Audionet Scientist Series Electronics: Stern Linestage and Heisenberg … · 2018. 7. 5. · naturalness of the presentation became apparent. ... One was the overwhelmingly conspicuous

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Audionet Scientist SeriesElectronics: Stern Linestageand Heisenberg MonoblocksGreg Weaver listens to new electronics fromAudionet at GTT Audio & VideoNov 13th, 2017

Wednesday morning, October 24th, found me taking a day trip to GTTAudio & Video, located in Long Valley, NJ, about forty minutes west ofNewark, to attend a private audition of Audionet’s new Scientist Series ofelectronics, the Stern linestage ($45k) and the Heisenberg monoblockamplifiers ($105k/pr.). Rather than take up space here with specifications,I’ll direct those interested to the Audionet website. Handmade in Berlin,these electronics also boast beautiful industrial design conceived by the

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legendary German designer Hartmut Esslinger. The Stern has received aNational Design Award and is now part of the Smithsonian's NationalGallery. The Heisenberg features a global patent on its floating panels thatallow for ventilation and light.

Aside from the substitution of the Scientist Series of electronics (and theseries of cables), the demo system described below was the sameexceptionally transparent and articulate setup I had heard in GTT’sprimary listening space (roughly 20’ by 35’ by 11’, with four non-parallelsurfaces) some 13 months ago when I reported on the introduction of theYG Acoustics Sonja XV loudspeakers.

The primary listening space at GTT Audio & Video.

We chose to listen exclusively to LPs for this audition, using the followinganalog front-end gear: the Kronos Pro Limited Edition turntable (withSCPS1 power supply, Black Beauty tonearm, and Air Tight Opus 1cartridge) feeding an Audionet PAM G2 phonostage with the EXP powersupply. For this event, the Audionet PRE G2 linestage and MAXmonoblocks (the very units serving as my current reference electronics; my



review for these will appear in TAS Issue 279) had been replaced by thenew Stern linestage, and two pairs of the Heisenberg monoblocks, used inleft/right biamped configuration. Finally, all Kubala-Sosna Elation seriescabling had been replaced with the maker’s new flagship Realization series.

In addition to their amazing sonic capabilities, the Audionet Heisenberg monoblock amplifiers also received a

National Design Award.

I got to spend the entire day listening to this remarkable system, andvirtually every LP we played (I had a dozen of my own favorite records withme) left me astounded.

We started our session with the 45rpm release of 88 Basie Street [Pablo



Records]. From the moment the needle landed in the groove, the utternaturalness of the presentation became apparent. I was hearing subtletiesof hall and performance ambiance that I’d never before heard in all myyears of listening to this LP on literally hundreds of systems. Transientswere crisper, more sharply and accurately delineated, tone color andtexture were astonishingly accurate, and every aspect of the presentationwas depicted with full, honest bloom, accurate weight, and ample body.

Moving to the 45rpm Zubin Mehta reading of “Mars,” from Holst’s ThePlanets [Decca], dynamic scaling was spectacular, and I was overwhelmedby the degree of ambient detail conveyed. The way this system recreatedthe sound of a snare drum—its location, size, tone, body, and retort—waschilling. This system expressed a fine degree of delicacy and finesse that I’dnever experienced prior, and yet, at the same time, there existed anenhanced measure of power and speed. Both of these characteristicscoexisted in equal measure; neither showed compromise.

While I had picked up on these sonic capabilities to some degree at theofficial unveiling of the Scientist Series electronics at the High End Munichshow last May (where they also received a Gold Award), this showingfleshed everything out, leaving no doubt about their prowess.



Rear view of the Audionet Heisenberg monoblock amplifiers.

On playback of Respighi’s Feste Romane/The Pines of Rome [MobileFidelity UHQR], I heard instruments more clearly delineated in space, andmore faithfully rendered in timbre and texture than ever before.

“Duke’s Place”, from the Louis Armstrong and Duke Ellingtoncollaboration, Recording Together for the First Time [Roulette, ClassicRecords], was an absolute revelation of the musicians’ spatial relationshipswithin the soundstage and of vibrant, faithful timbre. And the rhythmicpace, the timing and drive of the music, had never sounded more frenetic!

With my longtime favorite version of Beethoven’s Symphony No. 9, by SirGeorg Solti with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra and Chorus [MFSL 2-



516], my amazement in response this system peaked. I was hearing bowingsubtleties and nuances, hall space, the air of and around the strings, brass,and even percussion instruments, in the most relaxed, holographic, yetnatural manner. The resonant nature as well as the tone and texture ofhorns had never been expressed with more realism.

Listening to the entire Fourth Movement, the “Ode to Joy,” I wasinextricably drawn into this performance by a newfound purity in tonecolor, textural complexity and density, and the remarkable distinction ofthe individual voices of the primary singers as well as those within themassed chorus. This striking specificity of the vocalists in both enunciationand location coincidentally resulted in a more cogent, coherent sound ofthe massed vocal performance, rendering a presentation that was morenatural, organic, and relaxed, rather than artificially illuminated. This was,without question, the most convincingly and clearly I had ever “seen” aperformance with my ears. In fact, this reading was so evocative andmoving, at the end I shouted out, “Bravo!” and we both felt as if we shouldstand up and applaud the performance.

Shifting to popular music, we dropped my Supertramp, Crime of theCentury [MFQR 1-005] into play. Again, this was a revelatory listen. Forthe first time, the doubled vocals on “If Everyone Was Listening” wereclearly revealed, not just hinted at. The closing track, “Crime of theCentury,” was portrayed with the most focused and lifelike familiarity thatI’ve ever noted.

On Blues Traveler’s self-titled LP [Brookvale Records], both John Popper’svoice and harp were so crisp, solid, and realistic-sounding that it wasuncanny. Dynamic contrasts were breathtaking.

During my time in front of this system, my impressions about a number ofattributes that this new linestage and monoblocks demonstrated solidified.One was the overwhelmingly conspicuous absence of any vestige oftransistor pall, glare, or grain. Moreover, all instruments, both in their



singular, individual voices and in their specific locations throughout thesoundstage, had never been so starkly apparent and yet so convincinglynatural sounding.

Add to this the expressive and seemingly unflappable sense of unrestrictedpower and control, and you have a series of electronics capable ofrecreating a sense of realism unprecedented in my experience of three-plusdecades of reporting on the art of music reproduction.

As revelatory as this system had sounded during the launch of the YGAcoustics Sonja XV last year (and it had ranked among the three or fourmost realistic and musical systems I’d ever heard to that point), theaddition of the Stern linestage and Heisenberg monoblocks push the bar topreviously unattainable levels.

Even given the remarkable advancements achieved in amplificationproducts over the previous half-decade or so that have been leveraged by anumber of industry leaders (primarily of Swiss origin, though notexclusively), nothing else in my immediate experience has demonstratedthese components’ ability to so accurately and artfully combine delicacywith power, focus with bloom, resolution with body, detail with texture,and clarity with expressiveness. All told, these attributes more successfullypermit a listener to completely forget that what he or she is listening to is are-creation, a reconstructed sonic event.

In short, the combination of the Audionet Scientist Series Stern linestageand Heisenberg monoblock amplifiers establishes a new benchmark.



Bill Parish of GTT Audio & Video with the Audionet Heisenberg monoblocks.

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Audionet Scientist Series Electronics: Stern Linestage and Heisenberg … · 2018. 7. 5. · naturalness of the presentation became apparent. ... One was the overwhelmingly conspicuous