Too many exhibitors saw too little of us. Worse yet, we heard too little of them to write anything fair. We could say they were lovely. We could complain that they sounded terrible. The exhibitors, […]
Alfred Kainz’s Highend-Electronics rooms are quickly moving to the top of my must-see list. Recent shows have let you count on seeing some very large KR Audio tubes mated to some very large Voxativ speakers. […]
Where. Do. You. Even. Start? Music First Audio is part of Stevens & Billington. S&B does magnetics. MFA is the brand of the boxed product. MFA California is Warren Jarrett, who is a complete madman. […]
As I’ve mentioned, the California Audio Show is less of an industry event and more of a dealer show. The room run by Steven Lester was a fine example of that, with audio quality taking […]
Pass Labs was on hand despite their lack of a Bay Area dealer. We listened to vinyl here, spun on a Merrill-Williams REAL turntable, with a Triplanar arm and an Ortofon MC Anna cartridge. The […]
The California Audio Show is less of an industry event and more of a dealer show. This means something interesting in practice. Instead of manufacturers demonstrating their most stunning audio, what you get is folks demonstrating what […]
Forum favorite Jim Salk (of Salk Signature Sound) brought two pairs of speakers to the show, his Soundscape 8 ($7995) and Veracity ST ($4195). The source was the superb Auralic Vega DAC fed by Salk’s own […]
All of the audio shows I’ve attended have been blessed with live music, but I’m sorry to say that I haven’t often taken advantage of this for more than a few minutes. There’s always something […]
In your head Our label mate, Mike Mercer, tugged on our coats a bit on Friday to let us know that we were getting off easy. He was going to cover the Headmasters show-within-a-show, and […]
This room featured Von Schweikert Audio‘s new VR-100 XS speakers ($145,000 for the set). These consist of a four piece set: two towers with four 7″ magnesium-coned woofers, two 5″ magnesium mid-range drivers, and a […]
Soundscape Audio & Video inhabited the San Bruno suite on the third floor, turning this from an average hotel suite into a miniature approximation of an excellent hi-fi showroom, with four systems on display. The […]
It was nice to see some Audio Note UK gear that I had not previously seen at other shows. This room featured the E/SEC Signature loudspeakers ($73,000/pair), M9 phono preamp ($146,000), and fully balanced Ongaku […]
This unique room, hosted by the affable Robert Spence of Affirm Audio and the garrulous Rick Schultz of High Fidelity Cables, showcased Affirm Audio‘s Immersion loudspeakers ($20,000) and High Fidelity Cables’ new wares. Amplification was […]
Have some sympathy for SimpliFi‘s unfortunate Tim Ryan. He won the “show conditions” lottery this time out when his truck broke down on the way to the show. How did the room sound? On Friday […]
Audio Physic‘s North American importer, Reinhard Goerner, showed up with a box of records to front another of Audio Vision SF’s rooms. Unlike their glorious KEF room, or their perfectionist Dynaudio room, this was an […]
Yet Another Audio Vision SF setup resided in a barely ventilated cube at the end of the hall. This setup centered on Dynaudio’s C2 Signature speakers ($15k), an impossible room, and really, really lousy air […]
“I want you to go to the Legacy room,” Scot said. It was probably midnight on the East Coast. I couldn’t imagine why he thought he’d need to tell me that. “You’re high,” I said. […]
The second floor Cedar room was filled with a system fronted by show-sponsor Phasure. Phasure’s NOS1 dac handled the both number crunching and playback duties. Everything was controlled from a Windows PC running Phasure’s playback […]
Mal and I arranged to pop into the Zen/Triode room a little early on Saturday, in the hopes of getting some photos that weren’t full of people’s feet. This was particularly necessary as the room […]
Napa Acoustic was on hand to demonstrate, once again, that quality sound and affordability are not actually mutually exclusive. Stunningly, one could have walked out with everything in this room (three systems!) for less than […]
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