Nespresso,
in a foxy bit of cross-marketing set up a display of their Swiss espresso
makers and offered free cups to show-goers. The colored balls are not candy,
but rather different flavors in a variety pack. Normally they are sold in long
slender boxes of a single flavor per box. Cost averages about 63 to 68 cents (CDN)
per cup. Realizing I was about to hit the road for home, I begged a strong
one. Very tasty. Merci.
The Luxman SQ
38u integrated amplifier ($6000) took me immediately back to early adulthood
with its real wood cabinet and face full of knobs and switches and even a high
quality headphone output terminal. MM and MC phono stages, too. Conservatively
rated at 25 watts into 8 Ohms with 34EL power tubes, this amp drove a pair of
ultra-modern looking Vivid
loudspeakers. This blend of Old School/New School didn't work for me as well
as I've heard Vivid speakers in the past. Also seen here was the new Luxman
DA-200 DAC ($2900) that behaves as a control center with two analog inputs,
two S/PDIF digital inputs and a dedicated 24 bit/96kHz input for PC and Mac.
The main DAC operates at 24-bit/192kHz. The unit has both fixed and variable
outputs and S/N ratios of 119dB for digital inputs, 103dB for analog inputs.
In what might have been an adjacent room, I heard the new D-N100 CD player
($2000).
Circling by the AuDIYo
rooms again I connected with Steven Huang
of Audio Sensibility, an island of serenity and quality in a hobby
of skyrocketing costs. Selling direct, his cables go for very reasonable
prices. I use his Statement Digital cable ($199) with silver conductor as my
reference, and the plastic bag in my hands contains new cables and a small
tweak for review that I have been eagerly anticipating.
Doubling back into the room mentioned earlier with the blown
aluminum shelves on the racks, I encountered a much different sound with the Specimen
5 wpc amp driving a $3800 pair of larger Zu
(Essence?) speakers. Teo Liquid
Cables were connecting the gear and the music was very engaging and dynamic
with these high efficiency speakers. Earlier in the day I had a chance to sit
down with Taras Kowalcyzszyn of
Teo and he really laid the scientific icing on the anti-vibration cake we both
love. In searching for the correct spelling of his last name I stumbled upon
an unopened email he sent immediately after the Montreal show when I was down
south at the international furniture trade show. He summed up our conversation
beautifully:
You know it's funny...you get the importance of vibration
control...I get it...but somehow this industry doesn't really, really get
it... that mystifies the heck out of me...
Well, that's not quite
true; there are some who get it
within the realm of their own specialty. But few understand it at the
theoretical scientific level that Taras gets it, or as I and many listeners
get it at the "hands-on" tweaky level. Anyway, it was one of those special
moments when brains actually connected rather than merely exchanged price data
and model names. He talked of machining a specifically shaped hole into the
barrel of his interconnects that acted like a Black Hole for vibration and
improved the transmission of the electronic signal. He also gave me one of
those "Don't try this at home, kids" warnings, citing the multiple
failures that preceded his ultimate success. If you don't know the science
and cannot do the math, you will never get it right.
Stevie Ray Vaughn's recording of Tin Pan Alley sucked me
right in out of the hallway into the Son
Ideal room where I found another Oracle
Paris turntable spinning an LP. A Graham Slee
phonostage fed the signal to an Audiolab 8200CDQ
CD player ($1299) acting as a preamp with analog inputs and a DAC accessible
with coax and optical digital inputs as well as balanced and single ended
outputs. The signal then flowed to Audiolab 8200MB monoblocks (250 watts into
8 Ohms, doubling down into 4 Ohms) that used to cost $3500 each when the line
was under the TAG McLaren brand,
but have since been out-sourced to China and now cost $1100 each. What can I
say? It's a Wal-Mart World…save for the music that finally poured forth in
grand fashion from a pair of award winning Harbeth
P3 ESR monitors that more than did justice to the fine reputation of this
British loudspeaker manufacturer. The room was jammed with visitors, which
probably says more than any evaluation I might make.
