Sarone Bluetooth Player Canterbury HE EAR 509 Rey Audio

Click pics to enlarge. Right, book spotted at WSS. In English it would be Money cannot buy thoughts. I just reserved a copy from the HK Public Library, where it is still freely available (not sure for how long). Surprisingly, the Shenzhen Library has a lone reference copy not available for borrowing (but can be read in house).

Letter from Hong Kong (24-3): The Longest Days, Part I

What goes around comes around?

Written in Shenzhen

Part II. Jan 29th, Part I, at Taimonsing's, RCA vintage

Part III, Jan 29th, Part II, chez moi, SET amps

All of a sudden, I had a few days to myself. I contacted the resourceful icefox (aka my taskmaster) and he arranged a couple of day's worth of events (many thanks). This starts the chronicle.

January 28th, Chaiwan 

I arrived in Yuen Long around mid-morning and ran some errands. I returned some old HiFi News and, as I had some spare time, sat and read the January issue of the HiFi News from cover to cover. Really enjoyed the thorough review (not yet online) of the newly re-issued Musical Fidelity A1, which our Ray Salamat had reported on (here). It's also one of my favorite integrated amps (here).

icefox was so thoughtful as to have arranged a ride to faraway Chaiwan. So I met them at Tsuen Wan West MTR at 1 pm. The driver was Taimonsing, whom I had met once 20 years ago. He's a fascinating character, and you shall hear a lot more about him in Part II of this series.

Tannoy Canterbuy driven by EAR 509 monoblocks. ANUK Jinro and MC2 not heard. 

Tannoy Canterbury HE, EAR 509, Sarone Bluetooth Player

First we hit the den of WSS, surely familiar to many regular readers (should you want to read more about his older setups, just search WSS). Preamp was ANUK M8.

Story: When I left HK for NYC in 2018, we moved my Canterbury HE to my friend trazom's place. I had much earlier sold the Spendor SP-100 to him and he still enjoys it. During my stay in NYC, WSS moved to his current den, which is much larger than his old one that I had reported on several times. The Tannoy then went to him. I had actually visited him in this den towards the end of 2020, just before I went to China.

On this occasion, finally I got to hear the fabled Sarone Bluetooth Player, designed by WE guru Yip 西電葉. Basically, supposedly it cuts down functions performed by the Bluetooth chip to the minimum and the output circuit had been greatly tweaked, with many WE parts used. It is not cheap but many Golden Ears (like our own icefox) swear by it. Many have foregone CAS and CDPs in favor of it. Believe it or not! For my whole stay, source was icefox's iPhone playing Tidal Lossless. I must say its performance was excellent, and none of us missed the ANUK digitals. Incidentally, our own ELO had reported his experience at a Mongkok shop (here)!

Sound was very good indeed. Much better than in 2020, when it sounded a little overdamped (dead). Credit must also go to the EAR 509 monoblocks, which I had also sold to him. Incidentally, at my old place, it had sounded very good with the Tannoy's. My friend Thomas (moniker tubediyer) always said that was the best he had hear my Tannoy's. WSS had it serviced and it put out a flawless performance, tube neutrality at its best. It's fitting that trazom was also present to hear these gear at a larger place than his.

Rey Audio Loudspeakers. In front of the Left speaker is a Thomas Mayer Phonostage. Center left is the Connoisseur Phonoamp (I think Lyra). On the 2 stands in front is the 4-piece JC Verdier Phonoamp. Crazy!

On its own stand the Thomas Mayer Compactron Phono.

Rey Audio, Turntable and Phonoamp Galore!

Then we hit on old friend wher (moniker wadia). Read about my 2009 visit (his old place, where he now lives), which also tells you something about Chaiwan the locale for audio. This new place is actually a little smaller but has golden ratio, and it surely sounds better!

I won't try to list the 13 or 14 TTs, many with two arms, nor the plethora of phonoamps (you name it, it's there). Preamp was an old Studer Mixing Console. Otherwise it's FM Acoustics Electronic Crossover to Klein and Hummel amp and old FM professional amp.

wher was generous with his 威水, aka Scotch. Thanks man! I stayed for a long time. I was very glad that I met again Lawrence (moniker mda) who had actually sold me the EAR 509. Small world, huh? He's one of the many HK emigrants of recent times, who now lives in Nottingham.

Just because I was enjoying wher's whisky so much, I missed one of the scheduled stops, but I have some pics here:

Winston's R2R and Pro Stuff (Grundig Loudspeakers)

Then we all went to a delicious dinner. I just post the menu here, but pics shall appear in another article. Many thanks again to icefox for arranging things!

Enjoying HiFi News report on A1

Sarone at bottom of middle rack. Roksan TT and digitals not heard.

