[An Excerpt From]

Home Entertainment 2004
Hi-Fi and Home Theater Event

Report By Rick Becker

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Joule Electra, JPS Labs and Merlin Music Systems have formed a tight team for a number of years, and the sound of this trio keeps getting better and better.  Judd Barber's VZN-100 tube monoblocks ($15K) are beautiful to look at and very transparent, as output-transformerless amps tend to be.  But I sensed even greater transparency this year, than ever before.  Having reviewed ERS paper, and knowing that Bobby Palkovic had experimented with it, I talked with him about it.   Just as I did, he found that it didn't work in the crossover of the loudspeaker, but worked exceptionally well wherever there was a chipset (CD players, DACs, and amplifiers).  He found a perfect home for it in the outboard Bam (bass augmentation module).  This latest version of the 2-way floorstanding VSM model, now the VSM-MX, comes in at $10K with gloss lacquered finish standard.  I'm sure there have been additional upgrades to the crossover, and the resulting increase in transparency puts these loudspeakers up there with the very best in the world.  I forgot to ask Bobby about the stand mounted TSM model, but a quick hop, skip and jump over to their website indicates that model has received similar MX upgrades.

In the hallway, I ran into Joe Skubinski, whose JPS In-Wall cable gives my system a 30 Amp dedicated line, and Superconductor+ loudspeaker cable I use in my reference system.   Another gentleman from Equi=tech, whose name escaped me, indicated that their balanced line conditioner was being used in the Joule/JPS/Merlin room.  Good show, gentlemen!  This room was another in the handful of best at the show.

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