In comparison, the AudioClub
room displaying an all-Linn
rig playing digital music next door was virtually empty.
Moving on to the naim
room the music was hard driving with their new Ovator S-400 loudspeaker
($6500), Both the S-400 and larger S-600 utilize naim's Balanced Mode
Radiators that present the listener with a flat honeycomb diaphragm. The 85mm
version in the S-600 crosses over at 380 Hz while the 47mm version in the
S-400 crosses over at 700 Hz. Both rise to 35 kHz, essentially covering the
midrange and treble without the interference of a crossover. The BMR crosses
over to two bass drivers with a 4th order acoustic slopes and the
crossover is isolated in the plinth of the speaker. The BMRs are also isolated
in their own extruded aluminum cylinders at the top of the cabinet, which
itself is isolated from the plinth by a steel leaf spring that decouples the
cabinet above 12 Hz. Lots of technology here. The tactic of combining the
midrange and tweeter in a single drive unit is becoming something of a trend
in the past few years, though the implementation has varied. Rated at 88dB
sensitivity with 4 Ohm impedance, these are probably best driven by solid
state amplification, which naim does quite well with their own line of
electronics. If you have a larger room and want deep bass (28 Hz), opt for the
S-600, but from what I heard here, I'd say this is the best I've ever
heard from naim. It's also very well styled and available in five finishes.
Good show, gentlemen!
At the Solon speaker driver display I examined their new
Eton 26HD1 ceramic tweeter at $167 each. Actually, it is a ceramic coated
magnesium membrane said to combine the best features of each material. It
didn't ring at all when I tapped it on the stone countertop. (Just kidding).
Also noted were some thick power cords from Symphonica
Cable ranging in price from $250 to $650, hand crafted in Canada.
And a HiFiMan headphone amp and
HE-4 headphones did a nice job at recreating Pink Floyd's Dark Side of the
Moon. Sennheiser HD598 headphones
were on sale for $399.99, down from $449.
Every year the Totem
Acoustic room is among the very best and this year was a very
special one with the introduction of the first three models in their new
Element Series: the 2-way Fire, 2.5-way Earth, and 3-way Metal designs. Water
(subwoofer) and Wood (center channel) are yet to come. The three models shown
this year were really basically the same speaker, comprised of the same dome
tweeter for which Totem holds a manufacturing patent, and their in-house
designed 8" woofer. A guiding principle for the series was that the woofers
have no active or passive parts in the crossover. It runs free and clear. A
huge three projector panorama filled the wall of the large room, while a
sectioned-off area was used for demonstrating their new speakers.
While the 2-way Fire is a stand mounted monitor, and the
2.5-way Earth floorstander incorporates a passive woofer, both are 8 Ohm rated
with 88dB/W/m efficiency. The Earth plays strong down to 31 Hz while the Fire
goes down to 40 Hz, though both seemed to taper off discretely without calling
attention to their limitations. Aside from the deeper bass of the Earth,
they sounded identical from what I could tell in my brief auditions. This begs
the question of "Why not get a pair of subwoofers for the smaller Fire and
go really low?" The 3-way
Metal I heard in another room earlier in the show claims only one additional
Hz, is rated at 4 Ohms, but picks up efficiency to 91dB/W/m. The Metal was in a
tube-based system that only faintly resembled the Totem room with Classé
solid state electronics including the CDP-300 CD player, CP-800 preamp and
CA-M600 monoblocks. The music in the Totem room was more dynamic and a lot
more airy with terrific transparency and focus. The musicians were playing Right
there! Not that I think the Fire and Earth cannot be driven
with tube gear, they may just need the right tube gear with the right power in
the right sized room. My colleague Phil Gold appeared beside me and mentioned
that he has been promised a pair of Metal speakers, so we will be hearing more
about these in the future.
