The dreamboatA completely new product category. Or rather the wonder-ful transfer of the old radiogram into the modern era. Ly-ravox has produced in the shape of the Stereomaster SM2 the most tuneful all-in-one component of the present day.

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Whith what shall I compare this luxury ship? In the early 1960s, my father once splashed

out on a radiogram for the family. Now an heirloom that has found a place of honour in a basement room. More in-depth research reveals that back then the good old radiogram cost several months‘ salary. On its left a quality record player, on the right storage for record-cleaning materials, in the midd-le a large-format radio. That‘s what multimedia was like fifty years ago.The Lyravox brand‘s designers will have been as-

sailed by a related chain of association: everything in one component, all elegantly finished. Everything included that modern man needs. The price of a ‚Stereomaster M2‘ is admittedly not a trifling matter, but is however relative. To paraphrase Oscar Wilde‘s famous words: many people know a thing‘s price, but not its value. In the case of the Lyravox the latter is exceptional.Laying down the law against the fast streaming cuboids in their mono affectation. And laying down the law against the global, often loveless production chain. Quite the opposite of conceived in California or Wuppertal and made in China. Admittedly, at the

Author: Andreas Günther

wood in the spirit of Hanseatic tradition – these speakers look good not only on a private yacht, Lyravox proactively mar-kets this option widely as well. Added to this, come the principles of Art Deco – the conscious play of sweeping lines, curves and edges.The Stereomaster SM1 model in piano black displays the idea in almost iconographic style. This too is a message to the customer: you can purchase this unit in many different kinds of wood and finish variants. The custom-made concept lived out in small-run production. For most people seeing it for the first time one puzzle arises above all: what is it? That‘s followed by an even louder: what

can it do? An astonishing amount! In fact, everything that the modern music land-scape expects: stream from a home net-work, stream from Internet radio stations, read music files via USB. The only thing not integrated is a record player from the olden days. One can, however, be con-nected via the classic RCA input. As many option as possible should be thought about before the initial installation.Because, unlike the aforementioned ra-diogram, a Lyravox does not stand on four narrow legs, but gets gripped di-rectly to the wall by brackets. Ideally without any visible cables. Something interior designers will love, with the tra-

Northern lights for the Hanseatic firm: Lyravox buy their chassis from Scan Speak – including the Danes‘ legendary ring radiator. The small wide-bandwidth speaker (top right) consciously emits out to the side.

most recent high-end trade show a fair few people ambled admiringly past the Lyravox stand – and assumed the brand was Italian. A designer product.A mix including the elegant craftsmanship qualities of northern Italy. Plus a certain touch of noblesse, such as is predomi-nantly encountered in the cultural circles of arte, musica and, indeed, nobiltà. Add to that the melodic name with its open vowels. But they were wrong. Lyravox is an out-and-out German company. In fact, an out-and-out Hanseatic company. They do their thinking, manufacturing and li-ving in Hamburg.It was here around two years ago that Dr. Götz von Laffert and Jens R. Wie-tschorke had the initial idea behind the business. Today, both are directors of the company and, although they will not openly admit it, also representatives of the target group. That is, predominantly men, who when it comes to high-end audio want to see neither frilly stereo cabinets in their living room nor lamina-ted plastic handbags with iPhone integ-ration. Gathered around Laffert and Wie-tschorke is a team taking care of form, marketing and, of course, serious acou-stic design.What‘s behind the name? ‚Lyravox‘ sounds naturally close to the radiogram of bygone days, plus it has that Italo/Latin flair. Above all, however, it is an educated middle-class nod to the lyre of the Greek god Apollo and the vox of the human voice. On top of that comes the style of the design. Which goes in twodirections: on the one hand you feel the strong link to the elegant working of

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desmen doing the work of concealing a cable duct for Ethernet and power out of sight behind the plaster. And if I ever want to quickly plug in a USB stick? Then I use the discretely hidden port under-neath the middle of the unit. And if I‘m actually still one of those conservative people who take CDs down from the shelf? Then I‘m delighted by the centrally, almost invisibly embedded slot of the internal CD drive from Teac.Somebody has put a lot of thought here into efficiency and into integration into an extremely reduced design. As much as the overall component‘s design style looks elegantly unique, in its options it

is just as elegantly quiet. And in its con-trol by the user: supplied with it is a re-mote control with display and charging station and for anyone who wants things even more elegant, the company‘s own app can be loaded onto iPhone, iPad or Android components. Although this tech-nology is not really all their own. Lyravox is using the services of a major supplier on the world market, Audivo, who have tailored the software for remote control and app for the Hamburg-based com-pany.In detail: app and remote control list the available media, the connections, formats, artists and track resolution – in short, the complete spectrum of all that

is currently possible and required. The concept worked reliably, even on our pre-production test unit, while the Lyra-vox team continued to iron out the last few software bugs. So: top marks in terms of lean, targeted user prompts.In their acoustic conception Lyravox are not so lean: they want to achieve so-mething, great sound from, after all, 40 kilograms – and on top of that, still at the elite level, in high-end stereo. In light of the structural form this would be what one commonly understands as a challen-ge – for unlike with two separate louds-peakers the chassis here can neither be selectively aligned to one listening loca-tion, nor is this location at all the overall architecture‘s target.The sweet spot does not apply. The Lyravox aim is to compre-hensively pack the living room into a multi-dimensional sound. To do this Ly-ravox uses a mixture of hardware and software. The tangible part is refined: the Hamburg team buy in from other northerners, the Danes of ScanSpeak. Inset on the front of each unit are two 18W/4531G01 bass/mid-range drivers. The treble range is handled by one of the Danes‘ finest transducers, the R3004/66200 ring radiator. There is one further transducer pair on board. Hard left and right, two 10F/8414G10 mid/high-range drivers emit out to the sides – designed to broaden the spatial im-pression. In combination with DSP pro-gramming developed in house. Six digi-tal power amps delivering 400 watts fuel the chassis and the mains adapter pro-vides the separation between the >

The central brain: German specialists Audivo supply a tailor-made combination of streaming board (top) and DSP circuit board (bot-tom), which houses analogue and digital inputs as well.

