“Name another recent technological advance that has changed the audio scene as much as DS Audio’s optical cartridges have. If you can’t, that’s because there is none,” says US hi-fi magazine The Absolute Sound. Moreover, the company just keeps on innovating, enhancing its offerings with technology trickled down from its top-of-range masterpieces.
The DS-W3 is a case in point, a ‘third generation’ optical cartridge that’s “quite simply the best sounding ‘affordable’ optical cartridge that [reviewer Jonathan Valin] has heard in his system.”
Then again, if you’ve got the budget to go all out, DS Audio’s flagship Grand Master phono cartridge delivers “the most complete and most realistic reproduction of the music and musicians on LPs [reviewer Jonathan Valin] has ever heard.” What’s more, it “comes closer to the sound of R2R tape than any other phono cartridge on the market”.
But if affordability is key, don’t despair. The ‘one up from entry-level’ DS-003 has already won two coveted awards from The Absolute Sound: a Golden Ear Award 2022 and Product of the Year 2022. And with good reason, since this is another “trickledown masterpiece” that sports many of the benefits of the Grand Master for around one tenth of the price. Like the Grand Master and the DS-W3, the DS-003 uses ‘third generation’ optical cartridge technology, including a new dual-mono optical/electrical generator with independent LEDs and photodetectors for each channel. As a result, “channel separation is greatly enhanced—to the benefit of soundstaging and imaging.” At the same time, a reduction in mass “improves tracking and lowers noise to a near-inaudible level, increasing resolution and dynamic range”, while thicker wiring and improved equalization “help render tonality in the same lusciously rich, full-bodied, deep-reaching fashion that you hear on the Grand Master, with [open reel] tape, and in life.”
The ION-001 is DS Audio’s fourth award winner. It’s a free-standing ionizer that smooths out tracking by neutralising the static charge of your records. “It also somehow (and more importantly) neutralises timbre, in the sense of bringing tonal balance closer to colorlessly natural top to bottom,” says The Absolute Sound.
Finally, the ES-001 Eccentricity Stabiliser “is a breakthrough product from a company that seems to specialize in breakthrough products”. This “little marvel of optical technology” reads the concentricity of a record’s run-out grooves via infra-red light and show you what adjustments are needed to perfectly centre your record on the platter, allowing your stylus to track as its intended to. For anyone who’s deeply into analogue it’s “a game-changer and a must-own item.”
Find out more at https://ds-audio-w.biz and locate your nearest UK dealer via distributor www.soundfowndations.co.uk
Discover the complete list of Award winners in the March 2024 issue of The Absolute Sound.
David Denyer PR | The hi-fi specialist 