RMAF 2007 Day 2

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sleepysurf

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Here's a few pics and my thoughts after Day 2 RMAF. BTW, LOTS more pics at this URL... http://www.audioxsell.com/community/events/7/RMAF-2007.htm

I visited +/- 40 rooms the past two days, and seeing/hearing everything from good, bad, to ugly! Overall, I was most impressed with the MBL room, featuring their flagship Radialstrahler 101, which delivered superb holographic imaging and detail no matter WHERE you are standing or seated. Equally impressive (with MUCH better WAF, IMHO), were their 111E hybrid (pic below), and compact 121 stand-based models from their Noble line. The 111E gets my vote for best balance of looks and sound. All their speakers were driven by mammoth MBL amps, pre-amps, and their transport/DAC.

I re-visited the Emerald Physics room, powered today by small Bel Canto mono amps, with an iMac source feeding a Modwright LS 36.5 tube linestage. Again, at that <$3500 TOTAL price (which includes the Behringer DSP and Art Audio SLA1 and SLA2 amps), this is the most musical "budget" setup I've ever heard. See pic below.

I've also included a picture of the Fry Street Quartet, who has been featured throughout the weekend, in both full concert and impromptu chamber performances. Ray Kimber has recorded them using his IsoMike technique, and provided surround sound demos of those recordings using a massive array of Sound Lab electrostatics with a bevy of Pass X350.5 amps.

I also stopped by the Power Modules/Belles room, where I finally met David Belles for the first time. You may recall my saga with his 350A Reference amp driving, now my Summits. He just unveiled his MB-200 Watt monoblock amps, with new zero-distortion circuitry culminating in a high current (65 amps) MOSFET output. He was also demo'ing his new LA-01 SS line-stage, featuring a separate chassis power supply. He was using mid-sized Usher speakers (on stands), and despite some room bass anomalies, the imaging was tight, and vocals superb. I can't say I'm ready to trade up to the new monoblocks, but I suspect the MB-200's would have no trouble driving the Summits!

I also had the pleasure of meeting Roger Sanders, demo'ing his Sanders Sound System amps, designed specifically for electrostatic speakers. He was driving a pair of Innersound Eros speakers, from his former company, which unfortunately went defunct after he left. I must admit, the Innersound Eros sounded absolutely spectacular with his new amps. He spoke well of ML, and offers a NO RISK home trial of his amps! That's an offer I just might have to take him up on!

There were still a handful of setups still on my to-do list, but my wife and I have an early flight Sun, so I doubt I'll get to them. I'll leave it to Tim and/or Gordon to add more thoughts and pictures from this great show.

I encourage all audiophiles (ML owners, or not) to try and attend this show. IMHO, it's far better than CES/T.H.E. and Denver is a GREAT town and venue. I look forward to attending again in a couple years.
 

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Thanks for the synopsis and the reviews, Alan!

Any news on the Magico room at all?

We always hear about the good setups, any bad setups that you want to post about? I know you mentioned that not all were good...

Thanks again for the vigilant posts regarding your experience at RMAF, btw!

Joey :)
 
Sorry Buddy...

Bad news Joey - Magico doesn't appear to have a room at the show :(

At least they aren't listed in the directory. But you never know, they may be in someone elses system. I'm going back for Day 3 today, so I'll keep checking for you.

Your eyes and ears here in Denver,
Tim
 
Oracle

Day 2 of the show started out for me with a quick stop in at the Starbucks in the Atrium of the hotel. When I was walking out I could clearly hear the opening bars of Steely Dan's "Aja" from the other side of the atrium - a good 40 yards away. I had to go check it out!

The sound was coming from the Oracle and Usher room. The simply stunning, beautiful, gorgeous (insert your own adjective here) Delphi turntable was feeding a stack of Oracle electronics, and the sound was enchanting. Oracle is also launching their new integrated amp at the show, and as with all things made by Oracle, the build quality is just amazing...
 

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Usher

A great set of sources and electronics isn't much good without a set of speakers though, and in this case the speakers were from Usher, in the form of their very nice Be-400's.

Usher may just win the award for the best value at the show. The sound out of both the large Be-400's ($14,400) and the smaller, and possibly more amazing Be-718's at just $2795 was big, bold, accurate, warm, detailed - I could go on and on but you get my drift. These are AMAZING sounding speakers for the money. If they told me that they were charging 3-4 times what they are actually charging for them I would not have been suprized. Possibly the best buy in audio IMHO.
 

