Las Vegas 2001

 

  Our pre-show report brought you a first look into what is scheduled to appear at the Las Vegas 2001 shows (CES and T.H.E> Show). Please remember that many of the units below made their world debuted here on Enjoy the Music.com™ before making their appearance in any other press or public viewing. You heard about it here first as only Enjoy the Music.com™ can deliver!

 

Added 01 / 04 / 01

Located at the Hilton Ballroom suite 9205 during the CES and at suites 1101 and 1104 of T.H.E. Show will be Mirage loudspeakers with many new products. Specifically, their new OM-6, OM-8 and OM-9 plus a sneak peek at the upcoming flagship model will be on display. According to Mirage Engineers Ian Paisley and Andrew Welker, ever since the legendary M1si ceased production audiophiles have been looking for a worthy successor - one that made both strong visual and audiophile statements. The OM-5 and OM-7 introduced at the 2000 CES to replace the OM-6 and OM-8. Tentatively dubbed OM-1, this "all-out" Mirage flagship will be sneak-previewed to select dealers. Production of the OM-1 is slated for Spring 2001. Expect a suggested retail price in the area of $20,000/pr in a variety of finishes including Cherry, High Gloss Black and Aluminum.

Mirage's new OM-9 includes a 6.5", 2-way, 4-driver, vented floor-standing design. More than forty percent heavier than its predecessor, its performance improvements include better Omnipolar dispersion, flatter frequency response with deeper, tighter bass. The OM-9 is available now in Cherry veneer or High Gloss Black and carries a suggested retail price of $1,300 and $1,400/pr respectively. Mirage's all new Incognita Subwoofer is powered via an external amplifier/crossover combination rated at 500 watts RMS. Scheduled for Spring 2001 production and targeted at the $1,500-$2,000 range. A choice of a single forward-firing 12-in model and a bipolar, dual 10" unit that will "fire" through a large port.

 

 

At T.H.E. Show 2001 suite 1501 will be muRata with their new spherical tweeter system. Murata's Spherical Tweeter System has a wide dispersion range (+/- 45 degree) and a fast transient response from 15kHz to 100kHz. The spherical tweeters are easily connected to most of today's audio and home entertainment systems. It features a hi-fidelity ceramic spherical tweeter, wide dispersion range derived from the breathing vibration mode and is said to be suitable for most audio and home entertainment loudspeaker systems.

 

 

Energy loudspeakers will be showing their new Take 5.2 loudspeaker at the CES' Hilton Ballroom suite 9205. The Energy Take 5 is about to be joined by the Take 5 .2 with a new dedicated powered sub and numerous technical and cosmetic improvements over the Take 5. The new front-vented satellites (Take 5's are sealed) go lower, louder and are claimed to blend more smoothly with the subwoofer. The new Take 5 .2 will include flexible integral bracket mounting systems and offer the option of stand mounting on newly available cosmetically matched custom stands. The center channel of the new system is a dual-vented model using the same 1" aluminum and a pair of the 3.5" injection molded mid/bass drivers with rubber surrounds that are used, one per speaker, in the satellite model. Meanwhile the new self-powered subwoofer offers front-mounted controls, an A/V switch, an extra couple of dB of maximum output over that recommended for the Take 5, and an 8" injection molded/rubber surround woofer. The new sub also adds 5-way binding posts - both high level "in" and "out", making it more user-friendly to hook up. Positioning is also aided by the new option of setting the sub either upright or on its side.

Energy loudspeakers will also show numerous models that are said to offer refinements in driver, crossover and cabinet design, including the Veritas Dual Hyperdrive woofer technology, Tapered Crossover Systems and the 360 degree Veritas Bracing System. The V2.1 is a large bookshelf model sporting a 1" aluminum dome tweeter mated to a 6.5" Dual Hyperdrive woofer both contained in a heavily braced furniture grade cabinet . Suggested list is $1,500 /pr with availability now. The V2.2, a larger bookshelf model, steps up in size and features the same 1" tweeter but adds a 2" aluminum dome midrange driver housed in a Veritas Convergent Source Module. This midrange dome is a smaller version of that in the original Veritas models the V1.8 and V2.8. The woofer is the 6.5" unit common to all of these new Veritas models. Suggested list is $2,200/pr with availability now. The V2.3 is the smallest of the foor-standers featuring the same tweeter/domed-mid module of the 2.2 but with 2 6 ½-in. Dual Hyperdrive bass drivers. Together with all of these new Veritas models, it has a unique bracing system running from the phase plug of the woofer, through the center of the woofer magnet, back and through the rear of the cabinet, so that not only is the cabinet tightly braced but minuscule unwanted woofer basket vibrations are also eliminated. Suggested list is $3,500/ pr with availability now. The biggest of the new models is the V2.4 (seen above right), which retails at $5,000/pr. As a step-up from the V2.3 it has the same tweeter and midrange of the other models, yet with three 6.5" Dual Hyperdrive drivers. Each one progressively covering deeper parts of the bass frequency range.

