A SENSE OF DIRECTORY

Back in January 1985 in this space, Ivan Berger got out his abacus and tallied how much a stereo system would cost if it included the most expensive item from each category of the Annual Equipment Directory in our October '84 issue. Yore score seven years ago: $121,200. Grab our current Directory, and you'll need almost all of that to buy just the peak power amps. So we thought it high time to update the entire setup.

Assuming the 22 products get along with one another, we present The System to End All Bank Accounts. Sequerra had the tuner in '84, the Model 1 Broadcast Analyzer at $5,000. In our October '91 Directory, Day Sequerra has the FM Reference Panalyzer at $12,800. If you want AM stereo--and we want everything-add Audio Design Associates' MT-3000 ($2,500). For tape enthusiasts, Revox repeats with a cassette deck, this time the B215S ($2,900), while Fostex provides both the G24S open-reel deck ($14,500) and the D-20 DAT recorder ($8,000). That last category also includes a new product yet to find a Directory home of its own: Marantz's CDR-1 CD recorder, which we'll put in our home for $10,000. As for a plain old CD player, we could spring for the Wadia Digital 2000, but its price tag of $7,450 prompts the Ralph Kramden in us to respond, "A mere bag of shells!" So let's marry the company's WT2000 CD transport ($5,600) to the Mark Levinson No. 30 D/A converter ($13,000) for a much more impressive $18,600. That takes care of single disc study. For hour upon hour (upon hour) of background music, we also require Proceed's CD Library ($14,000), a 100-disc changer with 15 programmable categories and 2,970 (count 'em!) programmable selections. You could Proceed to play every version of Beethoven's Fifth Symphony listed in Schwann s most recent Opus catalog and still have room for 33 discs--which may or may not be space enough for Alan Douglas' exhumations of Jimi Hendrix.

Lest we forget, we have plenty of black vinyl that deserves respect. "I want my SME!" you cry, noticing the Model 30 turntable with Series V tonearm, all for $20,000. "Peanuts! Peanuts!" we reply. Not only can you have a choice of turntable at $15,000--Rockport Technologies' Sirius or Symphonic Line's RG 6--but you can add Basis Audio's separate Reference tonearm ($10,900) and Audio Note's AN-MC-2/LTD Signature phono cartridge ($8,000) and be proud to have conspicuously consumed to the analog tune of $33,900. (The $3,500 for the Kiseki Lapus cartridge from '84 would today buy you only the Audio Note replacement stylus.) But this handles just 33 1/3 and 45 rpm. Plunk down another $705 for Rega Research's 78 only Planar 78 turntable with RB250 tonearm ($575) and Rega's RB78 cartridge ($130). Time to process all those signals.

We're still buying the Packburn noise suppressor, now dubbed the Model 323 A and costing $2,650 (up only $200 from '84). Add to that Lexicon's CP-3 surround processor ($2,995) and Cello's Audio Palette/MIV equalizer ($17,000), and you've just burned another $22,645 in one paragraph.

The power amps we mentioned in the first paragraph are Audio Note's tube mono pair called the Gaku-On, listed at $120,000 (versus, in '84, the pair from Esoteric Audio Research at $10,000). You could then choose Dynaudio's Arbiter preamp for $41,000, but let's go a little further by combining Audio Note's M-7 Phono ($25,000) with FM Acoustics' line-only Resolution Series 266 ($16,980) for a preamp total of $41,980. Which leaves headphones and, oh, yes, speakers. For ultimate privacy at ultimate expense, Koss offers the ESP/950 'phones at $2,000. But there will be times when we'd like the rest of the household-and possibly the neighborhood-to hear the fruits of our outlay. Let's see ... Entec and Reuben Guss each have a speaker system for $100,000. Not bad, but here comes Wilson Audio Specialties with the WAMM Series VI at $125,000 (the WAMM system in '84 had the biggest speaker ticket at $42,000). But that includes an equalizer, so no fair. Our choice instead is R. Sequerra Associates' Colossus MkIII, each weighing 800 lbs. (with a grille material of, ahem, silk) and costing $75,000--which means $150,000 per pair, which means $300,000 for basic two-front, two-back surround sound.

The Sequerras do save us from having to buy a separate subwoofer as well as an external crossover, and because our system is intended primarily for audio-only purposes, we'll also bypass a center-channel speaker. As for cables and other accessories that don't appear in our Directory, spare no expense--but hurry before DCC and the Mini Disc force you to realign the whole enchilada.

That said, dear reader, our grand total stands at a very dear indeed $604,530. Five times the 1984 tally. The cost of our Directory issue itself hasn't even doubled--from $2.95 in '84 to $4.95 in '91. Then again, if a certain company's threatened takeover of Audio comes to pass--and they go ahead with plans to print the Directory on gilt-edged deli paper, bind it between slabs of aged macadamia fruitcake, and rename it LIRPA Labs' New and Improved Annual Equipment Directory to LIRPA Labs' Equipment and Maybe Some Stuff from Those Other Companies--you might have to take out a loan.

-Ken Richardson

(adapted from Audio magazine, Jan. 1992)

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