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

Room 652, 653 Synergistic Research
As I wrote above on the previous page, these rooms were silent displays of Synergistic Research products with knowledgeable people available to explain their applications. Perhaps it is best to suggest that you explore their website where you will find video explanations and demonstrations — some of which you can download and playback through your high-end system. For those who understand that everything matters, this is an exciting company.

Room 655 Ampsandsound And Rethm
In a much more sparsely filled room was a Rethm Maarga speaker driven by an AmpsandSound tube amp with new Western Electric 300B tubes. It was quite a contrast with the previous room. The music, coming through an AURALiC streamer had room to breathe and I was the only visitor at the time. The Maarga, like most of his speakers, is a single-driver design with high efficiency.

They are $11,500 including shipping from India to your door. Unfortunately, this was not the speaker he intended to show. His latest design was a victim of supply chain disruption and he was lucky to be able to borrow the Maarga from a local customer. A cut from Dire Straits' Brothers in Arms just floated in the air.

Room 657 GTT Audio
It is always a pleasure to meet up with Bill Parish of GTT Audio. He had a rather modest, though not inexpensive system featuring a Mola Mola DAC, and an Audionet Watt integrated amp ($18,800) driving the relatively new Tor monitor ($12k including stands) from YG Acoustics' more affordable Peaks series. The Tor is built in Colorado and screws onto the dedicated stands shown here.

It's available in three wood finishes. Cabling as always with GTT was from the excellent Kubala-Sosna line. The Audionet Watt from Germany is deceptively simple looking but weighs in at 55 pounds and puts out 167 Watts into 8 Ohms and 284 into 4 Ohms. It had no trouble in producing clean, controlled music with the Tor speaker. It was a very livable sound with air and soundscaping but without the razor-sharp edge that can quickly become tiring.

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