Random thoughts from an audio show...

jaxwired

Hi everyone. A good sized high end audio show is being held in my city this weekend and yesterday was day 1. Thought I'd share some of my impressions. Sorry, I forgot to bring my camera. I spent about 5 hours there and easily heard 20 systems. Many very expensive systems. Lots of tube equipment. Some of the brands names off the top of my head were: Krell, YG Acoustics, Legacy, Creek, Epos, Roksan, Davone, Peachtree, Thiel, dozens more.



1. I was blown away by a 4 speaker audio demonstration of blue ray audio playing. This was recorded at twice the sample rate of redbook CDs. It was amazing. They used 4 Theil CS3.7s and a wolf projector to show the video of the artists playing. Wow! Talked with the company rep and I think I'm going to buy an oppo universal player and explore this hi def music. Really the only thing at the entire show that just blew me away. I've never heard anything so lifelike and clean. I was truly hypnotized by it.



2. But regarding all these other high end 2 channel systems, I was happy to find out that these 50k and 100k systems just didn't sound much better than my system. In fact, quite a few of them I found too bright or even shrill. And apparently most people listen much louder than I do. WAY too loud in my opinion. I was just not very impressed. Of all the super high dollar systems only the Krell/YG acoustics combo was superb. As for the rest of them, I kid you not, I wouldn't trade my kit for any of them. Of course, room acoustics were part of the problem.



3. There's definately no "best" or "perfect" system. The one thing that amazed me was how different all these high dollar systems sounded. It's not like as you go up in price it just keeps getting better. Nope it just get's different, not better.



4. The Epos/Creek system was terrific. I've never heard Epos before and I really enjoyed the sound. I would not call it neutral though. It was very detailed and forward sounding which might be tiring long term, but for my demo I found them to be excellent and musical (Epos M22i).



5. To be honest, I really enjoyed the lower end systems (like the creek/epos) more than the expensive systems.



6. This show really deflated any desire I would ever have to get nuts and spend crazy money on this stuff. I just didn't see the value in these super high end systems. I'm not talking about a 10k system, I'm talking about 40k or 80k or even 200k systems. It's not that some of them weren't impressive, it's just that my level of musical enjoyment didn't increase over my system with any of these except the notable 4 channel hi res blue ray system.



7. By far, my favorite room at the show was a company called madisound out of madison wisconson. They sell speaker kits. They had a speaker kit for $600 a pair which includes everything including cabinets, crossovers, drivers, post plate, damping material, wire, etc. If you had told me these speaker cost $3000 I would not have blinked. They call them the "Loki". And they use a seas coincident driver with the tweeter mounted in the middle of the woofer like a KEF speaker. These sounded good, I mean really really good. And once I heard the price I was drooling. The speaker cabinet is a real wood veneer too.

8. Something else this show highlighted for me. I listen to real music. I buy lots of music and I buy current artists. For a lot of people that get obsessed with the audiophile hobby, they either forget about the music they love or they let the hobby change their tastes. Instead of buying great music, they start buying music that makes their HiFi sound great. These are not the same thing at all. I can't tell you how many of these 50k and 100k systems that used freakish music to demo their gear. I mean really bizarre stuff. Sure it had amazing dynamic range and the recoding was spectacular, but it wasn't good music, it was generally awful music. I made a compilation CD of CD quality tracks that I took with me and most rooms at the show were willing to play it. This allowed me to assess each system with the same few tracks. One guy told me how surprised he was that more people don't do this. I guess people are afraid to ask.

punk-roc

I'm just in the nascent stage of my audio journey, but i've also noticed the general trend of letting the need to show your setups dynamics over-shadow what you would normally listen too. The main problem i'm encountering, which is nothing earth-shattering and already well-known, is most of the music i like (which isn't radio-rock/pop stuff) isnt recorded all that well.. so its hard for a good setup to make it "sing".

We'll see, i'm excited to find those few bands i like that record/produce great sounding music that i'm just not aware of yet

Jason

hearingimpared

Nice report Jax. No turntables? I believe you are correct about the room acoustics causing the high, high end systems to sound, well, not all that. I've heard some high end gear at shows that sounded like **** but when I heard the same or similar in my favorite brick & mortar store it was a whole new ballgame.