 

 

Theta Digital, long known by audiophiles for their top-flight digital disc transports and digital to analog converters will be at CES' Shoal Creek room of the Golden Nugget. Theta is going deeper into the home theater. New Theta components including the Citadel mono amplifier will be used with a complete surround sound system. Direct digital signals from Theta's David II and Carmen DVD/CD transports, which feature Theta's unique 4:2:2 digital video output (and the DTV's progressive format of 480P) that is said to be especially effective at enhancing picture quality on digital video projectors and plasma screens. On the audio side, Theta's Home Cinema features will feature seven Wilson Watt/Puppies as well as a Wilson Watch center channel and REL subwoofers. Theta audio will provide the electronics with leading-edge components that include the new Citadel mono amplifier (rated for 400 watts into 8 ohms) with fully balanced differential and zero-feedback circuitry. The open-architecture Casablanca II Music and Cinema Controller plus the Dreadnaught power amplifier round out the system.

 

 

Krell Industries, Inc. will be at the CES LVCC Suite N243 introducing their all new Lossless Acoustic Transducer (LAT) line of loudspeakers and the New KAV Series components. Few details are available at this time. See our virtually live show report starting January 5th for more details.

 

 

Added 01 / 03 / 01

PS Audio will be at T.H.E. Show suites 2808/2810 with their new Ultimate Outlet ($299, seen right) and PowerFrame amplification system. The Ultimate Outlet can be used with their popular Power Plant devices to further enhance power purity. Since PS Audio admits their Power Plants are by themselves not perfect, the new Ultimate Outlet provides a "pre-cleaning" function as well as protection from surges, lightning strikes, and so forth. It is claimed to not only provide clean power for your equipment, it is said to provide the same cleaning from your equipment as well. The PowerFrame is a modular system configurable from mono to multi-channel use (MultiFrame $1,195, MonoFrame $799, Mono module $995 and Stereo module $1,195). The PowerFrame amplification system consists of two frames and two power modules: a MultiFrame and a MonoFrame and a mono and a stereo module. The frames contain everything except the actual power amplifier electronics. The stereo module has a pair of 200 watt per channel power amplifiers while the mono module is a single 300 watt amplifier. Features include 300 square inches of heat sink, WBT input/output connectors, 80,000 microfarads of energy storage, on-board thermal management system and a microprocessor communication buss.

 

 

Amphion Loudspeakers will be at T.H.E. Show suite 2902 with their Argon II minimonitor that includes their Bass Adjustment System (BAS). The BAS is said to allow for easy tuning of the bass response below 150 Hz for even the most demanding room conditions. Their proprietary Uniformly Directive Diffusion (U/D/D) system used for the higher frequencies is said to minimize the room reflections for frequencies above 150Hz for optimal music reproduction in all listening environments.

 

 

Popular potentiometer manufacture Danish Audio ConnecT (DACT) will be announcing their new CT4 Balance Control based on the CT1 stepped attenuator. Like the CT1 seen right, this new balance control utilizes SMD resistors and offers 3dB of adjustment from the center position with 1/4 dB steps. Initial values will be 50K and 250K. DACT will be at both the CES and T.H.E. Show with various manufacturers using their products. At the CES' Alexis Park, PBN Audio (suite AP1902) will have a new preamp using a DACT CT4 balanced stepped attenuator in a system with their amplifier and Montana Loudspeakers. The Glass Amplification Co., will debut a dual mono integrated PSE 300B amp with DACT CT1 stepped attenuators and CT100 phono stage module. At T.H.E. Show, Electra-Print Transformer Co. (suite 1604) will debut their new "Direct Reactance" SE300B amplifier using a DACT CT1-10K stepped attenuator and CT4-50K balance control.

 

 

Von Schweikert Audio is scheduled to introduce the VR-4 Gen. III at the upcoming CES 2001 and at T.H.E. Show. They will be providing demos of their entire product line at T.H.E SHOW suite 1310 and the Monte Carlo Q convention room. The VR-4 was first introduced in 1994 and garnished seven rave reviews in many publications. The new VR-4 Gen. III builds upon the legend with a new smaller size and stunning cosmetic design. The two-piece sat/sub system uses all-new drivers and crossover design resulting in greatly increased transparency, bass tightness and depth. Price is projected at $3,995/pr. A new center channel LCR-35 will also be introduced. The LCR-35 uses twin 5.5" aluminum woofers for lower frequency support. Availability is scheduled for late January 2001 and is projected to retail at $1,595 in black fabric wrap with decorator wood end caps. Von Schweikert Audio also plans to release the VR-S/3 self-powered subwoofer that uses new technology to deliver musical deep bass. Employing a 12" aluminum/Kevlar honeycomb cone designed to provide an extremely light yet yet rigid driver using a 3" voice coil. Dual spiders allows up to 2" excursion without distortion or damage while the 15 lb. magnetic assembly is said to assist in providing incredibly fast transient response with no overhang. An impressive 900 watt (peak) class A/B amplifier is included with the VR-S/3 using a high current power supply to eliminate clipped or muddy sound. The VR-S/3 will retail for $2,200. To top this all off, they will also be introducing their new high performance, low cost VR-3.5 tower loudspeaker. Using the same technology and type of driver array as our VR-5, the 3.5 uses smaller drivers and a cloth wrapped enclosure at an affordable retail price of $2,995/pr.

 

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