AXPONA 2019 Show Report -- Audio Expo North America
AXPONA 2019 Coverage By Rick Becker -- Part 7

  The photo of Utopia B gives you a sense of the size of the rooms along this hallway. Focal was featured here and probably had a live vs. recorded demo, given the white grand piano on the left. There wasn't much music going on here at the time I came through late on Sunday, but I've heard the Utopia III Evo speakers and the Naim gear, including the massive amplifier on the left at Canadian shows in the past. Yes, it's very good.

Naim and Focal have developed an intimate marketing relationship in recent years, which is not to suggest their speakers or components do not work well with other gear. The rich blue used on the speakers here seems to have been a minor trend at AXPONA this year. Deeper into this space was a display of Vicoustic room treatment panels that have been popular.

Also in Utopia B was this red SPL Performer m1000 monoblock was new, putting out 420 Watts into 8 Ohms, 750 @ 4 Ohms and 1000 @ 2 Ohms. Being more of a pro-audio company, the amp comes with only a balanced input, plus a balanced pass-through for linking to another amp for bi-amping. It also features a trim pot for use in balancing channels if your preamp does not have that capability. Faceplates come in black, silver and red and each amp comes with three decorative center plates to allow you to customize the styling to suit your fancy. Very cool!

Pricing on the net was listed as €4,199 (Euros), times two if you're thinking of stereo. It's pricey, but fills a niche for a small, but powerful monoblock. They are distributed by Plurison in Canada, possibly for all of North America. Other stereo gear in this series, including a highly regarded phono stage are also scaled down in size for those in tight quarters.

And here was another familiar face from the Canadian shows. Anne Bisson graciously interrupted her late lunch to offer a photo-op. How could I refuse? Most likely, the white piano in Utopia B was for her. I keep hoping Anne will appear at the Rochester International JazzFest in June one of these years.

Wynn Wong of Wynn Audio also came to Chicago from Canada. It seemed like a family reunion! The Thales Compact Mk2 Turntable ($14,850) with the gold articulating Statement Tonearm ($21,090) is certainly a very special design. It was fitted with an EMT JSD-VM Cartridge ($4,995). The Critical Mass Systems top-of-the-line Olympus V12 racks in black and chrome highlighted the Karan electronics from Serbia and even the Entreq grounding devices (Poseidon ($4,999) and Silver Tellus Infinity ($2400).

On the top left of the rack was the Metronome AQWO SACD/CD Player ($18k). Below that was the two-box Karan Acoustics L Ref Preamp ($16,995) and to the right below the Thales turntable was the Karan Acoustics Ph Reference Phono ($23,995). Karan Acoustics M 2000 Monoblocks ($59,999/pr) were on the bottom shelves. The speakers were the Vimberg Tonda Speakers ($38,000). Vimberg is a more affordable house brand of Tidal from Germany that has been very well received according to Wynn. Cabling was from Crystal Cable (Future Dream and Ultimate Dream) Obviously, in this price range the music gets very, very good. (Utopia C)

The end of the large corridor in front of the Utopia D was home to High Fidelity Cables who had what I thought were pretty extraordinary open baffle speakers making very decent music in such a large space. The circles on the flaps appeared to be resonators of some sort. Food for thought? You can see where they drew a crowd with the visual experiments justifying their magnetically driven cables. I couldn't stay to take it all in because I still had three large Nirvana rooms and another large rig in the open area at the far end of this hall.

And there was our friend Albert, again.

Moving down to the other end of the long hall, the large Nirvana A room had two major presentations, one of which had two sets of speakers. Again, the theme here was Von Schweikert speakers driven by VAC amps, which has proven to be a very successful combination at a variety of price levels. The larger system at the far end featured the tall VAC Statement 450 iQ integrated amplifier ($150k) driving Von Schweikert Ultra 9 speakers ($200k) supplemented with a Von Schweikert V-12XS Shockwave subwoofer ($11,500). The front end was the new TechDAS Air Force III Premium turntable ($62k) with a Graham Engineering Phantom Elite tonearm ($12k) fitted with an Airtight Opus 1 cartridge ($16k). The digital front end was the new Esoteric Grandioso P1 CD transport ($38k) and dual Grandioso D1 monoblock DACs ($38k/pr) with an external Esoteric G-01 clock ($20k).

