Price: $3495
Website: www.audioresearch.com
Jeff said: It is a beautiful-sounding component that captures the gestalt of finely recorded music. It might not be the absolute champion in terms of high-frequency transparency and upper-treble extension, but I’m not sure how musically relevant those areas are to the majority of music selections recorded at 16-bit/44.1kHz.
The gist: Digital solid-state from a company known for analog tube amps.