One channel of the JV Verdier Phonoamp, PS below.

Connoisseur Phono

Thomas Mayer Phono

Studer Mixing Console

The very rare Fi Phono amp

icefox refers to this kind of food as 麻甩佬 food

Winston's R2R

Visits Western Electric 91E Sarone Hartley Neat Iota

Click pics to enlarge. Above, Sorane.

Letter from Hong Kong (22-13): ELO Auditions

During the period that I was chewing on what preamp I should get, I visited several setups worth writing about.

HiFi shop in Tim Chee Building [Footnote 1]
Superb Bluetooth Streamer, named Sarone, designed by an experienced HK designer [Footnote 2] using vintage W.E. parts and transformers, which is no slouch at all!

Newly designed W.E. 91E Amplifier [Footnote 3]! DJ and I agree that the front looks a bit tacky and overwhelmed. Sound wise, there's nothing to complain about.

In front of me, two huge wardrobes (Hartley 24" white cone bass woofers used) made me feel like I'm peeking/hearing music behind them; yet it did not lessen my enjoyment of the beautiful sound coming out of the system.

They were playing songs with limited dynamics. As good as the W.E. 300B is, it can only play through its strength, not with songs that require a high dynamic headroom. So, obviously, vocals with few instruments exceled in this setup and My Favorite Things by Youn Sun Nah sounded so real, nuanced and emotionally stimulating; notes of the single gong-like instrument (no clue what it is) was a real treat and I could have just sunken deep into the couch and listen non-stop!

Home Visit to CW with his Great Setup

The system is anchored upon the Soulution 330 Integrated Amp, partnered with Luxman D10X SACD/CD Player

This gorgeous looking Magico Mini speakers did not sound mini in any way!

The Nordost Odin Two power cord was re-purposed into 2 pairs of XLR cables and a pair of spk jumpers. The price may become more "affordable" yet it is still out of my reach; but it does play an extremely important part as veins of the system.

While we had to go through a few iterations and fine tuning, the final outcome was rewarding and fantastic! Spain by Chic Corea Trio was really scintillating. The overall system is quite coherent, with high quality bass with a lot of QQ bounciness and tenacity. However, sound is kept within 2 speakers and height of soundstage is still capped at about 4ft, which i think can be improved by further speaker placement. We tried my DIY earthbox on his Lux SACD player and, all of a sudden, the sound improvement was indeed significant. Music became more involving, cohesive and it seemed like the musicians were feeding from each other's energy - they formed a unity and I almost wanted to give a standing ovation after the performance!

Audition of Lab12 Pre (one of my previous targets) at local distributor

What caught my eyes/attention was the cute NEAT IOTA Xplorer speakers which though small in size managed to throw out a huge soundstage and deep bass with its down-firing bass woofer (one more hidden in isobarik form). Played through vinyl setup and Lab12 Pre/power combo, the sound was natural, musical, analog (of coz). Overall, very good result indeed!

P.S. I noticed there was a second hand selling at a very attractive price, and I highly recommended it to a friend. Suffice to say, he was mightily happy with the performance as it totally trounced two DIY efforts and his SS preamp (no surprise). I also managed to change some misconceptions of him - that "Old is always better than new ". More to follow/

All three systems performed really well and can serve as very good reference points to gauge the sound of my own system! As for the Elekit TU-875 that I ended up with, please wait for the next installment!

Editor's Footnotes: [1] Hong Kong has several buildings mostly devoted to HiFi stores selling new or used gear, and it's paradise (or trap) for the unintiated. Tim Chee is in Mong Kok, in an old district known for its population of audio stores and immortalized by HK filmmakers; [2] The designer is Ah Yip, famous for his Western Electric expertise. Indeed, I have met him several times and am impressed by his passion and, something not so commonly encountered, candor. Yes, calling garbage by its name, which is, you guess right, garbage (including ultra-expensive stuff). According to our priceless HK consultant, icefox, the Sarone debuted with the dealer of the super-expensive WE91E in the HK Audio Show not so long ago and, despite show conditions, sold quite a few! If you are not a BT follower, you might not believe: the theory is to just use the BT chip (short signal path) and do the rest in proprietary ultra-luxurious fashion, including use of WE sourced iron for transformers. Not cheap but according to my friends, sensational in results. I call this Extreme Bluetooth, and icefox has informed me of another formidable contender, Kinney, with MONSTROUS antennas! I hope to feature these in another article; [3] I'm not sure what to say about this, from my conservative viewpoint. It's not something I'd tackle but I'd like to hear it. Yes, I hate its looks. Below are what icefox sent me, review pages from Taiwan's Audio Art. Sorry, pdf only in Chinese (the pages were loaded in reverse, so start from the bottom; click to enlarge). Enjoy if you can.