Capital AudioFest Chronicles 2022
Rick continues with the 6th floor Part B.
Show Report By By Rick Becker

Room 630, Suite 632, Room 633 AV Luxury Group Int. & Blink High End
Here a Margules I-240 tube integrated power amp ($6k), operating in Class A, produces 25 Watts into 8 Ohms per channel to drive a tall Scansonic speaker nicely with good resolution and very nice bloom.

Below that was a Margules DAC or streamer. An RSX Max Power Cord ($1850) was identified, but the information was sparse. The Scansonic speaker, a more affordable sub-brand of Raidho from Denmark, seemed to be their flagship MB6 B model.

In the next AV Luxury Group room was a Raidho Acoustics TD2.2speaker driven by a Jeff Rowland 1500 Wpc Daemon Super Integrated amp. That was a beautiful Oracle CD player on top of an Aurender n20 streamer and on the shelf below that was Berkeley Audio Design Alpha DAC Reference Series 3 that was running with a USB re-clocker behind it. Power cables were by RSX and interconnects were by Shunyata. At the side, on silent display was a gorgeous Raidho TD1.2 monitor ($25k in black, more as shown in wood) on a dedicated stand that might have been active at some point during the show. Thomas Kiss helped me out with the products in this room. The music here was very good with a fine sense of air and bloom.

Seen above is the distinctive Margules TT10 Deluxe turntable ($5k) with one of the more unusual record weights I've seen. An RSX Prime phono cable ($1250) was in the system here but unfortunately, the turntable was not being played at the time. What was being used was a Margules SF220 SC Special Edition Class A tube preamp ($7k), and a Margules U-280 SC 30th Anniversary Limited Edition tube power amp ($10k), putting out 50 Watts @ 8 Ohms in stereo or 100 Watts in mono, that was driving another Raidho speaker, the TD3.2 ($70k in black).

Excellent transparency and resolution here as you would expect from this level of amplifier and speaker. On the bottom of the rack was a Creek Voyage CD player ($3495) and a Creek Voyage i20 Integrated amp ($6195). Could this have been what I was listening to? Not likely, as the tubes were aglow in the Margules amp and the music had that midrange magic you get with tube gear.

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