LyravoxStereomaster SM2 - 170List price: 19.700 EuroGuarantee period: 3 JahreWeight: 39,7 kgSize (W x H x D): 170 x 30 x 23 cm Surfaces: piano black, pianowhite, macassar, oiled walnut,Siamese rosewood, natural euca-lyptus, white washed oak.

Distributor: : Lyravox Gerätemanufaktur GmbH & Co. KG Hopfensack 1420457 Hamburg

Telephone: +49 (0)40 320897980Website: www.lyravox.de

The measurementsThe frequency response shows a little peak around 1.5kHz but is otherwise per-fectly linear. The peak was due to a bug in the early DSP software which manifested itself after the listening test but before the measurements. It has since been ironed out, at the same time reducing the distortion – which is very low even in the non-corrected version.

source supply and the power preparers.For anyone who needs more: our test model was 170 centimetres long. Lyravox offers versions 200 and 240 centimetres long as well – upwards combined with up to ten chassis and an internal, impul-se-compensated subwoofer).If you look under the hood, you discover the tweeters‘ special alignment – their axes crossing three metres ahead of the components. Very attentive readers will see behind many of the base concept‘s values an old JBL Paragon, likewise a one-component loudspeaker, from the early stereo year of 1957.In our test we quickly stumble upon a very key weak spot: ourselves. For a spea-ker unit like the Lyravox Stereomaster SM2 a professionally configured listening room is only, let‘s say, partially suited. The concept lives from the diversity of the reflections – if the room has too much sound damping, the stereo effect beco-mes small. Plus: how do you screw a test unit to the fine acoustic panelling? We had to employ a makeshift solution – and initially placed the Lyravox on loudspea-ker stands. Which showed us that this sound component calls for the ideal height and the greatest possible proxi-mity to the rear wall. Otherwise the bass reproduction becomes imprecise and the positioning of sound loses a great deal of panorama. The good message for the end customer: you don‘t have to know anything or pay attention to anything – a Lyravox component gets delivered, ba-lanced, fixed and taught to sing by the dealer. The two company founders do

not believe in fully automatic adaptation to a given room. They have consciously decided that only a professional should perform the procedure of microphone analyses and volume adjustment. Then you can start to be amazed!The Lyravox is geared to pressure – the bass thrust appeared with phenomenal

Included: A display remote control – Lyravox has also developed an app for iOS and Android.

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AUDIOphile potential

RecommendationThe dealer takes care of the initial installation – including fine ad-justment. The room itself should neither be less than 20m2, nor be too heavily damped.

effortlessspacious and soft

neutralauthentic

Test- CDElement of Crime

The new ‚Lieblingsfarben und Tiere‘ CD is as usual worldly wise in its lyrics and consciously not mixed as show music. Very complex in graduation – only the really good transducers cre-ate space and harmonious closeness.

The authorAndreas Günther

Involved in the industry for years – as a trained journalist with a music degree in the background. Classical music is his metier, the concert hall the best source. But always fascinated by how well big music is transferred via loudspeakers.

AUDIOphile charactergripping

emotional anddynamic

immediatehigh resolution

presence. Nobody in the listening team would have believed that possible from such an elegantly shaped unit. The dan-ger of podgy show bass during the tran-sition to the lower mid-range has been perfectly resolved by the developers. It had contour and character – which in turn corresponded with a very up-front lower treble range. Or to put it less technically: the Lyravox looked for the perfect mix between thrust and transparency.‚Hvoom‘ and ‚Chiiih‘ any system can do. The Lyravox relies more on the mid-range with slight treble emphasis for more tempo and clarity. As if it was a British studio monitor with that tad extra of fresh air supply. Big orchestral music lies perfectly on this wave. Ravel‘s ‚La Valse‘ at original concert volume had exactly the right weight distribution bet-ween grand dynamics and grand phil-harmonics.Dynamic impulse and space. Not resol-ved right to last piece of spatial informa-tion, but gripping in the effect of the live sense of being there. Which didn‘t totally work with a concert grand: the harmo-nious closeness, the analysis of an inst-rument ‚all of a piece‘ seemed slightly brittle. What counts here is probably the last ounce of fine adjustment to the in-

dividual listening room – and I have to admit: a grand piano is the biggest chal-lenge.To be able to properly map this mixture of steel, wood, felt and not least reflec-ting parquet floor both harmoniously and dynamically. Voices are easier in this re-spect. Apparently the art is in placing them in front of the loudspeakers – the Lyravox scored here with its fine chassis. The membranes appeared fast and lively. As Adele began the title song to James Bond‘s ‚Skyfall‘, the lady appeared in the room, right in front of the Lyravox. As if it was a serenade in a close circle of friends, great presence and finely sup-ported by the almost provocatively re-laxed nature of the Lyravox. For a short daydream it was possible to imagine you were in a London gentlemen‘s club: elegant seating, ele-gant voice and elegant sound producer. It is perhaps precisely here that the gre-atest attraction lies – the fact that the Lyravox serves this cliché and simultane-ously contradicts it. With thoroughly honest audiophile ambition.Not only are the manufacturers – hopefully – getting richer with their business and design idea. The world, too, is definitely being enri-ched by this new product category. <

For those who know how to read the sym-bol: J and G stand for

the two company foun-ders, Jens and Götz.