Displaying items by tag: poland - StereoLife Magazine

Although Poland's most famous loudspeaker manufacturer started with budget speakers, its current catalog is dominated by mid- and high-end designs. The top position is occupied by the beautiful Jaspers, available in both passive and active versions. Then we have three series consisting of a single model - Amber, Jade, and Emerald. The bottom four is made up of the Ruby, Sapphire, Opal, and Pearl series. Right in the middle there's a series that has become a real market hit, combining minimalist design, high-quality workmanship, a rich color palette, and natural, balanced, and universal sound. The Diamonds were Pylon's flagships at the time of their launch. I remember how the bosses of the Jarocin-based manufacturer, still unsure of the rightness of their decision, wondered whether such loudspeakers would appeal to customers. Today, the company could probably produce only this series and would easily balance the books (especially considering that Pylon Audio is not only a manufacturer of equipment sold under its own brand but also a supplier of cabinets for leading foreign brands). However, since there was an opportunity to improve them, it was a shame not to take it. This is how the Diamonds mkII were born. To see what's what, I decided to review my favorite model from this series - the "twenty-fives".

If I didn't know what Fezz Audio and Pylon Audio have in common, I would think they share the same owner. The two brands openly support each other, exhibit together at major industry events, hold joint photo shoots, and have the same distributor in some countries. In reality, however, these companies only share what one would call a path to success. Not easy, bumpy, risky, based on ingenuity, diligence, and young energy drawing on the experience of the older generation. Pylon Audio began as a small carpentry shop making loudspeaker cabinets. Later, it began producing its own loudspeakers, raising the bar pretty much every year. Fezz Audio, on the other hand, is a side project of a family-owned company specializing in manufacturing toroidal transformers, or at least that's how it began. Many experts say that toroids are moderately suitable for tube amplifiers, but the Lachowski brothers had a different opinion on the subject. They developed a transformer that performed brilliantly, and since it was a successful project, they decided to follow suit and build a complete amplifier around such transformers.

Melodika is a Polish brand that has advocated a no-nonsense approach to audio equipment since its inception. The core of its offerings are cables and accessories, and the priority has always been the same - to give music lovers good sound for as little money as possible. When it comes to cabling, I've always associated Melodica with the budget-priced but extremely elaborate Purple Rain series. Signal, speaker, digital, and power cables, as well as splitters, adapters, or plugs - everything is here. I also like the concise descriptions focused on technical issues and parameters. Construction, conductors, cross sections, shielding, resistance, and other facts, rather than reports of sound written in verse and tales of geometry inspired by the concept of yin and yang. Wanting to go a bit further, the company introduced the Brown Sugar series. It currently contains seventeen items, all of which are speaker cables and jumpers. This is quite remarkable, as the idea wasn't born yesterday, and still, we haven't seen a single signal, digital, or power cable in this series. Instead, Melodika decided to show us - yes, you guessed it - another speaker cable. But what a cable it is!

It's not surprising that more and more people are interested in hi-fi equipment that is luxurious, beautiful, and offers excellent performance, but at the same time is as simple to use as a network speaker. Some audiophiles believe that increasing the comfort of our music experience automatically reduces the sound quality. If we have a pile of sources and amplifiers connected with expensive cables, if our living room has been transformed into an anechoic chamber, if before each listening session, we carry out an elaborate procedure of warming up the system while checking the humidity of the air and the voltage in the socket, we deserve great sound, and if we buy easy-to-use active loudspeakers, we don't. Is it true? Manufacturers of audio electronics have already discovered that it can all be simplified. Almost every new all-in-one system is an instant sales hit because all you have to do is add a pair of decent speakers and your home stereo is ready. But what if you could go one step further and eliminate the need to buy any electronics? This mission has already been undertaken by many companies, as the idea itself is not new or revolutionary. However, it has usually involved rebuilding budget boxes so that, with additional electronics inside, they don't cost a fortune. The result was cheap speakers powered by poor electronics, meaning lots of compromises and a sound far from ideal. Now Pylon Audio introduced its first series of wireless speakers. And it has done it quite differently.

Following the ongoing popularity of the Brown Sugar series, the Polish manufacturer, Melodika, decided to expand the offer with a flagship speaker cable. Melodika Brown Sugar BSSC95xx is the result of Polish technical thought and the culmination of 7 years of research, testing, and observation undertaken by Melodika specialists. The Hi-End speaker cable from the Brown Sugar series is based on the BSC2950 cable, which is the top model in this series and represents an impressive 9.5mm² cross-section. Since audiophile-grade Melodika Brown Sugar BSSC95xx uses high-quality materials and technical solutions, it is able to extract the maximum from your audio system potential and deliver an audio signal without compromising its purity and balance.

