Darren’s previous employment was with Naim Audio, working in their service department where he gained a detailed and thorough understanding of hi-fi products whilst also supporting his love of Hi-Fi that had started with a visit to the Harrogate Hi-Fi show alongside his dad, in the late 70s. Alistair’s journey into Hi-Fi started with his love of music (also inspired by his father) and is a keen guitarist, playing with David Lynch inspired band, The Red Room.
DNA Audio operate from Clifford house, a recently refurbished building that dates back to the 17th century. The stylish space features great facilities including two demo rooms, showroom, disabled access and parking for five vehicles.
“DNA Audio is delighted to be representing ATC Loudspeakers having long been admirers of them. Come and listen for yourself or get in touch.” Alistair Gladstone, DNA Audio.
Email: info@dnaaudio.co.uk
WWW: http://www.dnaaudio.co.uk/
Facebook: @dnaaudiouk
Twitter: @audio_dna
Instagram: @DNAAudio1
Home Cinema Choice have awarded the HTS40 & HTS7 system, ‘Best Buy’ status in the August 2018 edition of the magazine.
Here’s just a short out take of their thoughts on the system:
“When K enters Sapper Morton’s apartment in Blade Runner 2049 (Blu-ray), the various Foley effects amid the near silence of the room are beautifully conveyed. The squeak of floorboards and the bubbling of the pot on the stove are perfectly placed and worked into the mix. They don’t leap out at you because they sound absolutely and unambiguously right…There is simply no clue as to where one speaker’s activity ends and another begins. A good turn of the volume dial helps their performance expand in scale, but even at low levels the listening experience is wonderfully immersive.” Ed Selly, Home Cinema Choice, August 2018.
To read the review in full, click the HTS40 & HTS7 System Review to open as a PDF
Here is just a little tast of what reviewer, Ed Selly thought of this system:
“And the bass… the low end on offer here is exquisite.”
“It takes a little time to appreciate quite how good it is because it is so natural and unobtrusive, but it allows this system to demonstrate truly lovely tonality…”
“It is comfortably one of the very best imlimentations of active speakers I have had the pleasure of spending any time with”
Ed Selly, Hi-Fi Choice, July 2018.
To read the review in full, click the link below:
SCM40A & CDA2 Mk2 System Review, Hi-Fi Choice, June 2018
“ The CDA2 Mk2 is well built, comprehensively equipped and highly revealing, but more importantly it makes familiar material engrossing, it makes you listen longer and dare I say it, louder. ATC has driven down distortion and noise so that more of the crucial timing and imaging cues can be heard, in the process they have delivered their finest digital product yet, it’s a great pity they took it away!”
Jason Kennedy, The Ear, April 2018.
Read the review in full at The Ear website.
“…with a wide-open sound, masses of detail and unrestrained slam. It makes a fine partner for power amps and active speakers alike, getting on with the business of delivering the music without adding or subtracting anything. If it does all you need, it’s a bargain”. Andrew Everard, Hi-Fi News, April 2018.
Connect to a PC or streamer and use the on-board high resolution DAC to bring your music library, Tidal or Spotify to life.
Also need CD? No problem – simply use the CDA2 like a traditional player but connected directly to a power amp or active loudspeakers.
If you’ve also got a vinyl collection, hook up a phono stage via one of two analogue inputs.
Find much more information and an in-depth review and lab test in the latest edition of Hi-Fi News, available in print or digital editions now or via the link below.
To read in full or download a PDF, click this link to the CDA2 Mk2 Review.
ATC Loudspeaker Technology is extremely proud to announce the arrival of the CDA 2 Mk2 CD/DAC Preamp, which represents a re-engineering of its predecessor in all the key performance areas. Developed as the ideal partner for ATC’s latest P2 power amplifier and active speaker designs, the Mk2 combines convenient USB access to high-resolution music streaming with an upgraded CD transport and DAC board, dedicated headphone amplification, expanded input choices and analogue circuits redesigned to deliver an extremely wide and flat frequency response with very low distortion.
