J.Sikora Standard Max Supreme, KV9 Max Zirconium

In his review of the J.Sikora Initial turntable, Stereophile's resident artist/sage Herb Reichert wrote, "Extended bathing, lighting candles, making tea, and preparing food are ritual work forms that prepare my senses to accept both pleasure and illumination."

- KEN MICALLEF

When it comes to playing records, I too have a ritual. It involves carefully cleaning the vinyl, first on a Pro-Ject VC-33, followed by immersion in a HumminGuru Ultrasonic vinyl cleaner. Before and after, I inspect the record’s grooves with a pricey VisibleDust Quasar R magnifier.¹ Only then—black coffee hot, glasses cleaned, stylus brushed free of contaminants, notepad at hand—am I ready to receive the messages ingrained in a shiny black vinyl disc.

Writing equipment reviews is a similar meditation practice, involving varying degrees of focus, research, and critical listening before setting pen to paper—or, more likely, fingers to keyboard.

Traditions in place, I prepared to review the J.Sikora Standard Max Supreme Turntable ($38,500) and its matching KV9 Max Zirconium Tonearm ($11,750; discounted 10% when purchased with a J.Sikora turntable). After only a few spins, I came to some surprising preliminary conclusions.

An upgraded version of J.Sikora’s Standard Max, the Standard Max Supreme is built like a heavy-metal layer cake, each massive section supporting another, from its oversized isolation platform to its 40lb Delrin platter and its massive record weight. The Standard Max Supreme was built up in my listening room piece by piece like the Great Pyramid of Giza, with almost as many workers needed to assemble it to its altarlike form. Almost as many.

The Supreme upgrade included material/metal changes in all areas of the turntable's design, following J.Sikora's practice of utilizing mass loading to control resonances. I asked Robert Sikora how his father, company founder Janusz Sikora, a metallurgist by trade, decided which metals to use in the Standard Max Supreme (SMS) and where they should go.