The music streamer/server was an Aurender A100 ($4k). A Critical Mass Olympus V-12 Luxury rack with spaces for six components was $61,500. Cabling was MasterBuilt Signature, the house brand of Von Schweikert. (A wild guess on the cables would be $100k.) Without cables, whose price varies considerably depending on the layout of the installation, you're looking at $613k, a figure, once again, likely to catch the attention of someone who collects vintage cars, fine art and/or owns a yacht or private plane... oh, and who enjoys music.

My recollection is this was pretty much the system that was shown at Rocky Mountain Audio Fest, except there they used a Kronos turntable, and probably the previous version of the digital front end. As with the Euphoria room further above, this room was sponsored by The Audio Company of Marietta, Georgia, who is one of only a few major showcase dealers for Von Schweikert, though they carry other major brands as well.

The system nearest the entry of Nirvana A was considerably more accessible and could be trimmed down depending on your choice of speaker, preamp, mono vs stereo amp, subwoofer or not. Here's the rundown: The taller speaker seen here was the Von Schweikert Endeavor E5 ($40k), the shorter, E3 ($10k) and the V-12XS sub (again, $11,500). The choices of preamps were the VAC Master w/phono ($40k) or Renaissance w/phono ($13k). The TechDAS Air Force V turntable ($18k) had a Graham Engineering Phantom III tonearm ($7k) fitted with an Airtight PC-1 Supreme cartridge ($11k). The digital front end was simplified to an all-in-one Esoteric K-07 CD player ($6k) along with a Teac NT-505 streamer/DAC with a Teac CG10M external clock ($1k).

The Critical Mass Systems QXK rack totaled $29,520. The amp stands were $4990 each. The cables were a mixture of MasterBuilt Reference and Performance series. So here, the big way with the large speaker and monoblock amps, the rig was $205k plus cables. There were numerous systems in the show in this league. Taking it down to the smaller speaker, preamp and only one amp used in stereo mode, and you're down to $117k without the subwoofer or cables. And even here, this could be trimmed judiciously without compromise in many areas. Between the three rigs in the two VAC / Von Schweikert rooms, they had something for many people, right up to the extreme few.

And for those of us who fall below this bar, most of these manufacturers have even more affordable product that will sound nearly as good in our more modest size rooms. As we know, the room and proper set-up are critical and I expect The Audio Company does a fine job with set-up or these prestigious brands would not have been with them for so long.

Nirvana B featured two models of Credo Audio speakers from Switzerland powered by EMM Labs electronics which I had just heard in Montreal (driving Tetra speakers). Van den Hul cabling and a phono cartridge on the new VPI 40th Anniversary direct drive turntable were at the front end. Michael Kraske, product designer and head of sales at Credo was on hand to answer questions. The tall white speaker was the World Premiere of the Cinema LTM ($169k). The LTM is a spin-off of the design and production of a large one-of-a-kind project they completed in Paris over the course of a couple of years. Four 12" woofers in a sealed chassis are concealed behind the white façade of the speaker which is said to go down to 16Hz.The dark smaller speaker was the Reference One ($40k) and had a very high gloss finish that mirrored the surroundings.

Nirvana C was home to a home theater setup that was pretty much unfamiliar as well as dark. I'm not sure how I managed to get this photo.

The end of the long open hallway that was perhaps 40' x 350', in a large glass atrium that was labeled Nirvana Lounge in the show program, was a most excellent and unusual presentation by F1 Audio. Tight against a plywood backdrop were a pair of huge subwoofers with 18" drivers on each end. Far in front of the wall were the Magico M6 speakers ($162k) in all their carbon fiber and chrome footed glory, powered by a pair of D'Agostino M400 monoblocks (400 Wpc) that seemed toy-like in such a wide-open space. A D'Agostino Momentum HD preamp was the control center on a very sturdy bolt and board equipment rack. The sole source was a T+A Music Player feeding a Chord Dave DAC augmented with a Chord Hugo M Scaler.

I didn't pay close attention to the Transparent cables (other than to not walk on them), but this was a very carefully put-together rig that was one of the Best "Rooms" at the show. The speakers were so far away from any reflective wall that audible reflections were way behind the direct sound from the speaker — so far behind that the space seemed as cavernous as it actually was. With all that plywood behind it I expected a Chicago blues band to walk on stage and plug into the amps. It didn't happen, but it sure sounded almost live.

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