Fostex PX-5HS Fostex I first heard the Fostex PX-5HS speakers at the Rocky Mountain Audio Fest last October, and even in a cramped hotel room the sound was neutral, accurate, clear and clean. I requested a pair to review, and now perched on a pair of metal floor stands in my living room the PX-5HSs …

Last Sunday at the Trump SoHo New York hotel I heard a preview of a new pair of high-end headphones from Hifiman, the HE1000, and they were easily the best I’ve heard from that company. Hifiman founder and CEO Fang Bian wearing his HE1000 headphones Steve Guttenberg/CNET The see-through clarity and lively dynamics were remarkably effortless. Which is to say, …

Steve Guttenberg/CNET While CD album sales decline year after year, the US market still managed to gobble up 140.8 million CDs in 2014. That’s still a big number, but LP sales got a lot more media attention, because 2014 vinyl sales numbers were up an astonishing 51.8 percent increase over 2013! When the smoke cleared, actual LP sales totaled 9.2 …

You can cover your eyes and see absolutely no light, but you can’t cover your ears and block out all sound. Even the very best earplugs can only reduce, but never eliminate all sound. Listening seems totally automatic, but once you focus your attention on sound you’ll hear a lot more. To start, sit alone in a room, turn off …

Aurisonics Rockets Aurisonics Chances are, you’ve never heard of Aurisonics, so here’s a little backstory: it’s a company based in Nashville, Tenn., founded in 2011 by audio engineer and audio products designer Dale Lott. Frankly, I’d never been all that impressed with Aurisonic’s other headphones, so I had low expectations for the Rockets. But when I first tried them on …

The KEF LS50s, shown in white; they’re also available in black KEF If you’re like me and spend a lot of time hunkered down in front of a computer, and you love music, investing in a good set of monitor speakers makes a lot of sense. Some of the larger monitors in the following survey can also be used as …

Dave McNair with some of his mastering tools. Chris Henderson A lot of audiophiles believe that mastering plays an absolutely decisive role in the sound of recorded music. I’m not sure how this belief came to be, it shortchanges all of the other elements of record production. It’s akin to saying a chef can save a poorly prepared meal by …

I was initially skeptical about Tidal, but I’m really enjoying this new streaming music service. Spotify, Mog and Pandora never clicked with me; with those music subscription services I’d jump from tune to tune, listen a bit, then move onto something else. It’s not that I ever thought Spotify or Pandora sounded bad, but they couldn’t hold my attention. Tidal …

The PonoPlayer. Steve Guttenberg/CNET I feel like I’ve been hearing about the PonoPlayer music player for ages, so expectations ran high. The company never got around to sending one in for review, so I borrowed a friend’s yellow player. It feels light in my hands, and the triangular shape comes in handy when you lay Pono down on a table. …

Genelec M030 speakers Genelec Ask any sound engineer about Genelec speakers and you’ll get an earful. Pros worldwide revere the speakers made by Genelec, a company founded in 1978 that makes a wide range of monitor speakers for recording and broadcast engineers and discerning audiophiles. The M030 is an “active,” two-way monitor with a .75-inch dome tweeter and 5-inch woofer. …