Series 1
(All prices in US dollars unless otherwise indicated.)

ModWright's new LS 36.5 is a fully balanced, tube-rectified line-stage preamp that has one of the most-coveted features on its remote control -- phase inversion. The LS 36.5 costs $4995.

No one will ever accuse Shanling products of looking plain. The new CD-T150 uses top-quality Burr-Brown PCM1794 DACs for digital-to-analog conversion and four 6922 tubes in its output stage. The price is $3200 CAD.

Also from Shanling is the MC-3 "music center" -- a CD player, tuner, iPod dock and tube integrated amplifier in one chassis. It looks far more expensive than it costs: $1099 CAD.

Tenor Audio made some distinguished OTL and hybrid amplifiers before the company ceased operations a couple of years ago. Tenor has been financially resuscitated and has begun making new products. First off the line the second time around are the 350 monoblocks ($75,000/pair), described as "basically an OTL amp directly coupled to MOSFETs." Whatever the case may be, we're glad to see this once-distinguished Canadian brand back on the scene.

Frustrated by the quality of CD manufacturing, Canadian music label Fidelio Audio will soon begin selling 16/44.1 and 16/48 versions of their recordings directly from their website. Customers buy the digital music and stream it from their computers via USB to a DAC, as Fidelio did at Festival Son & Image with a Bel Canto DAC3. Fidelio claims an impressive improvement in sound via streaming over playing the physical media.

In these days of six-figure speaker prices, Monitor Audio's new Platinum-series speakers -- with their Ceramic-Coated Aluminum Magnesium (C-CAM) ribbon tweeters and midrange/woofer drivers made of honeycomb Nomex between ultra-thin C-CAM layers -- defy conventional logic with their fair prices. The Platinum 100 minimonitor costs $4000/pair, while the Platinum 350C center-channel speaker is also $4000. The Platinum 300 floorstander... [www.monitoraudiousa.com]