NO TURNTABLES? What's up with that?:(

jaxwired

Thanks.

Yes, lots of turntables. From low end Regas to Super high end (brands I've never heard of). There's no question that turntables have made a huge comeback. Pretty much every rig there had a turntable. On the other end, more than one wifi iTunes rigs.

Not being a TT guy, I didn't pay too much attention to them. Incedible pieces of gear though. HUGE and impressive.

hearingimpared

jaxwired wrote: »

Thanks.

Yes, lots of turntables. From low end Regas to Super high end (brands I've never heard of). There's no question that turntables have made a huge comeback. Pretty much every rig there had a turntable. On the other end, more than one wifi iTunes rigs.

Not being a TT guy, I didn't pay too much attention to them. Incedible pieces of gear though. HUGE and impressive.

LOL! I figured that and was just busting your balls.:D;)

Funny thing is when I go to a show or a store, I spend most of my time drooling and fiddling with turntables. They're just too sexy.

heiney9

Don't discount the higher end systems just based on what you heard in a "show" atmosphere. Higher end gear is definitely worth it , but like anything else you need to do your homework, figure out what you like and what you are trying to accomplish and then experiment.

Nice post

H9

dkg999

Bluray audio is fantastic! I've bought more concert video's on BD than CD's since I got my BDP. Creek gear and Epos speakers can make for a very nice and not so uber-expensive system.

jaxwired

dkg999,
Question for you or anyone really. Can I take bluray music from the digital out on a bluray player (like say an oppo bd83) and decode it on an external DAC. Does it work just like a normal redbook CD?

tonyb

Curious as to associated gear in the BR - Wolf system. Also,did you get an ear on Legacy's room? Was PBN-Montana there?

jaxwired

Regarding teh BR Wolf System, I didn't get a close look at the electronics, sorry.

Regarding Legacy, yes, I spent a good 15 minutes in there and I got to listen to my demo CD using their flagship speakers. All the electronics were Ayon. Tube amps and redbook CDP. The guy running the demo said they had a tecnical problem and didn't have the normal legacy signal processor in the loop. The legacy speakers were huge of course. The sound was very detailed. THe speakers used two ribbon tweeters and it showed. The legacy gear sounded very good. I wasn't blown away though.

dkg999

jaxwired wrote: »

dkg999,
Question for you or anyone really. Can I take bluray music from the digital out on a bluray player (like say an oppo bd83) and decode it on an external DAC. Does it work just like a normal redbook CD?

I'm not sure. Probably if you're playing a redbook CD that would work. If it's the digital out for the Dolby or PCM 2 ch on a BD, I'm not sure if a normal DAC like my PS Audio DLIII will decode it. I use the analog 5.1 out on my BDP, let it do the decoding.

BottomFeeder

Terrific write up, Jax. You took us right in there with you. & While I'm betting that the uber-expensive equipment would sound better in improved settings, it IS nice to know that once you get to a certain level of sound quality, steps up the ladder aren't so huge anymore.

& I love your comment about how one can start changing one's musical tastes just to show off the system. Too true. Thanks again.

markmarc

Attending an audio show needs to be taken with a grain of salt. Hotel rooms are outrageously difficult to get good sound. Small speakers have a tendency to get more raves as they are more likely to fit the room better sonically.

But with all the limitations it's a great way to spend a day.

pploeser

Hey thanks for the recap of the show. Never been to one myself, but would love to go. Are there any in Ohio?

I've often wondered what I'm missing out on, not having a system that costs $10k, $40k or even more. Maybe I don't need to know, since I don't have that kind of money to spend. Ignorance is bliss right?:rolleyes:

sucks2beme

Sometimes it good to feel your system performs well compared to others.
The alternative is to throw gobs of money around.
But at some point, it gets very hard to step up. You just take
big expensive side steps. Give up one thing for more of another.
There are a lot of great stopping points along the way that will
get the job done very well.

Jetmaker737

Nice post. Thanks for taking the time to record your experience.

The Blu Ray part piqued my curiosity. I'm not really into multi channel, but I wonder if they'd eventually record 2 Ch at the higher sample rate. Would there be an improvement?

