HIGH END 2019
Australian Hi-Fi 47
WilsonBeneschfounderCraigMilnesis a
proudfather!ThesubstantialGMTOneturn-
tableandarmsystemisn’tfinishedbutit’s
gettingthere.Thisis a veryambitiousrecord
playerbothphysicallyandtechnically.The
GMTOneusesa fieldcoildrivesystemwith
a largeringoftransformerssurroundinga
subplatterthat’swiderthantheacrylicplatter
withgrapheneandpolymercentrethatyou
see(threealternativeplatterswillbeprovided
inthefinalproduct).Theturntableis pneu-
maticallysuspendedwithisolationdowntoa
claimed1.7Hzandthetonearmis a unipivot
designthat’spartofa setofalternativearms
ofvaryingmasstosuitdifferentcartridges.
There’sstorageforthealternatearmsandcar-
tridgesinthestandandthesecanbeswapped
intosuitdifferentrecords.Asyetnoprice
hasbeensetbutit willdefinitelybeofthe‘if
youhavetoask’variety.
aThesingle-endedAriesCeratAchilleasLegendSeries
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ČŭŢdžěƓƧěƓƛðŢē ƛŁŢĴŗě͘ěŢēěēdžðŗdžěŭƯƧƐƯƧ̵ͷ ̆ ̶̇˟˗˗̻Wilson Benesch says that it plans to have a
full launch in December.
Designer Touraj Moghaddam describes
Vertere’s latest record player, the DG-1, as a
‘plug and play’ device because you can buy it
with a cartridge and all it takes to set up is to
get the counterweight in the right place. Ver-
tere has come up with a cunning arm bearing
based on nylon threads for both vertical and
horizontal movement. The idea is to avoid
stiction, the resistance that sliding bearings
have to changing direction, and given that a
stylus has to do this all the time that would
seem sensible. The arm itself is a flat, one-
piece sandwich construction with damping;
it has two counterweights to suit a wide
range of cartridges as well as the one that will
be optionally supplied. The most important
part of a turntable in Vertere’s opinion is the
motor; on the DG-1 this is matched to its
drive system during construction rather than
having adjustability built in to keep costs
down. Price will be £2,750 or £2,850 includ-
ing MM cartridge.
Audio Solutions from Lithuania showed
the most ambitious speaker it has built to
date. The Virtuoso has a cabinet within a cab-
inet for maximum stiffness, three crossover
settings to suit different rooms and tastes,
and a wideband midrange driver that covers
more octaves than most. It starts at 500Hz
above a pair of 190mm paper bass drivers
and hands over to the large 30mm tweeter at
7kHz. Which means that all the important
detail is covered by one driver which should
help coherence but I suspect that it may
stretch the high-frequency capabilities of a
165mm diameter driver.It sounded good in the booth though... as
you might hope for €23,000 per pair.
Focal is 40 years young and celebrated in
typically French style with the Symphonie
40, a case containing both Stellia (closed
back) and Utopia (open back) headphones,
a Focal Arche DAC/amp for the home and a
Questyle QPM portable player. This limited
edition creation costs €15,000 and will look
great in the boudoir. Those after speakers
can choose from the retro-style Spectral
40th floorstanders with beryllium tweeter
at €8,000 and a very limited version of the
Scala Utopia (€70,000) with a special black
silver finish, of which four pairs are to be
made. For a marginally wider audience
Focal also introduced light and dark wood
veneer finishes to the Sopra (oak) and Uto-
pia (walnut) ranges for those not so keen on
shiny paintwork.
British brand Falcon relaunched with a
BBC LS3/5a a few years back but designer
Graham Bridge is also keen on pushing the
tech envelope. The HP80 (£12,500) from
the new V series is a floorstander with a
grapheme-impregnated Twaron aramid fibre
cone in a 165mm diameter chassis that
Falcon developed in-house. It’s combined
with a 28mm soft dome tweeter and has
grab handles on the rear to give it a tougher
look. It sounded good with a wall of BAT
electronics that Graham was very keen to
turn up to 11.The sheer quantity of
kit can be snow blinding
but if you take your time
ŁƧͣƛƐŭƛƛŁċŗěƧŭǠŢēŢěLJ
components that really
do push the state of the
art rather than the art of
marketing