RØDE, famosa por sus micrófonos te regala la 9a Sinfonía de Beethoven en Audio HD

http://www.rode.com/animaeterna

The Anima Eterna Brugge & The Australian Brandenburg Choir
Ludwig Van Beethoven’s Symphony No. 9 in D minor, Op. 125 is now available in Blu-ray ($19.95) or DVD ($14.95), or as free 24-bit/96kHz digital audio download. 

Nuevos equipos NAD, imposible pasarlos por alto.

Una interesante combinación de vieja y nueva escuela, de gusto clásico y tendencias actuales que dan un resultado que es muy efectivo en precio y en desempeño potencial al parecer.

NAD C 388, C 368 And C 338 Have Hybrid Amplification And Bluetooth

NAD Electronics has three new hybrid digital integrated amplifiers that cover a wide range of technologies, power and price points. NAD's C 338 ($649) is a compact stereo amp that produces 150 Watts per channel (350W Dynamic @ 4 Ohms) while the C 368 stereo amp offers 80 Watts per channel (240W Dynamic @ 4 Ohms). Wireless network and streaming audio are fully supported by Wi-Fi and Bluetooth. The C 368 ($899) and C 388 ($1599 ) are future proof Hybrid Digital DAC Amplifiers that are as intelligent as they are powerful. A modular design construction ensures these are future ready for feature upgrades. BluOS Wireless Multi-room Audio is one feature that handles Hi-Res Audio option for streaming music. The C 388 and C 368 have inputs including MM Phono, Stereo Line, Optical Digital and Coax Digtal. Their advanced amplifier stages include many cutting-edge technological breakthroughs developed by NAD over decades of creating affordable ultra-high performance audio components. All three models can connect instantly with Bluetooth allowing them to stream music wirelessly from any Bluetooth-enabled device. The high performance aptX codec is fully supported on the top two NAD models. The advanced Bluetooth can also be used to listen to other sources connected to the amp via wireless Bluetooth headphones. There is even a control app that allows smartphones or tablet to control all functions of your NAD amp.

enjoythemusic.com

Sin diferecias palpables entre SACD y DVD-A pero ni entre esos formatos contra el CD

¿Son de hecho los CD lo suficientemente buenos como para no necesitar de nuevos formatos?

The Emperor's New Sampling Rate
ARE CDS ACTUALLY GOOD ENOUGH?
Artículo de Paul D. Lehrman

http://www.mixonline.com/news/profiles/emperors-new-sampling-rate/365968

Un estudio hace años donde ni el DVD-A ni SACD se hacen notar mucho el uno del otro, y par colmo de los HD Audio ese estudio tampoco encontró marcada ventaja, si es que alguna entre DVD-A/SACD y el viejo y cumplidor CD. Y me atrevo a decir que aplica para muchos, la mayoría de casos del re empacado y re etiquetado Audio HD ahora vendido en linea y no en discos.

The number of times out of 554 that the listeners correctly identified which system was which was 276, or 49.82 percent — exactly the same thing that would have happened if they had based their responses on flipping a coin. Audiophiles and working engineers did slightly better, or 52.7-percent correct, while those who could hear above 15 kHz actually did worse, or 45.3 percent. Women, who were involved in less than 10 percent of the trials, did relatively poorly, getting just 37.5-percent right.

 ...information about the signal chains and the source material within a couple of weeks of the article's publication on the Website of the Boston Audio Society, a venerable 37-year-old, independent non-profit organization, in which both authors have long been active. The equipment list included amplifiers from high-end manufacturers like Adcom, Carver, Sim Audio and Stage Accompany, and speakers from Snell and Bag End, as well as the oft-worshipped Quad ESL-989 electrostatics, which are supposed to have usable response up to 23 kHz — which is, of course, above the Nyquist frequency of the HHB recorder's converters. The subjects listened to discs that covered a wide range of material and included classical instrumental, choral, jazz, rock and pop, from audiophile labels like Mobile Fidelity, Telarc and Chesky.

