Finding your groove: getting into vinyl with Audio-Technica
I’d like to think that I could’ve been friends with the late Hideo Matsushita, founder of Japanese Hi-Fi powerhouse Audio-Technica. If I could, I’d travel back in time to 1960’s Tokyo, where a young Matsushita curated “vinyl listening sessions” at the Bridgestone Museum of Arts, exposing visitors to the sounds and possibilities of high end audio and the warmth of vinyl records. I imagine sitting with him in a mod coffee shop, listening to the stories of what he witnessed in those sessions, the conversations he had with visitors, and what ultimately motivated him to head back to his small apartment above a ramen restaurant and start an audio company of his own. In the histories I’ve read regarding AT’s humble beginnings, Matsushita’s motives seem clear. Produce high end audio at affordable prices, bringing audio excellence into spaces and to customers that simply didn’t have access to it before. His first two products, the AT-1 and AT-3 phono cartridges did exactly that, and...
Dec 6, 2023
To get ready for what some describe as hearing God, I have started investing in supporting systems, such as :
Schiit Modi 2 multibit
Schiit loki eq (yes, i like to eq ever so slightly)
Schiit magni 3
Littledot MKii with Voskhod tubes
Various cables
The "support" system, with shipping and custom duty is est USD1K. Yes, a sold state AND a tube system so that i can hear both worlds.
All this to get ready for a US200 headphone... something doesn't feel right.
The littledot is the only thing that has arrived so far and is currently running my trusty HD25-1-ii and sometimes my UE triplefi IEMs (my go-to travel bose qc15 and sony bluetooth headphones sound like crap on any system) I already like how things sound, and as time goes by, getting suspicious on just how MUCH better things will be with everything hooked up.
(No DAC yet so running through a very old audiotrak amp used as a preamp from PC 3.5mm out)
And is my setup a good match for an "upper" range of headphones?