Thank you to all our friends who visited the Jaguar Audio room at the 2026 SoCal HiFi Show in Costa Mesa. Parts of our SoCal system resembled our Axpona 2026 setup, but we also had some changes. Our source was the Klaudio Magnezar turntable with the Phasemation PP-5000 cartridge. We went back to the Phasemation EA-1200 phonostage, with dual power supply, which we used at Capital Audiofest.Â
However, the biggest changes were a new integrated amplifier and linestage preamplifier. The amp was the new Enleum Amp-54R, run in current-mode; this is a 50-watt solid-state amp built in Korea. The Amp-54R is a very unique amp in its current mode, because it sounds very immediate. Think of a current amp like an electric car, where the power to the wheels is immediate. The bass is very linear and doesn’t have much boom, so it’s perfect for a smaller room like this. When paired with the right speakers, these amps are very unique and special. The 54R includes an internal phono preamplifier (also current), and the upcoming 44R will have slightly less power, but will include a headphone amplifier.
Our linestage preamp was intended to be the new Audio Research Reference 7. This model was just starting to ship a couple of weeks before the show, and we asked the company to fully burn it in for us. However, thanks to the unreliability of UPS, the shipment did not arrive on Wednesday, as expected, or Thursday, so Audio Research was good enough to next-day their also-new Reference 20 to us for the show; we were installing this component into the system around noon on Friday (a perfect example of the nightmare adventures that sometimes accompany these HiFi shows). These are amazing components, and we can’t wait to use the Reference 7 in the Jaguar Reference System.
We had a special treat on Sunday morning. LA-based mastering engineer, Kevin Gray, who masters all the Rhino HiFi reissues, and has worked on thousands of albums since the 1970s, came in to listen with us. After offering to play something for him, Kevin requested we play his test pressing of “The Gallery”, a new album from LA jazz artist, Jacob Wendt; this album was just recorded in Kevin’s new studio, as well as produced, mastered, and released on Kevin’s label, Cohearent Records.
Kevin liked our setup so much, he asked if he could leave the test pressing for us to play throughout the day, then Jacob came by later to play more music from the new album. The new album is available for preorder now, and Jacob’s last album, Silver Street, is available for order now.
