Jordan Mitchell

DALI speakers have been on my shortlist since I first heard an Oberon 5 push warm, room-filling sound through a small listening room three years ago. Since then, our team has been running a long-term listening project on the brand, putting six current DALI bookshelf, floorstanding, on-wall, and center-channel models through real-world home theater and … Read more

I still remember the first time I dropped a powered sub into my daily driver. It was an older Civic with a tired factory head unit, no RCA outputs, and absolutely zero low end. Within an hour of bolting down a slim under-seat unit, the kick drum finally had weight. I have been chasing that … Read more

After 90 days of hands-on testing in three different vehicles (a 2016 Civic, a 2019 Tacoma, and a 2007 FJ Cruiser), I can say with confidence: the Pioneer DMH-2660NEX is the best apple carplay head unit for most drivers in . It pairs a responsive 6.8-inch capacitive touchscreen with rock-solid wired CarPlay, six preamp outputs … Read more

I spent six weeks testing 10 of the most popular portable headphone amps to figure out which ones actually deserve your money in . The Neoteck 16-300 Ohm Portable Headphone Amplifier earned the top spot because it drives demanding 300-Ohm cans like the Sennheiser HD600 with surprising authority while costing almost nothing, and 2.6k+ reviewers … Read more

Finding the best portable DACs for Android used to mean settling for clunky dongles that barely beat your phone’s built-in audio. After spending weeks testing 10 models across Pixel, Samsung Galaxy, and OnePlus phones, our team found something different: today’s portable DACs deliver desktop-grade sound from something that fits on a keychain. Some even add … Read more

Smartphones have gotten good enough at music playback that a casual listener might wonder why anyone still buys a dedicated hi-res audio player in . I wondered the same thing until I plugged a pair of planar magnetics into a $400 Android DAP and heard detail I never knew was buried in tracks I had … Read more

I switched back to a dedicated portable music player three months ago and I have not looked at my phone for music since. After 90 days of daily commutes, long flights, and two home-audio setups, I am convinced that the best portable music players in still beat your smartphone for serious listening. The reasons are … Read more

I learned this the hard way: my first boat stereo died in 14 months because I cheaped out with regular car speakers. Salt spray ate the baskets, the cones crumbled in the sun, and the magnets rusted shut. After that disaster, I tested 12 marine speakers over a full season — saltwater spray, sun exposure, … Read more

Finding the best monoblock car amplifiers can transform your daily drive into a concert on wheels. I have spent the last three months testing these single-channel amps with different subwoofers, wiring configurations, and music genres to see which ones actually deliver on their promises. A monoblock amplifier concentrates all its power into one channel, making … Read more

I have spent more weekends than I care to admit under dashboards with a multimeter in one hand and a subwoofer box in the other. After testing, swapping, and tuning, one thing is obvious to me: the best car amplifiers for subwoofers are not the loudest ones on the spec sheet. They are the ones … Read more