Emotiva launched the entry-level BasX audio component line Tuesday in an effort to win budget-minded consumers interested in high-end audio, President Dan Laufman told us on a media trip in New York. Components of the BasX line are a preamp/tuner with phono preamp that supports moving-magnet and moving-coil cartridges and digital audio file resolution up to 24 bit/96 kHz ($299); a tuner amplifier that adds a 50 watt amplifier ($399); integrated amplifier ($199); and four amplifiers ranging from $299 to $599. Warranty on the BasX line is three years vs. five years for the company’s standard and pro-level gear. The products are manufactured at the company’s manufacturing facility in Nashville with parts sourced globally, Laufman said. Rising labor costs in China enabled the company to bring manufacturing stateside with “close” cost parity, Laufman said. Bringing manufacturing local allows the company more control over manufacturing, he said. The company plans to take its lifestyle Emersa line to market later this year after tooling is complete at the end of Q2, Laufman said. The stylized Emersa line uses downsized components measuring 1-¾ inches high vs. the standard components measuring 6-8 inches tall, he said. Emotiva has a distribution ratio of 70-30 between its e-commerce site and retail, he said. Emotiva exhibited at the Axpona high-end audio show last week outside of Chicago where MQA announcements made a splash. On Emotiva’s plans for Meridian’s Master Quality Authenticated Hi-Res audio technology, Laufman said the company’s development team in Canada is “up on it.” If there’s enough market demand for product, along with music label support, “we’ll embrace it,” he said. “But there has to be a market for it.”
Following demos of MQA (Master Quality Authenticated) sound at CES, the Hi-Res Audio technology was in the spotlight at Axpona 2016 in Rosemont, Illinois, last week as Pioneer and Mytek joined Onkyo (see 1604120019) with free firmware updates making their gear MQA-capable. Pioneer’s $699 XDP-100R has 32GB internal memory and room for 400GB additional storage via a pair of microSD slots. The Mytek Brooklyn DAC ($1,995) has a built-in photo preamplifier, high-current 500mA headphone amplifier with dual jacks and XLR balanced and single-ended outputs. Bluesound is readying an update for its Hi-Res audio gear, the company said. Atlantic CEO Craig Kallman told us at CES (see 1601110059) that the company hopes to have a content licensing deal in place with MQA later this year and “ramp up converting as much of our content as possible as fast as possible.” MQA said at Axlona that it expects Hi-Res music streaming services using MQA to be available later this year. For now, consumers can sample and purchase MQA music from 2L, 7digital, OnkyoMusic and Technics Tracks, said MQA, with 2L’s entire library of 130 titles available in MQA.
Onkyo’s DP-X1 Hi-Res digital audio player is available at retail and can be MQA (Master Quality Authenticated)-enabled via a free update released Tuesday, said the company. When listening to MQA on the DP-X1 ($899), the display indicates the product is decoding and playing MQA-encoded music, and a green light signifies the sound is identical to that of the source material, said Onkyo. Hi-Res digital music provider Onkyo Music delivers all downloads as FLAC and MQA files, Onkyo said. The X-DAP Link music transfer application with MQA support will be released soon, said Onkyo.
B2B digital music and radio services company 7digital announced its first content available in the high-resolution MQA audio file format. Onkyomusic.com, powered by 7digital, will offer indie music in MQA in its Hi-Res audio store beginning Friday, said 7digital. 7digital is the first platform provider to offer MQA master quality audio for download and streaming. The 7digital customer base includes consumer brands, mobile carriers, broadcasters, automotive systems, record labels and retailers and numbers 46 clients in 33 countries. The company has licensing rights in 82 countries, which it says offers quick time-to-launch for prospective new clients worldwide.
Autonomic’s Mirage MMS-2A and MMS-5A media servers were cited by the Japan Audio Society for "excellence in audio reproduction," said Autonomic. It said the Mirage media servers aggregate music file formats “of all types” for delivery throughout the home, including high-resolution digital music up to 24-bit/192KHz.