Ern Dog

Same here. Blu ray music sounds very intriguing. Does a BR cd sound better than SACD?

jaxwired

Guys, they have hi res 2 channel music right now. The company at the show was itrax.com and there's another company called hdtracks.com. You can download at double CD resolution and play back as long as you have a DAC that can handle that signal. I know my benchmark can do it. These companies have 2 channel stuff as well as the multi-channel stuff. I'm trying to figure out right now if I should go with streaming from my desktop or buy an oppo universal player, but I'm definately going to be trying this soon. I'll report all my findings.

cfrizz

Nice write up. Thanks.

doctor r

I got a chance to tour the Axpona show this past weekend also and agree with alot of jaxwired evaluations. The Wolf 5 in one theatre system had Boulder monoblock amplifiers and Theil 3.6 I believe speakers. You can use an Oppo for the playback of these but you will need a precessor that can take in an HMDI signal. Normal DACs are designed for 2 chanels so you wuld actually need 3 DACs to handl the processing if you could (based on the seminar I attended). The 6 channels from TRAX are actually downloadable from the internet and then you wuold have to have the ability to use 3 two channel precessors to drive the speakers. They did say the new oppo is the best way to go in todays technology. Vinyl was everywhere at the show. The VPI classic with the new Ortofon top of the line MC was used with the VAC amps and King Sound electrostatics for a great system. Soundsmith was there with their strain gauge system, own power amps and speaker lines. The cartridge system was exceptional. Every room seemed to offer analog. Tube amps were driving over 85% of the sytems I heard in the rooms. It was amazing to talk with the distributors, designors, and marketers of some pretty fantastic (in price at least) systems. The designers/builders were by far the most interesting and informative. They loved to just talk about sound and how they tried to make thier designs work. The marketers were, well marketing. The one piece that I found most admired or in awe of for appearance and price" was the Continuum Audio Labs Caliburn turntable. The table and associated aircraft grade aluminum stand rang in at a cost of $149,995.00 for the table and $25,000.00 for the stand. It was something you wanted to get close to and observe but your were very careful to not get close enough that you could be accused of touching. The diversity of sound was amazing. Horn sytems that I found detailed but to bright IMHA along with some rooms having amazingly detailed systems that had no soul. There were a few systems that were just right and made sweet music. One thing that is very clear after this experience is that synergy trumps price.

hearingimpared

Doctor R wrote: »

I got a chance to tour the Axpona show this past weekend also and agree with alot of jaxwired evaluations. The Wolf 5 in one theatre system had Boulder monoblock amplifiers and Theil 3.6 I believe speakers. You can use an Oppo for the playback of these but you will need a precessor that can take in an HMDI signal. Normal DACs are designed for 2 chanels so you wuld actually need 3 DACs to handl the processing if you could (based on the seminar I attended). The 6 channels from TRAX are actually downloadable from the internet and then you wuold have to have the ability to use 3 two channel precessors to drive the speakers. They did say the new oppo is the best way to go in todays technology. Vinyl was everywhere at the show. The VPI classic with the new Ortofon top of the line MC was used with the VAC amps and King Sound electrostatics for a great system. Soundsmith was there with their strain gauge system, own power amps and speaker lines. The cartridge system was exceptional. Every room seemed to offer analog. Tube amps were driving over 85% of the sytems I heard in the rooms. It was amazing to talk with the distributors, designors, and marketers of some pretty fantastic (in price at least) systems. The designers/builders were by far the most interesting and informative. They loved to just talk about sound and how they tried to make thier designs work. The marketers were, well marketing. The one piece that I found most admired or in awe of for appearance and price" was the Continuum Audio Labs Caliburn turntable. The table and associated aircraft grade aluminum stand rang in at a cost of $149,995.00 for the table and $25,000.00 for the stand. It was something you wanted to get close to and observe but your were very careful to not get close enough that you could be accused of touching. The diversity of sound was amazing. Horn sytems that I found detailed but to bright IMHA along with some rooms having amazingly detailed systems that had no soul. There were a few systems that were just right and made sweet music. One thing that is very clear after this experience is that synergy trumps price.

What I wouldn't give to see and hear that table. Nice write up Doc!

doctor r

Possible glimpse at the following website. Can't help with the hearing side.

doctor r

hearingimpared

I've read about it and have seen pictures before. I am a big fan of Michael Fremer. Thanks for the pics though Doc.