As I type, there’s over 2100 pounds of gear in Barn for review. And that’s not shipping weight which pushes the total well over 3000. Pounds.
But coordinating review gear is more involved than moving heavy things in and out of the Barn because real care and planning goes into not only what’s here but when, when it comes to putting together systems that make sense.
The easiest current example involves a bit of a peak into the future. As you may have seen, the Qualiton 300B integrated amp arrived earlier in the week while the Audio Note Meishu Phono 300B Konzertmeister joined just yesterday (in Barn post coming soon). That’s 2 amps that offer 25 and 8 Watts respectively of output power so they need appropriately sensitive speakers to drive.
Of course the Barn resident DeVore O/96 can fit that bill but I always like to use more than one pair of speakers when reviewing amps, and vice versa, so in addition to two pair of higher efficiency speakers coming to the Barn very soon, another 300B-based amp/preamp combo will also join the fun. A total of three 300B-based amps paired with three pair of speakers.
The summer of the 300B.
Then there’s the opposite end of the spectrum in terms of amps, speakers, and power with the recently reviewed YG Sonja 3.3 which will see time with a total of six amps—the Soulution 301 integrated (review), Constellation Inspiration Integrated 1.0 (review), the Bel Canto Black ACI 600 integrated (review), and the stunning JMF Audio HQS 6002 Amplifier and PRS 1.5 Preamplifier (review) combo were all used in the review, but the Octave Audio Jubilee Preamplifier & Jubilee Mono ULTIMATE Monoblock Amplifiers (more info) and Audia Flight Strumento Series N°1 evo Stereo Preamplifier & N°8 Monoblock Power Amplifiers (more info) will also see some YG time in their reviews, giving a very nice view into the Sonja’s way with a lot of different partners. And another pair of current-demanding speakers will join the fun to work out both stacks of power if all goes according to plan.
And this accounts for just part of what’s happening now in Barn.
What comes after all these reviews is already well in the works but coordinating all of the gear that’s already here took real time with some things in the works for over a year. But the time and effort is not only worth it, I think it’s essential work when it comes to offering appropriate system context with multiple partners.
All to say it’s largely behind the scenes logistics that account for a lot of my time especially when you factor in unpacking, set up, swapping, and re-packing.
I offer these details not as a complaint, I do that with the Barn mice because the spiders simply don’t care, but to give a fuller picture of what goes into making Twittering Machines hum.