Joining rear panel coaxial and optical 192kHz inputs, the Mk2’s new high resolution USB input is capable of handling PCM data up to 384kHz and also DSD64, DSD128 and DSD256 natively. Excellent jitter rejection ensures that signal integrity is maintained even with poorer quality sources and over long cable runs. Completing the Mk2’s wider digital interface, a new TEAC-supplied CD transport delivers faster play and seek times, much lower mechanical noise and improved error correction.
The meticulously re-engineered analogue circuits optimise ATC’s implementation of a new premium 32-bit AKM DAC, selected for exceptionally low noise and distortion. Supporting the DAC, the Mk2’s power supply architecture employs no fewer than nine additional high performance voltage regulators, and local power supply decoupling has been improved from the Mk1, yielding further performance gains.
In another refinement, both input and output gain stages have been improved by an arrangement of discrete op amps comprising six common gain blocks: two for left and right input buffering, and four to provide a “true” differential output for the left and right channels. The positive and negative drivers are arranged in parallel to ensure that the signal delays and phase shifts are identical on both sides. The output stages are configured as unity gain complementary compound (Sziklai) pairs, biased in class A.
These major design revisions combined with many marginal gains (from hand-soldering surface mount components on the legs of specific chips for instance) ensure that the CDA2 Mk2’s analogue stage exhibits exceptionally low noise and distortion across a very wide bandwidth.
Also benefitting are twin rear-mounted analogue phono/RCA inputs and an additional aux analogue input via 3.5mm mini jack, which is equipped with high input sensitivity for improved compatibility with phones, tablets and other low output portable devices. Additionally the Mk2 benefits from a revised high performance headphone amplifier capable of driving headphones from 30 – 600 ohms, delivering exceptional results from the vast array of modern headphone designs. Output is via a rear panel mounted 6.35mm jack.
The CDA2 Mk2’s chassis is constructed from a combination of steel and aluminium and uses constrained layer damping to control panel resonances. The front panel is machined from an extruded section of 13mm/0.5” aluminium alloy with a brushed and anodised silver finish.
The product is supplied with IR remote control and is covered by a six year warranty (2 years CD mechanism).
Recommended UK Retail: £2950 (inc. VAT).
The Mk2 combines convenient USB access to high-resolution music streaming with an upgraded CD transport and DAC board, dedicated headphone amplification, expanded input choices and analogue circuits redesigned to deliver an extremely wide and flat frequency response with very low distortion.
Join us for the first time at Bristol: Room 102!
The show takes place from Friday 23rd to Sunday 25th February and is held at the Marriott City Centre Hotel, Bristol.
Sound & Vision – The Bristol Show Website
“this is a fine loudspeaker of startling dynamic range with great clarity and excellent resolution.”Martin Colloms, Hi-Fi Critic, December 2017.
The SCM50PSL has been awarded a much coveted, ‘Audio Excellence’ award by highly regarded magazine, Hi-Fi Critic, the only independent advert free magazine featuring venerable reviewers, Paul Messenger and Martin Colloms.
Here’s just a little more of Martin’s thoughtful insights into the SCM50PSL.
“The inherent neutrality enabled all kinds of material to express itself, from jazz (both forceful and relaxed examples) to heavy rock such as classic Hendrix, where you were brought almost to the front of the audience at high sound levels. The more modern Keith Richards’ Main Offender sounded like we were present in the monitoring room, it was so punchy and immediate…I suppose its great virtue was the way it became acoustically unobtrusive, allowing the wide range of music programme we sampled to tell their individual stories.”
“This ATC three-way generated powerful, tuneful and believably accurate sound images. Despite reasonably compact stand-mount proportions, it had fine bass with extension, tune playing and attack, a very neutral and well integrated midrange, and a sweet, detailed and natural high frequencies. Rather more powerful than its modest proportions might indicate, this fine design delivers stereo images on a grand scale, and conveys much of the character and detail in fine recordings. It hits the audio excellence level for its sheer all round ability – not least the massive power handling and the resulting dynamic range.”
Martin Colloms, Hi-Fi Critic, December 2017.
To read the review in full, open or download the PDF here: Hi-Fi Critic SCM50PSL Review
ATC have produced a limited run of the SCM7 finished in high gloss red, yellow and black for the Hong Kong and Chinese markets. The speakers are available now from Sound Concepts in Hong Kong and exclusive retailers in mainland China.
