Scott Wilkinson

Network music servers perform several distinct functions—acquiring and storing digital-audio files, managing and selecting what you want to listen to, streaming those files over a wired and/or wireless network, and receiving those files so the music can be played on a sound system. Most music-server products provide all these functions in an integrated system, but Scottish high-end long-timer Linn has taken a different approach. It's Digital Stream players, including the flagship Klimax DS, are strictly client devices that receive audio streams from the network and play them on any sound system.

Many have tried, but few have succeeded in simulating a convincing surround soundfield with conventional headphones. Several years ago, I heard a demo of one such system from UK-based Smyth Research, and it really knocked my socks off. That was a prototype, but the technology, known as Smyth Virtual Surround (SVS), is now available in a commercial product called the Realiser A8.