Muy bien, siempre hay que dejar lugar para seguir evaluando y descubriendo "Does this mean that someone else couldn't do a similar experiment and end up with different results? Not at all." 

But something is causing people to say they are hearing differences. If a double-blind test can't confirm those differences, then what's going on? For one possible reason, let's go back to Moorer's paper that I quoted earlier (called “New Audio Formats: A Time of Change and a Time of Opportunity,” which can be found on his Website,www.jamminpower.com). Later in the paper, Moorer noted that humans can distinguish time delays — when they involve the difference between their two ears — of 15 microseconds or less. Do the math, and you can see that while the sampling interval at 48 kHz is longer than 15 µs, the sampling interval at 96 kHz is shorter. Therefore, he says, we prefer higher sampling rates because “probably [my emphasis] some kind of time-domain resolution between the left- and right-ear signals is more accurately preserved at 96 kHz.” It's an interesting starting point for a discussion, but to my knowledge it's never gotten past that point — as a theory, it has never been expanded upon or tested. And judging from the results of Meyer and Moran's experiment, it doesn't seem to be a factor. 

Y entre todo esto del Audio HD hasta surge una conjetura plausible respecto al por que se escuchan cambios con cables o algunos accesorios o equipos high end, suena como sujeta con alfileres deteniéndose apenas pero no se está tampoco en posibilidades de   desecharla  ¿Es todo un filtro de peine?:

Ethan Winer — a musician, engineer, studio owner, manufacturer and iconoclast who's been in the recording business for some 40 years: moving one's head or listening position as little as four inches can result in huge changes in the frequency-response curves one is hearing. What could be a 10dB dip in one spot at one frequency could be a 6dB boost a couple of inches away. These wide variations are caused primarily by comb-filtering effects from the speakers and from the various reflections bouncing around the room, which are present no matter how well the room is acoustically treated. Winer blames this phenomenon for most of the unquantifiable differences people report hearing when they are testing high-end gear.

He writes, “I am convinced that comb filtering is at the root of people reporting a change in the sound of cables and electronics, even when no significant change is likely. If someone listens to their system using one pair of cables, then gets up and switches cables and sits down again, the frequency response heard is sure to be very different because it's impossible to sit down again in exactly the same place. So the sound really did change, but probably not because the cables sound different!”.

Arriesgada y suena más imposible que decir que sí hay cambios por que tampoco varía tanto el lugar de escucha al volverse a sentar uno.

THX ahora es para "gamers".

Un indicativo más de la decadencia en el mundo, THX la icónica organización de George Lucas que revolucionó e impulsó mejoras considerables en el audio para cine en casa, en algún momento no lejos de excesos,  ha informado que ha sido vendida en su mayor parte a una compañía que fabrica productos para "gamers".

Bonito por fuera... PMC Twenty 5.23

Les comparto esta imagen de las PMC Twenty 5.23 con un precio por encima de los 3500 Euros, prácticamente en los 4000 Euros.

Como siempre en estos casos no cuestiono el diseño ni el sonido pero por casi 4000 Euros ¿No se podía poner más empeño en lo interior? Eso sí, a ver si encuentran lo absurdo al pie de una de las imágenes.

Por cierto, la revista alemana  Stereo está lanzando ediciones en inglés lo que facilitará el acceso para muchos a estos excelentes contenidos.

https://www.stereo.de/home/

Se estandariza USB-Tipo C para aplicaciones de audio.

Bajo la especificación "USB Audio Device Class 3.0" se ha definido al USB Tipo C como la solución primaria para todas las aplicaciones de audio digital.

Además de la practicidad y conveniencia esta estandarización permite interoperabilidad y un mejor manejo de energía de algunos aparatos y algunos consideran quee tener un solo conector multiuso detonará nuevas capacidades en nuevos diseños.

http://www.usb.org/home