Hi-Fi News' Hi-Fi Show & AV Expo 2002

Sunday
Page 2

 

  In the Tube Technology room (from top to bottom) was their Fusion HB70 stereo integrated amplifier (£1,550), CD64 CD player (£1,990), and FMT tuner (£950). Fusion is TT's tube/solid-state line where the integrated amplifier is a 70 watt per channel hybrid design while the CD player is available in either solid-state or tube output. The CD player also ha a 24-bit/96kHz DAC, low jitter, and high-quality transport mechanism. The tuner has a "Class A" tubes output stage.

 

Cadence Europe's new Avita loudspeaker (£2,450) boasts an electrostatic unit from 1,400Hz upward while an Eton dynamic driver with center phase plug insures reproduction of lower frequencies. The driver has been customized by Cadence for optimum coherence within this product.

 

Seen here are Halcro's dm68 amplifiers driving the Cabasse's Kara loudspeaker. Source material was lovely analog with the Clearaudio Master Reference turntable, Master TQi tonearm, and Insider Reference cartridge.

 

Longstanding and well-respected loudspeaker manufacturer Tannoy was proudly showing their TD12 (£6,500) and TDSub (£4,500). See our review of the TD12 by Alvin Gold within our Review Magazine by clicking here.

 

Wharfdale has a large display with their Evo 8 (£250) and Evo 10 (£320) monitors, Evo 20 (£450) Evo 30 (£650), and Evo 40 (£750) floor standers. Specially designed Kevlar midrange and woofer units are stiff yet lightweight to insure fast yet accurate transient response.

 

As we are on a roll with world firsts, here is Madrigal Audio Labs Mark Levinson No 431 stereo amplifier in prototype form. This dual monaural, fully balanced 200-watt per channel unit handles both RCA and balanced (XRL) inputs. No pricing set as the release date is scheduled for December 2002, though expect pricing under $7,000. Their upcoming No 432 doubles the power output and tentatively priced around $9,000.

 

Also in the booth was the extraordinary Grand Prix Audio stands. They take a note from sports car racing and favorably brings it into your home. See our review!

 

Art Audio's Adagio T100 parallel triode amplifier produces 50 watts with two T100 (approximately $20,000) output tubes, though it is also available as a 52BX (same pricing) with two 52BX tubes producing 30 watts. The Lucite base is augmented with glass cylinders that enclose the tubes that are highlighted with a blue glow.

 

 

Rotel's RDV-1080 DVD-Audio/Video player (£659) replays DVD-Audio, Dolby Digital and dts replay.

 

World first for a show is Rotel's new 02 Series that replaces their old 900 series. The RA02 integrated amplifier (£350) produces 40 watts per channels, has two pairs of loudspeaker binding posts, five inputs, defeatable tone circuit, MM phono stage, 12V trigger and pre-amplifier outputs. The RCD 02 CD player (£380) is HDCD compatible and features a low resonance transport and digital output. DAC is an 18-bit Delta-Sigma variety. The RA-01 (£250) is identical to the RA-20, yet no wireless remote. The RT-02Am/FM tuner (£280) has 30 presets, RDS and wireless remote. The bottom two units are the RC-03 pre-amplifier (£280) and RB-03 (£280) 70-watt per channel bridgeable amplifier.

 

Click Here For Page 3

 

Click here to see a
complete listing of show exhibitors.

 

Click here to see our previous year's show report.