Issue 118    December 2014
Looking Back At 2014... And Looking Forward To 2015
Editorial By Alan Sircom

  It's the end of another year, but this one came tinged with some great sadness. Early in November, it was announced that Harry Pearson, the founder of our sister title The Absolute Sound, had died at the age of 77. His influence on the field of observational audio reviewing is incalculable, and his loss leaves the whole audiophile community diminished. We asked our Chairman and CEO, Thomas B. Martin, Jr. to remember the late, great HP.

This has meant that our coverage of the CanJam at Rocky Mountain Audio Fest and our report on The Hi-Fi Show 2014 will be postponed until the next issue. Our apologies to all those wanting to see the latest headphones and high-end audio devices, but I hope this is acceptable under these difficult circumstances.

However, as I said at first, we are at the end of 2014, and about to welcome in 2015. The audio world has (as ever) gone through some change, and even some changes back. Are we beginning to see a resurgence in CD as we did with LP? Who knows? It's too early to call it either way, but the general switch-over to downloading hasn't happened quite yet, despite the launch of TIDAL high-resolution streaming and HDTracks final arrival to the UK market. We'll explore these new formats, and more, in 2015.

Next month, we'll ring in the New Year with a special Hi-Fi+ calendar. That's right – twelve months of the hottest, top-notch audio pin-ups. Fortunately, those dozen delightful pin-ups will be taken from some of the finest audio products made today, in part because it's a bit too nippy out there at the moment for me to cavort around in my leopard-skin mankini. Maybe next year, if you're 'lucky'... 2014 has been a bumper year for competitions in Hi-Fi+, and with both Audiodesksysteme's Vinyl Cleaner and Peachtree Audio's Nova220SE given away in this issue, 2015 is looking pretty good for the competition haul, too.

However, to round off the year with a bit of joy, here's a list of recent lucky winners. From our National Audio Show prize draw, congratulations go to Malcolm Summers, who wins an iFi Micro iDSD portable headphone amp, preamp, and DAC. Our other lucky iFi winners were Doug Dickinson, Cosmo Hynds, Terry Cymbalisty, and Jeremy Honeybun. Congratulations, too, to Don Howden of Alberta, Canada, who won the excellent Ayon Audio Orion III integrated amplifier, while Gerard Peters of London won the Hi-Fi+ Signature pair of superb Wilson Benesch Square One loudspeakers, Lucas Armstrong of Wellington, New Zealand won a fantastic pair of Final Audio Design Pandora Hope VI headphones, and Matthew Silvester, of Wallington, UK who one the sublime Vertere Pulse R interconnects.

Merry Christmas.

Alan Sircom, Editor Hi-Fi+