Author: DOuG pRATt

Supply Chain and Demand

To my surprise, Trump’s tariffs on Chinese imports had no apparent effect on inflation. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen didn’t make that point when questioned on last night’s PBS NewsHour, but she’s confident that Biden’s additional tariffs will likewise not directly hit American consumers.

The policy talk seems to have shifted from intellectual property theft by China to excess productive capacity. The bigger issue is, it’s a little late to undo the effects of 40 years of free trade globalization. Will protectionism motivate American manufacturers to stop looking at the quarterly bottom line, and start figuring out better ways to compete?

Why Spend More?

Unbelievable prices at the moment on Amazon for two excellent items that I own:

Sony MDR-ZX110 Headphones w/mic and pause button: $15 https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00OUX6U6G/

Subynanal USB-C Dongle DAC/headphone amp: $3 https://www.amazon.com/dp/B08817XKSW

A dongle DAC is pretty much a requirement for those who prefer wired headphones for their phones. At only three measly bucks, the DAC’s specs aren’t state-of-the-art, but the sound is excellent, the noise floor is silent (no added hiss), and there’s plenty of volume with all of my headphones and IEMs I’ve tried.

According to Amir at Audio Science Review, equalizing the Sony headphones (for the Harman target frequency response curve) “produces reference quality sound!” You can do that automatically on an Android phone, using the free Wavelet app. (I sometimes prefer the un-equalized sound.)

The sky’s the limit on expensive audio equipment, but for most everybody there’s no need to spend more than $18. Don’t need the mic and pause button? Then the headphones are only ten bucks. I’m not limited to these two products, but if I were I’d be perfectly okay with that.

Hooked on Needles

Something I realized rather quickly with CD (and also DVD), is the players are commodities. I have never felt the same personal connection for a disc player the way I always have for my speakers, headphones, receivers, turntables, and phono cartridges. Yes, even phono cartridges.

These are a few of the pickups, as cartridges used to be known, that I remember fondly.

The Pickering V15 came installed on my Garrard 40B turntable, way back in early 1972. Five years later, the Stanton 500 was on the Micro-Trak tonearms of the Russco Cue-Master turntables at the radio station.

The Shure M91ED was purchased to replace the Pickering.

The Audio-Technica AT-13Ea lived on my JVC VL-5 turntable.