Sony Lissa > Reviews (2)

After having most of my room hooked up to my PC, I thought it was about time my Hi-Fi followed this trend. After looking at what was on offer it was SONY that raised my eyebrow with their Lissa system. Three separates that are linked together by just 1 cable. I'm not a big fan of cable mess, in fact I find it a pain in the neck, having to follow cables to see where they go, tie them up out of the way, you know what I'm talking about. With this Hi-Fi it's non-existent, SONY call it their i.LINK technology. This allows the data to be transmitted to be both digital audio and control data. So this means all those pesky cables that you try to keep hidden have been minimised to just 1 cable.

Anyway, enough cable talk you want to hear about the Hi-Fi itself, well without further ado, here we go…
The 3 separates are divided into a Receiver/Amplifier which is a FM/AM RDS tuner for all your radio needs and also puts out 2x50W on a fantastic pair of SONY's top of the range 'Pascal' speakers (I'll talk about them in a bit). A Minidisc player which can provide Longtime recording (MDLP) which crams more onto your disk. It can also record High-Speed-Dubbing between the CD-MD at 4x normal speed, very handy when in a rush, or if your impatient like me, it also has all the recording/editing functions you will ever need for your MD. Finally there is the CD player which although produces High Quality QS sound (a thing of SONY's) can only hold one CD at a time which is a little bit annoying but is not the end of the world.
Another nifty fact about this is the H.A.T.S (High Quality Digital Audio) Jitter control to improve the sound output quality. This gives the output a really crisp sound that doesn't just better my previous Hi-Fi, it beats it into the ground.

The look of Lissa is again something to thank SONY for. The 3 units although not as thin as other systems are extremely flat and take up hardly any space height-wise, so storing them on a shelf is great. With a brushed metal casing and blue display, a nice modern look is presented, it also matches my TV and DVD player really well. The 2 small 'Pascal' speakers look great. Unlike most box speakers, these are an oval shape with 2 larger speakers at each end of the oval and a small tweeter in the middle. Do not be fooled by their size though, they can put out a large amount o bass and music will never sound the same again. They can also be attached to the wall so deciding where to put them is given more options.

The total kit cost just over £600, this included the PC connection kit that has to be bought separately. Although it is a lot for a Hi-Fi, the features and sound it has are astounding it is also part of SONY's QS range which is one of their top spec Hi-Fi's so cheap isn't in this price list. So if you have a bit of money to spend and you want a Hi-Fi that is a bit extra, keep this in mind.