The Best High-End Audio Accessories for your iPod at HE 2006
By Chris Boylan
Things that Make your iPod Go "Mmmmmmmmm"
No, this isn't about cheap cases and retractable cables, The Home Entertainment show in Los Angeles was all about high-end audio, and some of these tasty audiophile treats make excellent companions for your iPod. When you want to get the most enjoyable sound and the most accurate performance out of your portable music collection, look to one or more of these products.
Liquid-Cooled Goodness
When you finally stop moving, your music doesn't have to. Just plug your iPod into its home dock, and plug that into
Von Gaylord Audio's Uni Signature Edition liquid-cooled tube amplifiers ($59,000/pr) driving your favorite high-end mini-monitors, like say,
Von Gaylord Audio's Legend Mark II, Series 2.
Von Gaylord's Uni amplifiers with Legend loudspeakers.
Sure, the amps are close to 200 times the cost of the iPod, but top-of-the-line sound and unique looks don't come cheap. The amps are claimed to be not only the first liquid-cooled tube amplifiers but also the most powerful triode-based tube design available at 200 Watts Per Channel. And if you turn out the lights, you'll enjoy your system even more by the warm glow of the power tubes radiating waves of heat through the clear dialectric fluid.
Von Gaylord Audio's liquid-cooled Uni Special Edition ($59,000/pr).
Not to be outdone, the Legend Mark II Series 2 mini-monitors ($3,995) also make a visual impression in such funky colors as metallic green, purple, or orange. There's even an optional Chameleon color ($1000 extra) which changes color when viewed from different angles. The system sounds great no matter what you feed it - black vinyl, silver discs or an iPod.
Next Stop, Planet Earth
Back in a little place I like to call "reality,"
Aperion Audio also recognized the potential of the iPod add-on market, showing off a
Sonic Impact Super-T amplifier ($159) driving a pair of Aperion's own Intimus 422-LR Satellite Speakers ($200/pr, in Cherry or gloss black finish). Even without a subwoofer, these little guys were pumping out some solid sounds from your basic garden-variety iPod mini.
Aperion hooked an iPod to a Sonic Impact Super-T amplifier ($50) driving their Intimus 422-LR Satellite Speakers ($200) for high quality sound at a low low price.
Horns of Plenty
In you're looking for a less traditional look, and have a bit more disposable cash (and don't mind waiting a few months), then you may be interested in
Ferguson-Hill's FH007 system ($1250/system, expected October, 2006). The iPod-friendly FH007 system includes a 4-channel amplifier (biamped stereo configuration), two spherical woofers and 2 horn tweeters. U.S Distributor
Ultimate Audio Video had a working prototype on-hand which was making some pleasantly transparent sounds from an iPod source.
Ferguson Hill's FH007 mini system features transparent horns and spherical woofers.
The FH007 are a smaller version of Ferguson-Hill's full-sized powered transparent horn speakers ($27,000 for complete set, including woofers, horns, crossover and amplifier), also distributed in the U.S. by Ultimate Audio Video.
Ferguson Hill's horny speakers are also available in a full-sized version.
Is "iPod White" an Actual Color Swatch?
In a design nod directly to Apple,
Almarro is putting final touches on an "iPod-white" version of their tube integrated amplifier, the A-205 (available this Summer for approximately $900). This amplifier uses a single 12AX7 twin triode tube for input, driving EL-84 output tubes in a single-ended pentode (SEP) design, cranking out just under 5 watts of pure Class A power per channel.
Almarro's A205 single-ended tube integrated amp will soon be available in iPod white.
Due to its low power output, you'll probably want to mate the Almarro amplifier with a highly efficient speaker design, as Almarro did, matching them with
Cain and Cain's brand new "I-Bib" loudspeakers (pricing not available, but somewhere between their Abby ($1500) and I-Ben ($5500)). As with all Cain and Cain speakers, the new I-Bibs featured unique lines and beautiful woodwork. These little beauties' looks were outdone only by the quality of the sounds emanating from them at the show.
Cain and Cain's I-BIB with matching subwoofer.
Welcome to the Little Room Inside My Head
In the more "traditional" iPod accessory department,
Headroom had a large collection of portable pleasures on display including many different headphones from many manufacturers matched with Headroom's own headphones amplifiers. Who needs a headphone amplifier, you might ask? Anyone who wants to squeeze every last drop of sound quality out of their iPod, computer, smart phone or other portable media device. That's who!
Headroom had on display all manner of portable pleasures.
Headroom amplifiers don't just boost the volume or line level of your portable device; they also include proprietary spatial processing that make headphone playback sound more like a live musical performance. Instead of music coming from two distinct points (one in or on each ear), the sound through Headroom processing emanates from a virtual soundstage inside your mind, with individual instruments and voices forming a unified cohesive whole.
Ivy Scull, from Headroom, poses with their updated Total BitHead amplifier, available in transparent (pictured) or black.
About the size of a deck of cards, their popular Total BitHead amplifier (now $199) has undergone an upgrade, and a price reduction (not a common combination). It can be powered via AAA batteries or powered directly via the USB port of a laptop, in which case it acts as a USB soundcard as well, converting your music into high quality analog sounds directly from the digital source. The current version of the Total BitHead is what this reviewer carries on his daily commute, along with a pair of
Etymotic Research ER4P in-ear earphones, and I wouldn't want to live without either of them.
Speaking of in-ear earphones,
Shure was on-hand showing off their new top of the line, the E500PTH ($499) Inserting these little babies in my ear canals produced some really smooth sounds with deep solid extended bass, and ultra-smooth high frequencies with no trace of sibilance.
Shure's E500PTH has an integrated microphone so the real world can intrude on you, only when you choose to let it.
As with other well-designed in-ear 'phones, the Shure e500 will isolate you a bit from your fellow man as it mutes exterior sounds to an inaudible whisper. But in a novel touch, the e500PTH (short for "Push To Hear") comes with an integrated (but detachable) microphone module that allows you to tune into the sounds of the outside world when required. Smart-phone owners, don't get excited, though, these are *not* designed to double as a cell phone hands-free device. They simply make it easier to handle day-to-day communications without yanking the 'phones all the way out of your ear canals.
Music to Your Ears
And what good is all this fine equipment without something to play on it? To this end, dealers like
Music Direct and audiophile record labels like
Mobile Fidelity Sound Labs (among others) were on hand to help visiting music-junkies score a fix of well-recorded and mastered musical treasures.
Music Direct and Mobile Fidelity Sound Labs were on-hand making sure audiophiles got their high-quality music fix.
All in all, the Home Entertainment Expo in Los Angeles had many offerings for the iPod lover, or anyone who enjoys high quality reproduction of music or movies. So iPod-lovers of the world unite, start saving those pennies and hop aboard the high-end audio bus!
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