Essayer OR - Gratuit

MANUFACTURERS' COMMENTS

Stereophile

|

December 2025

MoFi Distribution would like to thank both Ken Micallef and John Atkinson for their time and effort reviewing the HiFi Rose RA280 integrated amplifier (November 2025, p.93).

MANUFACTURERS' COMMENTS

HiFi Rose RA280

The RA280 is an example of trickle-down technology creating a value proposition while also advancing technology—in this case, the GaNFET-based class-AD amplifier circuit. There are very few robustly built integrated amplifiers that can outperform the RA280 anywhere near its price.

Today's class-D (and class-AD) amplifiers employing GaNFET output devices are more than capable of creating the sonic illusion of class-A thanks to their ultrahigh speed and low-distortion switching characteristics. Let's acknowledge that class-D is here to stay and will continue to improve; the RA280 exemplifies this reality.

The HiFi Rose RA280 strives for accuracy, both spatially and tonally, while also being highly musical, as KM discovered over and over with many of his preferred recordings, both analog and digital.

Thank you, Stereophile, for this excellent and thorough review, as well as the opportunity to write this comment.

PLUS D'HISTOIRES DE Stereophile

Stereophile

Stereophile

Life in the emerald beyond

If you find yourself in Monaco on a Sunday night, make your way to La Note Bleue, a cozy restaurant and music bar on the beach by the Avenue Princesse Grace. There, you're likely to find a legendary world/fusion guitarist sitting in with a group of young jazz musicians eager to cut heads with the acknowledged maestro of inner awareness and otherworldly spirits. Forever known to some as “Mahavishnu,” you can call him by his birth name, John McLaughlin.

time to read

3 mins

December 2025

Stereophile

Stereophile

36 sides of late Bowie

I Can't Give Everything Away is the sixth and last of the Bowie box sets that survey specific periods in the artist's career. The first was Five Years 1969–1973, released in September 2015. That was followed by Who Can I Be Now? (1974–1976), A New Career in a New Town (1977–1982), Loving the Alien (1983–1988), Brilliant Adventure (1992–2001), and finally the new set. Together, the six sets are an impressive testament to a musical giant—a heavyweight tribute figuratively and literally. You could use this last installment to pump up your biceps.

time to read

3 mins

December 2025

Stereophile

Is this the ultimate old-school analog move?

Dedicated readers know that lately in this space I’ve been on something of an analog kick. Two months ago, in the October issue,¹ I wrote about refurbishing and modding my old McIntosh FM tuner. Last month’s column (November) was on the much-discussed but little-understood topic of the skating force on a phono cartridge stylus.²

time to read

4 mins

December 2025

Stereophile

STEREOPHILE'S 34TH ANNUAL PRODUCT OF THE YEAR 2025 AWARDS

Stereophile's Product of the Year Awards were first published in 1992.1 I decided at that time that, in contrast to other publications' awards schemes, we would keep the number of categories to a minimum.

time to read

21 mins

December 2025

Stereophile

Stereophile

DeVore Gibbon Super Nine

LOUDSPEAKER

time to read

11 mins

December 2025

Stereophile

Stereophile

Some marketing claims are true

None of the amps I build are better than the others,” Justin Weber of Ampsandsound told me not long after we met. “They are just different.” I may have smirked inwardly. According to his company’s website, Weber makes no fewer than 23 amplifier models, many capable of driving both headphones and speakers, ranging from the $2700 Kenzie OG to the $38,000 Arch Monos. Are they really all equally good?, I wondered. Surely this was just a clever Buddhist ploy to distract us from some of his amps’ high prices. Doesn't the extra $35k spent on the Arch Monos buy you something more desirable than the performance offered by the little Kenzie? Writing for an audio magazine means I hear a lot of marketing claims, some more risible than others, and I have learned to take them with an entire seabed worth of salt.

time to read

11 mins

December 2025

Stereophile

Stereophile

Lotti Golden

Her life became a whirlwind. Taking the train in from Brooklyn to Manhattan to pitch songs and experience the East Village scene, she landed a song-publishing deal at age 14. In 1968, at 18, after a chance meeting in an elevator, a legendary songwriter/record producer was interested in assisting her in making her debut album. Released on Atlantic Records in 1969, Lotti Golden's Motor-Cycle was wildly experimental and ahead of its time. Seemingly poised for success, the album and her career suddenly vanished.

time to read

4 mins

December 2025

Stereophile

Stereophile

Baby you can drive my car(tridge)

While I was coming to grips with this month's review subject, the idler drive Garrard 301 Advanced, I began to think about the various methods that have been used to spin turntable platters over the years. Since the transition a century ago from windup clockwork to electric motors, there have basically been three ways to spin a turntable platter: idler drive, belt drive, and direct drive. True, there have also been a few designs that go their own unique ways, such as the rare, water-driven Oasis made by David Gillespie of Saturn Audio in the late 1970s and the gear-driven H.H. Scott 710 I once owned and foolishly sold. But almost everything made since the 1950s uses one of the three main drive systems. Even the Omega Drive system, which was used by Wilson Benesch on their extraordinary GMT One turntable, is at its core a direct drive design.

time to read

10 mins

December 2025

Stereophile

Stereophile

Audio Research Reference 330M

MONOBLOCK POWER AMPLIFIER

time to read

19 mins

December 2025

Stereophile

Stereophile

MANUFACTURERS' COMMENTS

MoFi Distribution would like to thank both Ken Micallef and John Atkinson for their time and effort reviewing the HiFi Rose RA280 integrated amplifier (November 2025, p.93).

time to read

2 mins

December 2025

Listen

Translate

Share

-
+

Change font size