn table among Franc Kuzma designs. The Kuzma family sound is just as evident here as in his bigger, badder ass designs. it's also a very musical turn table, otherwise it will be difficult to persuade me to move away from the Linn Sondek LP12.

Torus Power RM 8A, yes 8 Amperes is all you need. It's showing 1.6A current draw at idle, when my system hits it's Rock & Roll stride at 104dbs, it would be drawing a little over 4.2A! 

The Torus Power Conditioner needs no introduction as you can catch or revisit my adventures with it here within these pages. That's what buying the best equipment do, it stays with you for a long..... time, and possibly maybe for a lifetime. No further thinking about what ifs or regrets later, years down the road.

So that's all about the equipment, as all cables and accessories are carried over from the past and can be viewed from these pages. All I can say is that after 3 years living without HiFi, I am just glad to be back and have sound, good or bad. My journey starts all over again from here on. 

Sony To Launch 4K SXRD Video Projector At KLIAV 2012.

Sony 4K SXRD video projector.

Sony Malaysia will launch and demo their state of the art 4K SXRD video projector at the coming KLIAV show 2012. Projecting images at four times the resolution of full HD capabilities, will certain awe and inspire the next generation of cinematic experience today.

Another reason to go to KLIAV 2012 to be awed and inspired!

Sony Launches New Range Of Balanced Armature Headphones.

Sony launched a new range of Balanced Armature headphones recently due to be available sometime next week at all Sony Stores and retail showrooms. The latest batch of headphones are clearly aimed at the iPod generation, with a discerning taste for good sound. I believe this is a good starting point to draw the youngsters in to our high end audio hobby.


The XBA-3 model of the Balanced Armature headphones is the best sounding one of all. Clearly the crowd's favorite too, judging from the many people who agree to it's sound. 



An illustration showing the incredibly small sized BA driver(left) comparing to a regular dynamic driver(middle) and a Malaysian 10 sen coin(right).

A water test for the sport model XBA-S65. The headphone still played like it did before. Impressive! 



On hand to present the technical details of the new range of Sony XBA headphones is Negano san, who worked in the headphone division of Sony for the past 30 years or so. He spent the last 3 years developing the Balance Armature technology, and professes to using past top models, competitor's product and live music to benchmark his development. He also uses a variety of music, including classical symphonies to test for the live like sound staging properties as heard in the concert hall on the XBA-3 model, which is a three way design! He also said he used disco, or club music to test the XBA-4 model, a four way design which comes with a built in super woofer.



All the Balanced Armature driver assembly are first made in Sony's Japan factory, then sent to their Malaysian factory for final complete product assembly and packaging to ensure high build standards and reliability.



The range from left,  XB-1, XB-2, XB-3 and XB-4. Note the bigger body size as we higher up the range.



The other XBA models available includes the XBA-BT75 wireless blue tooth enables headsets, and the XBA-N85D digital noise canceling headsets, targeted for the highly mobile people who like to travel with their music on the go.

The XBA series headphone prices start from RM$199.00/set of XBA-1 to RM$1399.00 for the XBA-N85D.

The large group of bloggers and press at the launch.

  

The Sony Representatives and model parading their latest ware. Negano san is third from left.


I had a great time trying out the various models in the range, all powered by a portable Sony player with dedicated headphone amp. The model that I felt sounded most balance and certainly very audiophile transparent sounding is the XBA-3 model, which is a 3 way design. The more expensive XBA-4 which come with a built in super woofer is just tad over boosted in the bass, which mask the detailed musicality of the XBA-3 somewhat.

The new Sony XBA series is bound to give Monster's Dr Dre series headphones a strong challenge in the local market place.



Sony's SACD Swan Song? Sony XA5400ES SACD/CD Player.

This is an old post of ours in the blog we previously contributed to.

The Sony XA5400ES SACD/CD Player.

This Sony SACD/CD player caused a stir in the Internet forums and amongst SACD based audio community as a giant killer, when launched sometime late last year, 2008. It was rumoured to be Sony's last SACD player made ever. My friend PS, whom is so entrenched in to SACD just had to get hold of this player, no matter what! He spent the last few months knocking on Sony Malaysia and Singapore's door, begging them to sell him one. No one in the organisation gave him two hoots! Finally, poor PS had no choice but to get a 230V spec unit imported from Germany, with the help of the Internet. The irony of it all? The Sony XA5400ES is indeed proudly made in Malaysia! It would seem to me Sony Manufacturing Malaysia Boleh!, but Sony Marketing Malaysia Tak Boleh???

The Sony stting proudly on my hifi rack.

