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OK, so here's what I saw and did:
I attended the show on Saturday, and boy am I glad that I had prepurchased the tickets. The line to buy tickets was rediculous, and after buying them people had to then register (interests, family income(!) etc). I received the 'red carpet' treatment which was basically picking up my name tag. After getting my name tag, I looked through the shows brochure to find out who was where and mark off who I wanted to see. The show was spread out among 6 floors of the hotel. The first 2 floors were ballroom floors with conference rooms, whereas the upper 4 floors were regular hotelroom floors. The displays on the first 2 floors were not bad, but the displays on the upper 4 floors were horrible at best. Overcrowded, hot, and claustrophobic, not to mention the lines in front of the elevators to get to these floors (which I quickly bypassed via stairs and freight elevators). I also noticed that the show was more geared towards high-end 2-channel audio than multi-channel surround sound (nice for me, not for others). I couldn't take any pictures because the rooms that I did manage to get to had the equipment set up nicely with no views of thier 'business side'.
Here's a listing in order of what I felt was the best sound taking into consideration sub-optimal rooms and overcrowding:
1. AudioPlus Services, a French Manufacturer importer, had incredible sound coming through a pair of JM Lab Utopias being driven by YBA Passion amps, and front-ended by Audio Refinement. Even though I was in a rear corner of the room, the sound was breath-taking.
2. Audio Connection, a dealer in NJ, had a pair of Vandersteen 5 speakers being driven by Cary V12 monblocks and Wadia source equipment. Very lush sounding.
3. I forget the name of the dealer, but they had Piega speakers drivern by monstrous Halcro amps and Accuphase front end. Very nice.
4. Sony's SACD demo. They had what seemed to be a whole slew of up and coming multi-channel players.
5. The Krell/Faroudja demo by Sound by Singer was nice and showed what you can do with $150,000 in change (minus speakers).
6. Red Rose Music's system was nice and well-priced.
Here's a list of what did not impress me:
1. BAT electronics and AvanteGarde speakers: Blah.
2. Dynaudio room: unimpressive, flat.
3. Newform Research: a pair of D-65's, nice sounding but no horizontal dispersion.
4. Anthem/Sonic Frontiers: Nice-looking gear, but wouldn't it be nice to plug it in?
5. LINN: blah.
6. Harry Pearsons Reference System: A guy tapped me on the shoulder and asked if I would like to audition HP's reference system. I said sure. After a 15 minute wait, I got to listen to $280,000 worth of gear ($53,000 of which was cabling) that did not impress me.
7. Mirage OBM-1 (?) speakers with Classe apms: nice for chest-thumping rap.
8. Magnepan decided to show off thier 20.1's at a dealers location outside the hotel. WTF?
While there was a lot more to hear, I only listened to these systems but did get to eye a lot of other stuff. I did happen to personally meet some industry insiders:
1. Richard Vandersteen and wife
2. Dennis Hadd (Cary)
3. Mark Levinson
4. Ray Kimber
5. David Chesky
6. Chad Kassem (Acoustic Sounds)
7. Colleen Cardas
8. Lew Johnson (CJ)
I also managed to buy some good CD's and vinyl at good prices.
So, other than the fact that it was way overcrowded (2 other conventions at the hotel the same day, not to mention a visit by Bill Clinton), it was nice seeing and hearing mega-buck equipment. I came home that evening and plopped down in front of my stereo with a cold beer and listened to music for a few hours. Sorry for not fulfilling any requests of equipment to see or take pictures of, but I am somewhat averse to overcrowding and if I saw that a room was SRO, I quickly moved on to the next.
Q.
I attended the show on Saturday, and boy am I glad that I had prepurchased the tickets. The line to buy tickets was rediculous, and after buying them people had to then register (interests, family income(!) etc). I received the 'red carpet' treatment which was basically picking up my name tag. After getting my name tag, I looked through the shows brochure to find out who was where and mark off who I wanted to see. The show was spread out among 6 floors of the hotel. The first 2 floors were ballroom floors with conference rooms, whereas the upper 4 floors were regular hotelroom floors. The displays on the first 2 floors were not bad, but the displays on the upper 4 floors were horrible at best. Overcrowded, hot, and claustrophobic, not to mention the lines in front of the elevators to get to these floors (which I quickly bypassed via stairs and freight elevators). I also noticed that the show was more geared towards high-end 2-channel audio than multi-channel surround sound (nice for me, not for others). I couldn't take any pictures because the rooms that I did manage to get to had the equipment set up nicely with no views of thier 'business side'.
Here's a listing in order of what I felt was the best sound taking into consideration sub-optimal rooms and overcrowding:
1. AudioPlus Services, a French Manufacturer importer, had incredible sound coming through a pair of JM Lab Utopias being driven by YBA Passion amps, and front-ended by Audio Refinement. Even though I was in a rear corner of the room, the sound was breath-taking.
2. Audio Connection, a dealer in NJ, had a pair of Vandersteen 5 speakers being driven by Cary V12 monblocks and Wadia source equipment. Very lush sounding.
3. I forget the name of the dealer, but they had Piega speakers drivern by monstrous Halcro amps and Accuphase front end. Very nice.
4. Sony's SACD demo. They had what seemed to be a whole slew of up and coming multi-channel players.
5. The Krell/Faroudja demo by Sound by Singer was nice and showed what you can do with $150,000 in change (minus speakers).
6. Red Rose Music's system was nice and well-priced.
Here's a list of what did not impress me:
1. BAT electronics and AvanteGarde speakers: Blah.
2. Dynaudio room: unimpressive, flat.
3. Newform Research: a pair of D-65's, nice sounding but no horizontal dispersion.
4. Anthem/Sonic Frontiers: Nice-looking gear, but wouldn't it be nice to plug it in?
5. LINN: blah.
6. Harry Pearsons Reference System: A guy tapped me on the shoulder and asked if I would like to audition HP's reference system. I said sure. After a 15 minute wait, I got to listen to $280,000 worth of gear ($53,000 of which was cabling) that did not impress me.
7. Mirage OBM-1 (?) speakers with Classe apms: nice for chest-thumping rap.
8. Magnepan decided to show off thier 20.1's at a dealers location outside the hotel. WTF?
While there was a lot more to hear, I only listened to these systems but did get to eye a lot of other stuff. I did happen to personally meet some industry insiders:
1. Richard Vandersteen and wife
2. Dennis Hadd (Cary)
3. Mark Levinson
4. Ray Kimber
5. David Chesky
6. Chad Kassem (Acoustic Sounds)
7. Colleen Cardas
8. Lew Johnson (CJ)
I also managed to buy some good CD's and vinyl at good prices.
So, other than the fact that it was way overcrowded (2 other conventions at the hotel the same day, not to mention a visit by Bill Clinton), it was nice seeing and hearing mega-buck equipment. I came home that evening and plopped down in front of my stereo with a cold beer and listened to music for a few hours. Sorry for not fulfilling any requests of equipment to see or take pictures of, but I am somewhat averse to overcrowding and if I saw that a room was SRO, I quickly moved on to the next.
Q.
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