Sony has expanded its Hi-Res Audio lineup for the road with a line of components slated for December delivery. The company announced Tuesday the RSX-GS9 digital media player/head unit ($1,499), XM-GS4 4-channel amplifier ($299), and XS-GS1 “super tweeter” ($199), which join a field of high-end loudspeakers for the car. The head unit is natively compatible with the DSD (5.6MHz/1bit, 2.8MHz/1bit) audio format. The Sony Digital Sound Enhancement Engine upscales lower quality files to Hi-Res Audio, the company said. Connections include Bluetooth, near field communications, two USBs and one micro USB, it said.
Marantz completed the rollout of its full-size home theater lineup Monday, unveiling the AV7702mkII A/V network preprocessor. The AV7702mkII ($2,199, October) builds on last year’s model, which included Bluetooth and Dolby Atmos, by adding DTS:X, HDMI 2.0a compatibility with high dynamic range, BT.2020 pass-through support and HDCP 2.2 compatibility on all HDMI inputs and outputs, Marantz said. The second-generation processor is “ready for the next generation of Blu-ray disc players, set-top boxes and other 4K Ultra HD sources,” the company said. It can be upgraded to support Auro-3D and the Auromatic upmixer up to 10 channels, it said, and the processor boasts audiophile-grade Elna capacitors for high-resolution audio reproduction.
MQA Ltd. confirmed it's working with Bluesound to incorporate MQA decoding into the Lenbrook brand’s product road map. Bluesound disclosed at a press event in New York Tuesday (see 1508250067) that it will have MQA decoding in its latest series of multiroom hi-res audio products, and it will likely be this year. The six products comprising Bluesound Gen 2 are due to ship next month, but MQA can be added in a firmware upgrade, said Greg Stidsen, director-technology and product planning, Lenbrook America. “MQA continues to work with many hardware and service partners to ensure MQA will be widely available for music fans,” the company said by email. “There will be additional partner announcements coming this year and we continue to target 2015 for MQA content to be available," it said. MQA, developed by Meridian co-founder Bob Stuart, was promised for early 2015 but hasn't been released. The company didn’t comment on the reason for the delay. According to the MQA website, the MQA encoding process involves going back to the original master recording to capture “the missing timing detail.” The codec uses advanced digital processing to deliver music in a form that’s “small enough to download or stream,” said the company, calling it “better-than-high-resolution music” that can be streamed to any device. Comparing MQA with MP3, the company said MP3 delivers a tenth of what was recorded in the studio in order to fit into a compressed file. MQA also delivers the missing 90 percent, it said, “without any loss of convenience.” MQA-encoded content can be streamed or downloaded in any lossless format, said MQA. Supporters of MQA listed on the website include Arcam, Meridian, Onkyo, Onkyo Music, Roon, Tidal and 2L.
Sony and rock band Foo Fighters said they agreed to work together on a Hi-Res Audio initiative. The effort coincides with the 20th anniversary of Foo Fighters’ debut album. Sony will engage in unspecified marketing initiatives as part of the arrangement. It will promote Foo Fighters and Hi-Res Audio “leveraging the power of Hi-Res Foo Fighters songs worldwide," in Asia, Europe, Japan, Latin America and the U.S., it said. Sony considers Foo Fighters “a particularly important partner with great potential for conveying the incredible allure and value of Hi-Res to audiences worldwide,” it said. Foo Fighters has “always wanted the flesh and blood and emotion of our songs to get through to every listener and Hi-Res Audio is the best way for our fans to hear the music ... in its purest quality and truest form,” said the band.
Yamaha added a half-dozen models to its 2015 Aventage line of network AV receivers, including three high-end models -- the flagship 9.2-channel RX-A3050 ($2,199), RX-A2050 ($1,699) and 7.2-channel RX-A1050 ($1,299) -- that incorporate Dolby Atmos and DTS:X. The RX-A850 ($999) supports Dolby Atmos, and the RX-A750 ($699) and RX-A550 ($549) are said to bring performance and build quality to new price points. All Aventage AV receiver models offer 4K Ultra HD video playback with HDCP 2.2, said the company. The RX-A750 and higher models will support high dynamic range video as part of the HDMI 2.0a specification via a firmware update, Yamaha said. All of the models have Bluetooth, and all support hi-res audio files including DSD (Direct Stream Digital; 2.6 MHz / 5.6 MHz) and AIFF content in addition to files encoded in WAV, FLAC and Apple Lossless audio, said Yamaha.