Turntables! Tonearms! Cartridges! Munich High End 2025 Video 2
Munich goes out with an analog bang!
Wow! Analog went out with a big high tech bang at Munich High End 2025. This is my second show video covering analog news and it's far from the final one. Due to Euro dollar variations and a volatile tariff strewn world marketplace all prices here are approximate.
The final Munich High End show—the capper to a 21 year run—was filled with new analog gear from the Airon TH1 American-made $36,000 unipivot air bearing pivoted tonearm...
to a new Soulution 787 turntable that features a stationary arm and moving platter, to Kuzma's new $35,000 12" Safir arm and $35,000 sapphire bodied CAR70 cartridge featuring the one piece Orbray lab grown diamond cantilever/stylus fitted into a sapphire tube.
Soundsmith showed a $19,000 Kudos moving iron cartridge featuring what Soundsmith's Peter Ledermann claims is a "nearly indestructible" cantilever that took years to develop. A re-tip costs $900, so factor that into your buying decisions.
"Boron is back with a vengeance" according to the U.K. based Audio-Technica rep who showed the new VMx cartridge featuring fewer coil windings using a new copper wire formulation said to improve sonics. Finally, this cartridge features threaded holes so no more finger fumbling with tiny nuts (that doesn't sound right).
But more importantly, boron is now available for cantilevers throughout much of the Audio-Technica line, including same pricing for boron as for aluminum. The number strewn A-T line is well explained by Ed Forth in the video.
Reed displayed a new optical cartridge it developed in cooperation with DS Audio along with a new Equalizer/headphone amp and power supply. The cartridge has a unique feature that allows you to unscrew a front mounted circular plug to gain access to the cartridge interior to suck out dust.
TechDAS introduced a new Air Force IV turntable that fits between the mid-priced (with the TechDAS line) Air Force III and the lowest priced Air Force V. The new IV features all of the expected Air Force features including an air bearing platter and vacuum hold-down but steps up from the V with a separate motor and a one piece platter. Price is around $35,000. The recently introduced Air Force 10 air bearing tone arm (around $40,000) made for a costly but fine sounding combo.
Thrax showed its first solid state phono preamp. The fully balanced dual differential handsome design features a large screen showing all adjustment settings, which are settable from the front panel. Price is $9000.
Thales/EMT's Micha Huber did an informative "show and tell" (and hear) demo in the Stenheim room in which he showed various stylus profiles and played music using them, beginning with the low information but pleasing sounding spherical stylus. The final demo was of the Exquisite cartridge featuring a one piece ceramic cantilever/coil former. I raved about the version i reviewed--next to the top of the line—that I purchased, but I was unable to do direct quick comparisons. Here, with cartridges mounted in plug-in head shells attendees were able to hear the various styli and cantilever iterations and it made clear that the Xquisite is as spectacular sounding as it sounded not directly compared to others.
One of the show's highlights was the Soulution 787 turntable featuring a stationary arm and a moving platter. Soulution's Cyril Hammer explains how it works.
This 40 minute video covers all of this and more and still there will be more over the next week as the editing continues!
This video is more about the saxophonist Jerome Sabbagh than it is about me. I didn't produce the thumbnail !!!!!