It seems that whilst Sony engineers are still highly competent, their marketing team have somewhat been too busy marketing mobile phones, Vaio lap tops and LCD Bravia screens amongst other things. Audio products seems to be all but forgotten when compared to the more glitzy tech products in the Sony catalogue. My personal call to Sony Malaysia, WAKE UP!!! The XA5400 SACD/CD player trully deserves your attention, and by refusing to sell it, you are doing disservice to all the SACD and CD music lovers in the country, not to mention, your bottom line. I don't think I need to remind you of your dismal overall financial results for the last operating business year? I also don't think Sony founder, Akio Morita would be a very happy man if he was still alive today.

The Sony's ultra smooth tray mechanism. Almost as smooth as the Esoteric X-03

O.K. enough of my ranting of Sony and the dysfunctional Marketing Dept. Let's see if the XA5400ES is truly all hype? First up, it seems to be built on the existing platform of the former top model XA9000ES, to save cost, which is no bad thing. Despite that, the fit and finishing quality from the Sony Malaysian plant is first rate, based on the sample PS bought. The design is typically Japanese business like and very ergonomically friendly. There's a lack of audio jewellery that makes past Sony ES series components so desirable, like full copper plated chassis, full aluminium face plate, gold plated RCA and XLR(which I used all the time during the review) output jacks. Weighing 11kgs, the player can be describe as solid medium built rather than battleship quality. The CD tray mechanism operation smoothness is second to only the much, very much more expensive Esoteric X-03, and makes almost all other high end expensive CD player seemingly shameful by comparison.

The back panel of RCA & XLR analogue ouput jacks. The Sony XA5400ES does multi chanel too, but only via it's HDMI output.

The sound of the Sony XA5400ES is truly impressive. It always portrays a musical sound stage and imaging in such a convincing manner, with the much prized high end "air" or space between instruments, making stage depth layering very easy to perceive. The tonal balance is very close to my resident Marantz CD7 in flavour too. Invitingly lush, warm, smooth and full bodied best describes it's tonal balance. This was confirmed as I was switching between Pass Labs and Bryston amplifications. When partnered with the Pass Labs combo, the sound was as described above. With the Bryston gear the lush, warm, smoothness was still apparent, but the sound also gained a certain level of dynamics and transient excitement. But should the Sony XA5400ES be compared to the Marantz CD7 or the Bryston BCD-1, both are very much more expensive by the way, two areas of deficiency did start to show. First is the area of very low level details in the music, like as in when I play my favorite Tube Hifi Violin CD, I found that many of the subtle breathing and bowing techniques recorded, were simply glossed over by the Sony, comparing to the Marantz. When compared to the Bryston, the Sony's handling of macro dynamic and transient swings is not as great at the contrasting ends of band width extremes. However, the Sony did excelled at portraying micro dynamics instead.

There are no sonic nasties presented by the Sony XA5400ES either, the highs are never grainy or harsh, mids never shouty, and bass is articulate, detailed and always tuneful. The best part about the Sony is that it possesses a level of musicality and cohererence in musical presentation, never before attain able at this price point. It may be the PRAT factor, but music always flowed freely and somehow manages to communicated that emotional massage of the musical performance very effectively. I had no trouble connecting "emotionally" with this player at all, and when buying source components, this is especially important!

The complete back panel view.

Unlike previous generation SACD players, which always tend to short change CD play musically to show case SACD's format superiority. Those days are over, as people now days tend to buy a CD player performance first, and if it plays SACD too, then considered a bonus. That's the market trend, and the XA5400ES does not short change the CD play back at all, I am happy to report. The Sony just plays both formats with the best ability it can. Other than being a little more analogue like sounding and slightly better low level resolution retrieval when playing SACD software, I enjoyed the CD format's musical performance just as much. Also gone are the days when a player takes ages to recognise if you've put in a CD or SACD in to the tray. The Sony mostly took no more than 20 seconds at worst to sort if self out automatically, although the user is allowed to override with manual format selection.

The standard Sony remote supplied. No fancy remote this time for the XA5400ES.

Depending on how Sony Malaysia work it's costing, should it be available in the local market, the player would likely to retail for between RM$5 - 7k(my guestimate, based on it's UK retail price), which is really cheap for an ES series component. The Sony XA5400ES would certainly be THE ultimate CD/SACD player to get for those in the midst of setting a hifi system costing between RM$15-20k budget range, or those seeking to up grade from that good ol' Marantz CD63. Trust me, it's that good, and I here by confirm that all the Internet and overseas buzz about this player is not hype. Not at all.

Dear readers, please do yourself and all other music lovers a favour at this coming KLIAV show, go to the Sony exhibition room(which is big I am told, so you can't miss it!), and ask for the Sony XA5400ES SACD/CD player. Hopefully, that will jolt the local marketing guys out of their comfy slumber and make this wonderfully musical player available in the local market. For not, us Malaysian audiophiles and music lovers on a budget would be musically poorer.

And finally, PS, you've made the right decision, and I am glad you've decided to stay your course of purchase, The Sony XA5400ES is a mighty fine buy indeed.

Sony Malaysia enquiry contact, tel: 1-300-88-1233