When I review new Pylon Audio speakers, the same word usually comes to mind - progress. First loudspeakers available in high-gloss and mat lacquers, the first proprietary drivers, first cabinets manufactured for well-known foreign brands... Enumerating the next milestones and delighting in the technical, qualitative, and business successes of the Polish company, however, doesn't interest me as much as in what direction its offerings are heading and what value its new models will represent. Here, too, one can observe stable, thoughtful development driven by rising customer expectations and investments in machinery. Over the past few years, many speaker series has expanded to include the most majestic three-way models, and new designs from the excellent Ruby line have been introduced, but we had to wait a very, very long time for the next price and quality barrier to be overcome. Finally, Pylon Audio introduced the powerful Amber floorstanders, now available in mkII version. The new flagship should generate huge excitement, but such gigantic speakers are not for everyone and will not play well in any room. However, we have known for a long time that Pylon Audio is working on a series of loudspeakers that is a development of the concept known from the Diamonds and Emeralds. And we finally got it. The Jasper series now includes sleek monitors and two floorstanding models, including one already available in the mkII version. But, for many reasons, I decided to try the smaller Jasper 23 floorstanders.

Many manufacturers of high-end cables try to convince us that we are paying for advanced technical solutions, incredibly precise engineering, exotic materials, and details worked out to perfection, such as patented connectors coated with silver, gold, rhodium, or all those expensive metals altogether. To some extent, this is true, for it is difficult to achieve great sound when trying to build such cables from cheap conductors, the worst quality dielectrics and connectors worth two dollars. It's easy to imagine that when all these components are the best money can buy, the price of such cable goes through the roof. Is this madness? Probably yes, but it doesn't change the fact that there is no shortage of people willing to buy high-end cables, as well as companies ready to provide them with what they want. What is shocking for a novice audiophile does not seem so strange to someone who has been building their system for many years, and has already spent tens of thousands of dollars on speakers, amplifiers, sources, and anti-vibration racks.

Audiomica Laboratory has updated its product line with two models that belong to their reference Red series. The current Audiomica Labs catalog includes over 60 proprietary cables, and the existing models are successively modified and updated after extensive testing. The latest cables are the Red Reference series which have been recognized by demanding music lovers around the world for their great value for money.

I have long got bored by the discussions on whether or not the power cords actually work. Maybe it's because, unlike some of their participants, I have experienced all or almost all the stages of this adventure. Just like many audiophiles, I have started as a skeptic. It cannot be done in any other way, since one gains expertise in this field through time-consuming experiments and listening sessions, not sudden enlightenment or the purchase of the most expensive accessories on the market. To hear the difference, one has to reach for hi-end products. Buying a cord that is more expensive than the appliance it's connected to seems ridiculous, yet, the system does not sound the same way it used to, and the thought of improving the sound returns like a boomerang. Over the years, I have tested many cables and conditioners. I have participated in many listening sessions and different sorts of experiments. I have compared standard 'computer' cables to hi-end wires worth thousands of dollars. That is why I am not particularly interested in purely theoretical discussions. Been there, done that, have a t-shirt. I prefer to check power accessories in practice. And that is what I'm going to do now.

We became interested in the products made by a Polish company, Pylon Audio, when it had just started being successful and their loudspeakers - Topaz and Pearl - gained recognition. Then, other products followed, such as Sapphire, Diamond, and Opal. Not to mention the floorstanding loudspeakers manufactured for Unitra or Audio Physics's Classic series, both using cabinets made by Pylon Audio in Jarocin - a city in which, in the 80s, the biggest rock music festival in Europe used to be organized. Testing their products was always a chance to catch up on Pylon's latest achievements. It seemed as if the company had been, step-by-step, checking off the next points on their earlier prepared plan. Launching a new series of speakers, adding glossy lacquers, entering international markets, designing their own mid-bass speakers, establishing collaboration with the award-winning partners, awards, exhibitions, honours, expanding wood veneer palette, extending the factory… Every now and then a thought comes to my mind that reportage about the Pylon factory would be something worth making, yet every time one problem arises - such article would have to be often updated, since in one year the situation may change so dramatically that a huge part of knowledge about Pylon Audio may simply become obsolete.