Not sure about technological innovations, as my products unashamedly use old-school tech (valves and R-2R DAC chips), but strong opinions would be:

1. I prefer electronics that have minimal signal processing, i.e., DACs without oversampling and digital reconstruction filters, and amplifiers that do not use negative feedback.
2. I believe that power supply quality is very, very important and can often define the product’s sound.

Direct contact with me. Fast reply, advice on how to get the best from my products or solve technical issues. Quick turnaround with updates on progress of any repair or service issues. I have been in the audio industry for over 35 years as a dealer, manufacturer, designer, service engineer, and just about everything else. Clients get the benefit of that experience when they buy from me.

This one is hard, as it changes a lot and I listen to lots of different things:

• Wagon Wheels – Sonny Rollins, Way Out West
• Five Feet Tall – Lady Blackbird, Black Acid Soul
• Symphonic Dances – Rachmaninov, Eiji Oue, Minnesota Orchestra

Living Voice Loudspeakers

We do not use any standard DAC chip solution from the open market, but rather developed our own proprietary conversion algorithms and programmed them into general FPGA processors that are field upgradeable. In other words, every improvement or change in algorithms can be downloaded from our website and loaded into our products, all by the end user. More details are here.

For one of the most critical components in any DAC we, again, are not using any standard technology, but rather developed a very unique and proprietary algorithm that takes into account the very sensitive properties of our human hearing system and they way it perceives clock jitter. More details here.

When we were part of the DSD creation team at Sony we were tasked with a very challenging project: the definition of a high speed digital communication protocol that would support any PCM and DSD format (i.e. sample rate). This link should be able to transmit any audio data from any source to a DAC. The solution I came up with is based on a high speed fiber optic data link as it is used in super high speed data links where secure data recovery at the receiver is crucial. While the speed of transmitting audio data is well and way below the capability of such fiber optic links I still chose this physical link because of its superb data and clock integrity / stability. In addition the fiber optic media provides a galvanic separation between digital source and core DAC circuitry. This alone already results in an audible improvement. All our products support this link and we call it PLINK. We use it to connect external transports, servers or USB interfaces to our DACs.

We see customer support as an opportunity to show to the customer who we are and how much we care. Usually, I answer all inquiries and customer support requests personally, within 24 hours and with as much technical info as possible. While some of our dealers possess good technical know-how and are able to interact with customers on that level directly, other distributors do not provide any technical support. Either way we encourage customers to contact us directly for any help.

I often get feedback from customers that this kind of direct and expert support ultimately convinced them to buy our products. So obviously the way we do it is not standard in our industry.

There are many excellent recordings that can demonstrate the behavior of our of DACs, but it is mostly a function of the listener's taste in music. For instance, people who do not like classical music do not hear its finesses when played on our equipment etc. For my own personal taste I often use any DSD re-mastered track of Pink Floyd or Roger Waters. This is also because most of these tracks were mastered using my designs and with that they show off specifically the "analog-like" behavior during transients of our DACs and the resulting 3-dimensionality of the sound stage.

As a digital "pure-bread" listener I do not use analog sources myself and only our own electronic designs (including amplification) for playback paired with a variety of different loudspeakers from mid-size to professional near-field monitors. The latter are usually more revealing and neutral than most consumer or audiophile speakers, but are only suitable in small studio environments. Over the years I have been working closely with brands such as Hafler (professional speakers), Evolution Acoustics, Stenheim and many speaker manufacturers.

We always try to make no « me too » products. For instance most of our DAC models have a DSP built in for various signal enhancement treatments, like room equalization, creative equalization, de-essing, vinyl emulation and more.

I suggest to contact our dealers and/or distributors first. If they cannot handle the issue they are welcome to direct the customer to us. Customer satisfaction is very important, so we try to solve all inquiries as well as possible. We still support our first products dating back to 1985.I suggest to contact our dealers and/or distributors at first. If they cannot handle the issue they are welcome to direct the customer to us. Customer satisfaction is very important, so we try to solve all inquiries as well as possible. We still support our first products dating back to 1985.

• Nils Lofgren: Bass & Drum Intro
• Daft Punk: Get Lucky (mastered using our pro audio equipment)
• Rufus D: Jugendraum (mastered using our pro audio equipment)
• Plus Classical and Jazz music of course.

• Headphones: Audeze
• Speakers: airplain (one of our OEM customers)