Mr. WONG is an audiophile whom have journeyed with a number of local and abroad audiophile for some years. He shared to me that only the past eight years (give or take) that he has taken the audio journey more seriously.
He is a firm believer of the importance of having a dedicated room or space for the hobby, where some tuning and tweaking can be done to express the ultimate performance of the cherished audio components.
Recently, Mr. WONG purchased the loudspeakers of his dream, the TAD Reference One, Mk.2 and done up a sizable and dedicated audio room for his audio set up that comprised of the Accuphase Mono Amplifier and a DCS CD player.
Given that wonderful news and some months of setting up, I got myself and others invited into his home for a listening session. He treated us to a generous dinner. There was where I got to know WONG a little better!
He started the listening session with a track of lady vocal. Her voice was presented with control, lean and clean but emotionally engaging enough to nearly make you forget it was a digital playback.
He continued the listening session with material of similar genres and again it proved to me the above attributes. I congratulated him on his job well done in setting up his room (‘s Acoustics) and system components.
It’s time for some serious and demanding musics! He obliged with a GRP All Star Big Bang music at peak 100 dB!
Hearing that system really PLAY (!) made my body shake! I really enjoyed that presentation! Technically, there was no overlapping of frequencies thus each tone was cleanly and clearly presented. To me, that is crucial to enjoy a complicated and multi-layered musical presentation.
Next, WONG took up the challenge to play a classical piece of deep bombastic bass, Reference Recording’s Fiesta. That piece will put a toll even on the best of audio system. I would say his efforts and his audio system survived it. The dynamics and the extreme low were presented with control and of satisfying quantity.
Finally, as for our last call of the night, we opted for Sheffield Lab Drum Track at peak 100dB!
WOW! Those mid basses attacks were more impressive than LIVE! I doubt real life kit drum will kick you as hard as those TAD Reference One Mk.2!
I left WONG’s audio set up with gratitude knowing I have experienced and enjoyed a man’s work and it’s fruit.