John Browning

As a home hi-fi specialist, John has worked on countless setups over the years, and has accrued a wealth of experience, insights and knowledge on the subject. His experience means that he can not only assist in the assessment of your current system, but will also come up with suggestions to boost your sound quality.

Technics SL-1000R Review

Technics was founded in 1965 as Panasonic Corporation’s high-end hi-fi brand. The term first appeared on loudspeakers, but it was an obvious fit for Shuichi Obata’s innovative transcription turntable. The ‘Technics by Panasonic’ SP-10 was the world’s first direct drive deck of the contemporary era, debuting in 1970. It made its way into broadcast studios

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TEAC VRDS-20 Review

Compact disc had a particularly intriguing period in the early 1990s. Digital audio, like ‘that difficult second album,’ had a dilemma in terms of how to progress. Philips and Sony had developed slick second-generation machines, but these were simply evolutions of their first-generation goods, and it was time to start over and create fresh forward-thinking

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Spendor S35se Review

‘Retro’ was all the rage in the early years of the new millennium, and in hi-fi, the rebirth of the BBC LS3/5a loudspeaker was at the forefront of the trend. The shameful truth was that this iconic little mini-monitor was a terribly defective, if cute, design even back then. New drive units, cabinet technology, and

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Sony TC-K81 Review

It’s difficult to overstate the significance of Compact Cassette as a format in 1979. The Long Playing record was nearing the end of its life cycle – or so we believed – with an increasing number of consumers opting for pre-recorded cassettes over vinyl. At the time, the quality of LP pressings seemed to be

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Sony TC-K55II Review

From 1974 to roughly 2004, Sony produced cassette decks. The machines evolved dramatically over those three decades; they began as top-loading devices with small VU meters, slow ballistics, Dolby B and Chrome tape capabilities, and little else. They were multi-motor, had Metal switching, Dolby B, C, and S, electronic meters and tape counters, and a

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Sony TA-F55 Review

Sony amplifiers had abandoned their unique but unstable V-FET output transistors by 1979, and were inventing in new ways – the goal was to bring an interesting twist to a standard design. As a result, Sony engineers placed the power transistors on the main circuit board from the center of the new TA-F range upwards

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Sony TA-F35 Review

Page after page of criticism and opinion – sometimes dressed up as fact, sometimes not – on how bad Japanese amplifiers were in 1980 could be found in any British hi-fi journal. They claimed this was especially true in the inexpensive sector, where all of their “frills” meant money wasn’t spent on items that would

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