Headphonesty
Digital Headphone Magazine For Audiophiles
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Latest posts
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The Cheapest SACD Player in the U.S. is Disappearing, and the Next Option Costs About Five Times More
The warning signs are piling up, but there’s still a chance Sony isn’t done yet. Sony’s has made SACD playback affordable for people who don’t want to spend thousands on a dedicated player. Besides, it also supports 4K Blu-ray, which makes it a practical choice for people who…
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35 ‘Holy Grail’ Hi-Fi Products Audiophiles Would Buy in a Heartbeat If Money Were No Object, According to Surveys
The price tag is only the beginning. Some of these machines come with demands most buyers would never expect. Every audiophile has a dream system they build in their head. But the gear people dream about isn’t always the most expensive. A hand-built tube amp with a long waiting…
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Reel-to-Reel Albums Are Now Selling Out in Days Despite Costing Ten Times More Than Vinyl
The revival comes with surprising compromises that even the most expensive equipment cannot eliminate. Reel-to-reel tape is finding buyers again, and some audiophiles are spending $300 to $500 on a single album. To fuel this, Rhino, Analogue Productions, and other labels are…
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10 Reasons Why Audiophiles Still Don’t Trust Class D Amps Even When They Measure Better Than A/B
The letter D did half the damage. Ask audiophiles about Class D amplifiers, and you’ll still hear complaints about harsh treble, cheap construction, and sound that lacks the warmth of traditional amps. These opinions have followed Class D for decades, even as newer designs have…
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Jon Anderson Sings ‘Roundabout’ at 81 After Two Hours on Stage, and One Fan Claims His High Notes Beat the Record
The musicians behind him have a history of their own, and the night ended with an unexpected personal moment. On October 13, 2026, Jon Anderson took the stage at Le Bataclan in Paris with The Band Geeks. After more than two hours of music, the 81-year-old singer saved…
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15 Speakers That Can Play Extremely Loud Without Distortion, As Voted by Audiophiles
The clever engineering behind the speakers audiophiles chose for loud, clean playback. There comes a point when turning up the volume starts making the music sound worse. Even Revel’s $22,000 Salon2 manual tells owners to back off if the sound begins to distort or strain. But…
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Most Hi-Fi Streamers Can’t Play Apple Music Lossless Natively Except Sonos, and Bluesound Just Revealed Why
Even expensive hi-fi streamers can fall short of the audio quality subscribers are already paying for. Apple has included lossless audio with every Apple Music subscription since 2021. Hi-fi streamers are the gear audiophiles buy to play full-quality files. Yet, Sonos aside,…
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20 Modern CD Players That Can Outperform the Vintage Heavyweights, as Voted by Audiophiles
Some beat vintage machines in the lab. Others make keeping a CD collection easier. The great CD players of the 1980s and ’90s still have devoted fans. Some of those machines are now collector’s pieces, and a few remain tough to beat. But does an old flagship still make more…
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25 Audio Brands That Declined the Most in Quality Over the Past Decade, According to Over 1,000 Audiophiles
Some familiar audio names now stand for very different products, with old favorites harder to repair or replace. For years, certain audio brands earned a kind of trust that was hard to shake. Their names alone were enough to make people feel confident about what they were…
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Journey Brings a Steve Perry Lookalike Onstage That They Rejected Years Ago, and Now Fans Want Him as Their New Frontman
After years of singing Journey’s songs, he finally took the microphone beside the band he once hoped to join. Jonathan Cain is playing the opening of “Faithfully” at a red piano in Tokyo. For nearly a minute, the center microphone is empty. Then a singer in a patterned jacket…
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Vinyl Still Keeps Spatial Details Better Than Digital Audio, Claims Hi-Fi Legend Richard Vandersteen
His listening tests reveal surprising differences that science has yet to fully settle. Richard Vandersteen has spent nearly 50 years designing speakers known for their focus on timing and phase accuracy. And after all that time, he still believes vinyl can preserve musical…
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Collector Measures 2,100 Albums And Finds Remasters Win Just 1 In 5 Times, But One Label Keeps Defying the Odds
A few surprising exceptions reveal why the same remaster can look like an upgrade or a downgrade. Buying a remastered CD can feel like a safe bet for better sound. But a newer edition can have less measured dynamic range than one you already own. Rian van der Merwe, a music…
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Your Router Can Add Noise Into Your Hi-Fi System Even Without a Single Playback Error, Says Hi-Fi Engineer
One seemingly foolproof way of fixing this can introduce an entirely new problem. Your router and Ethernet cables may be doing their jobs perfectly, as they deliver music to your streamer without errors. Some audio engineers believe electrical noise traveling through those…
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25 Famous Rock Albums with the Worst Recording Flaws, as Ranked by Audiophile Votes
The flaws aren’t always accidents, and a new remaster doesn’t necessarily mean you’ll hear what was missing. Some of rock’s most celebrated albums have never sounded particularly good. Audiophiles have spent decades debating whether the problem lies with the recording itself,…
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Bose Now Owns a Key Supplier Behind KEF, Naim, and dCS Gear
Bose promises business as usual, but owners have good reasons to watch what happens next. Bose made headlines when it bought Skullcandy on October 21. But four months earlier, it had already made a deal with much wider reach into the hi-fi market that mostly went unnoticed. In…
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Phil Collins Gets One More Moment Behind His Old Drums, Years After Passing the Sticks to His Son
What began as a chance to revisit his drumming days ended with a few words that said more than the performance itself. Phil Collins had spent decades behind the drums, from his years with Genesis to the famous fill in “In the Air Tonight.” But by Genesis’s final concert in March…
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Bluetooth’s Biggest Sound Quality Upgrade Is Coming In 2027
Apple, Samsung, and Qualcomm could play major roles in how widely this technology becomes available. You can pay for lossless music on Spotify or Apple Music and still lose some of that audio quality when listening through Bluetooth headphones. That’s a problem the Bluetooth SIG…
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Marantz, NAD, and Arcam Launched New CD Players Despite a Parts Shortage That Could Make Them Impossible to Repair
We traced the hardware behind these launches and found some surprising gaps in manufacturers’ disclosures. CD players need a mechanism that spins and reads each disc, and some of those mechanisms are going out of production. PS Audio and Naim have already discontinued products…
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Ritchie Blackmore Reveals Why He Finally Returned To Deep Purple After 33 Years Of Bitter Feuds
What began as a simple guest appearance brought an unexpected admission from the guitarist For the first time in almost 33 years, Ritchie Blackmore was back onstage with Deep Purple. Beside him stood Ian Gillan, the singer he had clashed with for decades, singing “Smoke on the…
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Audiophile Power Cords Only Sound Different for One Reason That Has Nothing to Do With the Cable, Says Hi-Fi Designer
The difference was convincing enough to challenge his own assumptions, but the explanation pointed somewhere unexpected. Rob Watts, Chord Electronics’ Digital Design Consultant and creator of its Watts Transient Aligned (WTA) and Pulse Array technologies, once dismissed the idea…