Sean: Although I think you know that I would not buy a piece of gear based on specs, and I am sure you wouldn't either, I do want to join you in commending Stereophile for being just about last man standing when it comes to publishing original test results. In fact, I think they should expand the practice: Test the gear written up in the columns, not just the reviews; Add more speaker tests to help quantify dynamic and frequency response vs. distortion + noise; And like JA finally got around to doing this month - but seemingly only because it involved his beloved LP12 - start including measurements when it comes to analog gear. Measurements are a useful check on both gear quality and reviewer accuity.
Having said that though, I haven't got any problems with the specs of any of the pieces mentioned. My only problem with the Pass amp, for instance, is if the true measurements deviate greatly from the manufacturer's claimed measurements - which it seems as though they might - but not with the unit's measured capabilities per se. Yes, it does seem faintly ridiculous to me that an amp the XA160's size, weight, type, and price shouldn't offer more output grunt and linearity, but I don't think you can extrapolate from that into some kind of accelerating trend toward a 'personalized fidelity' paradigm within the industry. And complaining about output impedance in an amp with no global feedback seems a little disingenuous to me. Maybe something was sub-optimal with the test sample anyway, and I'll withold judgement (on this narrow issue) until Pass responds in the magazine.
As for the BAT preamp, it would have been nice had JA included a measurement of its response somewhere in between unity gain and max output. Absent that, I have to infer from his comments that the measured behavior really did not bother him, and that he really did think this piece was well-engineered for use within normal operating parameters. That there might be some slight change in the location of the upper -.5dB point (into average loads) dependent on volume setting does not, to me, seem to be all that unusual, or to disqualify a piece from consideration as a high fidelity instrument. In fact, it seems quite possible to me that such a volume control might well be engineered to deliver superior transparency through the heart of the volume range - no doubt what BAT would contend. And again, I'm not sure what you're driving at with remarks about I/O impedances - the BAT's input impedance was unmeasurably high, and the output impedance seems reasonable for an all-tube design that eschews cathode-followers, and will work fine with plenty of amps.
With the AH! CD player, you're probably right, it certainly does appear as if the response has been slightly tailored to yield a small dip through the 'brightness' range. But hey, customers interested in a heavily modded, tubed version of a mass-market player might find this attractive. And though the rest of the results may not have been stellar, they were all OK, and they're probably of no audible consequence or any great sin at this price.
More to the point, neither you nor I have heard these pieces - the reviewers did. And again, I can see no real basis, just from this anecdotal evidence, to back up your assertion that 'new gear is getting worse' in general.
Having said that though, I haven't got any problems with the specs of any of the pieces mentioned. My only problem with the Pass amp, for instance, is if the true measurements deviate greatly from the manufacturer's claimed measurements - which it seems as though they might - but not with the unit's measured capabilities per se. Yes, it does seem faintly ridiculous to me that an amp the XA160's size, weight, type, and price shouldn't offer more output grunt and linearity, but I don't think you can extrapolate from that into some kind of accelerating trend toward a 'personalized fidelity' paradigm within the industry. And complaining about output impedance in an amp with no global feedback seems a little disingenuous to me. Maybe something was sub-optimal with the test sample anyway, and I'll withold judgement (on this narrow issue) until Pass responds in the magazine.
As for the BAT preamp, it would have been nice had JA included a measurement of its response somewhere in between unity gain and max output. Absent that, I have to infer from his comments that the measured behavior really did not bother him, and that he really did think this piece was well-engineered for use within normal operating parameters. That there might be some slight change in the location of the upper -.5dB point (into average loads) dependent on volume setting does not, to me, seem to be all that unusual, or to disqualify a piece from consideration as a high fidelity instrument. In fact, it seems quite possible to me that such a volume control might well be engineered to deliver superior transparency through the heart of the volume range - no doubt what BAT would contend. And again, I'm not sure what you're driving at with remarks about I/O impedances - the BAT's input impedance was unmeasurably high, and the output impedance seems reasonable for an all-tube design that eschews cathode-followers, and will work fine with plenty of amps.
With the AH! CD player, you're probably right, it certainly does appear as if the response has been slightly tailored to yield a small dip through the 'brightness' range. But hey, customers interested in a heavily modded, tubed version of a mass-market player might find this attractive. And though the rest of the results may not have been stellar, they were all OK, and they're probably of no audible consequence or any great sin at this price.
More to the point, neither you nor I have heard these pieces - the reviewers did. And again, I can see no real basis, just from this anecdotal evidence, to back up your assertion that 'new gear is getting worse' in general.