That’s a lot of 2s!
Grimm Audio will be showcasing their new flagship LS1c Active Loudspeaker along with the new PW1 Phono Stage in celebration of 20 years in business at High End Munich 2024.
You read that last bit right—a solid state phono stage designed by Grimm’s co-founder Peter van Willenswaard with industrial design by Michiel Uylings who also designed the stunning Grimm MU1 (review). The press release (below) was short on details but I plan to fill them in later this week from Munich.
The new Grimm LS1c Active Loudspeaker houses a number of upgrades over existing models including a TPCD Carbon Composite tweeter developed by Seas in cooperation with Composite Sound, manufacturer of cutting edge “metamaterial” membrane technology, the latest generation Hypex NCore class-D amplifiers, a complete ground up firmware rebuild, and a number of software improvements including the crossover phase correction filters of the LS1 DSP. These software, firmware and DSP improvements will be available to all LS1 owners later this summer.
The first run of PW1 Phono Stages are expected to ship in October 2024 ($TBD) while pricing and availability for the LS1c Active Loudspeaker are, at present, TBD. I’ll also update this info from Munich in a few days along with lots more pics.
Here’s the complete press release from Grimm:
Celebrating 20 years and 2 new products at High End Munich
May 4th, 2024
High End Munich, May 9th-12th in room E216, will become a remarkable event for us. First of all we will celebrate 20 years of Grimm Audio! When we founded the company in 2004 we focused on studio equipment. After the introduction of the LS1 in 2010, the hifi market took a strong share of our market. In Munich we will display all the products we developed during our 20 years in both the pro audio and hifi world – starting with the unique discrete design DSD AD converter AD1. On Thursday and Friday one of our first AD1 customers, Jared Sacks of Channel Classics and Just Listen Records, will give presentations about his recordings. People from his download platform Native DSD Music will also be present in our room.
And now the breaking news: to celebrate our anniversary we will present no less than two new products in Munich!
PW1
Introducing… the PW1 phono stage! Grimm Audio’s co-founder Peter van Willenswaard put many years of development in this ‘Phono Wizard’. In fact he spent a life time designing and improving phono preamps, both in solid state and with tubes. Of all stages of audio amplification, phono preamplifiers pose the biggest challenges to a designer. In this respect the solid state PW1 can be considered a true masterpiece.
The result is a well balanced design with Peter’s signature sound, that is very spacious, detailed and open, but at the same time rhythmically addictive and emotionally involving. Industrial designer Michiel Uylings of MU1 fame matched the spectacular sonics with a simple but powerful cabinet shape and Grimm Audio’s design team made the copper shielded interior look like a piece of art. The first batch of PW1 units is expected to ship in October.
LS1c
The second news is nothing short of sensational. We present to you a new flagship active loudspeaker, the LS1c. In 2010 the original LS1 was launched. In 2017 we released the LS1be with Berylium tweeter and SB1 motional feedback subwoofer. This year, after another 7 years, we introduce the LS1c with TPCD Carbon Composite tweeter. This tweeter is developed by our supplier Seas in cooperation with Composite Sound, manufacturer of cutting edge “metamaterial” membrane technology. By means of advanced modelling and computer controlled layering of carbon sheets, the membrane resonances and breakup behavior are fully controlled.
As a result a TPCD membrane has almost the same properties as the Berylium material we used in the LSbe. And this is very good news since the only manufacturer of Berylium membrane material recently stopped production… We placed the carbon tweeter in the proprietary aluminium waveguide that Seas developed for us, so the LS1c HiMacs version maintains the stunning ‘mounting screwless’ looks of the LS1be.
But we did not stop with just replacing the tweeter. The LS1c project demonstrates our long-term dedication to the LS1. Virtually all elements of this platform are renewed:
- The electronics have been redesigned and now carry the latest generation Hypex NCore class-D amplifiers. A remotely controlled stand-by function is prepared.
- The firmware of the platform has been rebuilt from the ground up, which improves its stability and opens doors to future developments.
- The PC remote software for Windows and Mac computers has also been completely redesigned. It is made with an in-house developed cross-platform GUI library toolkit.
- Our method of individual loudspeaker calibration for crossover filters and driver aberration equalization has further been refined.
- With the knowledge we gained from developing the MU1 and MU2 FPGA Pure Nyquist filters, we were able to dramatically improve the crossover phase correction filters of the LS1 DSP. The sonic improvement is stunning.
The LS1 concept has proven itself for more than a decade and we are dedicated to keep supporting and improving it. We clearly demonstrated this by putting many years of development into the new hardware, firmware, software, DSP, EQ and calibration methods. The LS1 platform is now better and more stable than ever. It is not without reason that dozens of studios rely on LS1s on a daily basis. All software, firmware and DSP improvements will become available to every Grimm Audio LS1 customer as a free update around this summer.
We invite you to celebrate our 20th anniversary with us in room E216 at High End Munich, and enjoy demonstrations of an LS1c/SB1 & MU1 system, and a second system with MU2, PW1, Wilking Delta turntable with Benz Micro cartridge, Halcro Eclipse stereo power amplifier, Crystal Cable Arabesque Minissimo loudspeaker – crossed over to our SB1 digital motion feedback subs, our SQM line cables and Furutech loudspeaker cables.
Company Website: Grimm Audio