The Totem mid-woofer and tweeter seen here expand on the
knowledge gained from the smaller Torrent mid-woofer used in their Tribe III
and V speakers. The mid-woofer has an exceptionally clean and long throw due
to the use of a large number (13-17?) of slivers of neodymium magnets embedded
in the motor that create a uniform magnetic field to control the pistonic
movement. In chatting with Vince I mentioned concern over the increasing
scarcity (and demand) for rare earth elements, including neodymium which is
sourced exclusively from China, at this time. He shared that Canada has newly
discovered deposits of this metal, but that commercial availability is
probably five years off. Another curiosity was the fact that the drivers were
not countersunk into the front baffle as on many high-end designs. I was told
the faceplate of the 1.5" dome tweeter was part of the cooling system which
allowed it to play "ridiculously loud". Also, the front baffle was only ¾"
thick—too thin to allow countersinking of the 3/8" faceplate of the
mid-woofer. Exciting times we live in. And these are certainly exciting times
for Totem. While they have always been among the best loudspeaker
manufacturers, this Element series is a big step forward that will put top
shelf performance within reach of a lot more enthusiasts: Fire, $6000, Earth
$9000, Metal: $13,000.
On silent display in a main hallway was the elegant Focal
Bird series available simply as a pair of speakers or as powered
2.1 series with a separate amplifier. (Bird: $500/pr; large oval Super Bird: $650/pr; powered
Bird/ Little Bird System 2.1 $995; power Bird/Bird System 2.1: $1145; power
Bird/Super Bird System 2.1: $1295. Also available are short table stands and
wall mounts. These were truly elegant signs of spring, available in black or
white.
I wandered into another large room where Liberty
Trading had set up huge rows of LPs. On another table I spotted
this Orb anti-static device to
clean up the negative ions on you CDs and LPs ($340/$295 show price). Makes me
wonder if I should play around with Linda's hair dryer. Next to it was an
Orb LP hot plate device ($1400) that will flatten your warped LP in two hours,
for those special pressings that you've been wanting to play, but
couldn't. And a final item in a securely locked glass cabinet was what
looked to be a Feastrex Naturflux
Exciter, NF5ex. My full-range driver
guru tells me Feastrex are the best currently in production and I expect these
are in the range of $2000 each. You will also need a special field coil
transformer, sold separately.
Shortly there after I happened upon Art
Dudley feverishly bopping to music coming from LSA
loudspeakers set up in this large room. We then auditioned a pair of
single driver speakers on short stands, admiring the simplicity and finesse of
the design. Art leaned over and asked me if I was still having fun in this
industry. I think I answered with a smile. By late afternoon, it was
approaching midway in the show. There were plenty of attendees scurrying
about, but it was not jammed. And the number of presenters seemed to be
noticeably down from last year, missing the novice entrepreneurs and even some
of the more prominent manufacturers. The important thing here was the
affordable access for the public to see and hear far more product than they
could possibly expect in any single city, much less any given dealer. The
advent of the Axpona show only a few weeks later in Atlanta may have been a
possible influence on participation here, but I expect the proliferation of
regional shows open to the public will be a positive influence on the survival
of our industry. Those on the West Coast can look forward to T.H.E.
Show, June 3rd through 5th, 2011, in Newport Beach.
Denver is the home of the Rocky Mountain
Audio Fest, October 14th through 16th, 2011. I spoke with Michel
Plante who will be lending his expertise to the TAVES
(Toronto Audio Video Entertainment Show) September 30th through October 2, 2011.
Hopefully that will draw in some of the manufacturers from that area who were
noticeably absent in Montreal. There is no shortage of equipment for fine
music reproduction. The shows will certainly help expose our hobby to larger
numbers of people. On the other hand, each of us could invite a friend over to
hear some music, too.
As the mist rose off the pond on the roof of the Hilton
Bonaventure, I retrieved my Tracker from the catacombs below and
made the trip back to Rochester without incident this time. Forty hours later
I was in High Point, North Carolina, minding my own business at the spring Home
Furnishing show. Thank you for your patience. I look forward to seeing you in
Toronto.
Click
here for main Salon Son & Image 2011 show page.
High-Performance Audio Reviews
