I've never seen such dirty dirt

Definitely not worth the money, especially considering that the quality of the audio coming out of the 1/8' miniplug on the iPod is far below the quality that this system should be fed. If one had a $1000 D/A converter from Lavry or such, then it might shine. However, even an Audiophile system like this improves the audio only a percent or two above a $1800-2000 system. Not worth my pennis.

Er...I typed pennies, but it came out naughty. Stupid Apple keyboard.

I would also like to add that if one compresses digital audio using AAC or MP3, you have destroyed all the subtleties that this sort of transducer is supposed to give you.

One last thing: there is nothing inherently wrong with digital audio (as this article claims the equipment magically fixes) if it is recorded, mixed and mastered properly. Audiophile recordings are made digitally every day, even in home-based studios. Start with a great tube mic, a Class-A mic pre, a top-notch A/D converter (running 24bits and at least 88.1kHz) and a mixing system comparable to Pro Tools LE or better and you can obtain a sound to rival anything available if your acoustic environment is working with you rather than against you.

This audiophile crap is rammed down people's throats all the time, when most of the problem with people's sound systems is the room they listen in. A $4000 listening system in an untreated room will still sound like crap, especially if you feed it iPod audio through a 1/8 inch miniplug.

My own system is a Presonus Central Station (for D/A conversion) hooked to a pair of self-powered Mackie HR824s (THX-certified, BTW). Although the setup begs for a sub (that will come later), my listening environment is treated acoustically and that helps quite a bit.

PS: It's hilarious to me that someone would claim that a tube amplifier would magically fix crappy audio. A tube amplifier introduces a specific kind of distortion that makes good audio sound a tad better, but will do nothing if your audio reeks. It would be like putting chocolate syrup on a turd.

HAHAHA "It would be like putting chocolate syrup on a turd." Awesome.

Hmm, double-cone speakers? I thought dual-cone speakers weren't as nice as woofer-tweeter combinations. Or is that just a misconception?

First of all: a good setup will make ALL your music sound better, mp3 or uncompressed. But, as anyone who has even a little knowledge in this field will tell you, the final sound is only as good as the weakest link in the system. The weakest link here would be the sound from the iPod. I personally believe that speaker choice makes the most dramatic difference so the iPod will sound pretty good through this setup, but the expense would be better balanced by adressing each stage. If there was an optical digital input and some high quality converters on this amp you could connect it digitally to your G5 and have a truly high-end solution.

Re: Weakest Link

I absolutely agree with your weakest link comment. With this proposed system, I see several weak links:

A. AAC or MP3 compression (great stuff for listening while on-the-go, but by no means audiophile)

B. El-cheapo D/A converters employed within every iPod (it is not possible have truly decent ones, which take up at least 10 cubic inches with supporting hardware)

C. 1/8" unbalanced stereo mini-plug connection (not to mention the crackle that results from "messing" with the connection)

D. Untreated listening room. Most people don't even think to address the sonics of their listening environment. The typical crime here is to EQ the signal to make it work better in the room. WRONG. Treat the room to fit the audio.

Personally, I rip every important track from CD on my Quad G5 using Apple's Lossless CODEC. That way, when I play from iTunes (with no iTunes sonic enhancements--very important) through my optical Toslink connection to the outboard D/A and then to the Mackies, the sound is pretty damned good.

Music is usually mastered these days in a way that sucks out much of the life and dynamics using digital lookahead peak limiters like the Waves L2 or L3 (or equivalent), so even with a pristine equipment and listening environment, you're still hearing something very far away from what was originally recorded and mixed.

And don't even get me started on the pitfalls of vinyl. Anyone who thinks vinyl is the way to go should look at what must be done to the source signal to get it to work properly on vinyl -- puke.