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Music Room

Once I left the Oracle/Usher room I went right over to where I'd started Day 1 (and where I'm likely to start Day 3 shortly) - the Music Room. Lots and lots of great LP's, CD's SACD's etc. to tempt a music lover. True to the form I'd demnonstrated at our National GTG in Lawrance over the summer, I dropped some serious coin.

So did my buddy Joe who's shown here handing off some hard earned cash to our good friend Chad Kassem from Acoustic Sounds. Chad's great Blues Festival is next week at his famous Blue Heaven studio and concert hall in Salina,KS - a road trip may be in order!
:bowdown:
 

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"True to form..."

Of course Tim, we wouldn't have it any other way! You not dropping coin on vinyl is like Dave looking for the nearest train station!

"Your eyes and ears here in Denver, Tim"


Thanks my friend!

"Usher may just win the award for best value at the show..."
I have heard a lot about these speakers but have yet to hear them. There is a dealer here in Chicago who has read a lot of my posts and has invited me to the store to listen in detail to Usher, I should've taken his invitation.

Anyway, I have a friend who had the 802D who then moved to the Usher 400 (pictured in your post) and he is still flat out impressed with it. I just wrote a review on the 802D and I was very favorably impressed with that particular speaker... and if my friend's move (and your favorable impression on them) from the 802D to the Usher BE400 is any indication of its SQ, I think I'm definitely in for a treat.

I've seriously had it with speakers costing more than a luxury car. We're not all made of money you know... we just want to enjoy music.

Again, keep up with the good documentation of the happennings at RMAF 07..... love coming back to this forum and reading up on your stuff! I haven't seen GG post though and I know Alan's MIA today....

Joey :)
 
Teres Audio

Finally continuing some coverage of the show for Day 2. It's gonna be spotty for a few days I'm afraid between the work schedule and the Rockies games (of course they'll get a break for a few days after they sweep the D-backs tonight :D ).

Teres Audio had a huge room this year - and they needed it with these gigantic custom horns being fed from Chris Brady's custom amps and his great line of turntables. These things are just plain works of art that you have to see to believe. Stunning to behold and equally impressive in their sound. Last year he was running Edgarhorns in his room. These sounded much better, and could make your pant legs flap when pushed hard!

Sorry for the dark pictures, like I said, this was a BIG room...
 

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LoveCraft

LoveCraft might be a new name, but the company is actually what used to be known as Cain and Cain - makers of very fine single driver based speakers offering ultra-efficient designs suitible for the SET crowd or anyone else looking for clean crossover free sound. These flame painted speakers were just gorgeous! The sound was too...
 

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Lyngdorf

I spent a LOT of time in the Lyngdorf room - and came very close to pulling the trigger on one of their room coorection DSP modules. They gave a very effective demonstration of the effect of their units in a room that was set up about as bad as possible (on purpose) to demonstrate the usefullness of the devices in taming all sorts of room issues. They were able to correct for the back row of chairs placed directly against the back row of the room, or the middle row of chairs, with the push of a button. This was very effective stuff. Any similarity to the TACT equipment is due to the fact that the chief designer and CEO used to be with TACT or owned them, I can't remember which. They offer the DSP portion in an integrated Amp, a stand alone digital pre-amp, or a seperate processor that can be inserted between your existing pre-amp and power amp (the one I almost went for) at $3800.00 for the latter. Sorry, I didn't catch prices for the others - I was fighting pulling out my credit card when they told me that the "Show Special" for the RP-1 was $3000. I may still contact them for an in house demonstration and if they can honor the show price I may have to post an update to my system shortly. Yes - it was that effective.
 

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Escalante

Escalante was back at the festival this year with both their amazing Fremont ($19-$21K depending on finish) and their new Pinion at $11K. When I was in the room I was once again mesmerized by the sound of the Fremonts - they seem to do just about everything right. They have the speed and transparency of our Martin Logans with the weight and authority of the very best dynamic speakers. They would be on my short list of contenders should Joeyitis hit me in the speaker department. All of the elctronics from source to amplification was Electrocompniet which obviously didn't hurt. I never did get to go back and hear the Pinions, which is a pity. This was likely in the top 10 sounding rooms.
 

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I spent a LOT of time in the Lyngdorf room - and came very close to pulling the trigger on one of their room coorection DSP modules. They gave a very effective demonstration of the effect of their units in a room that was set up about as bad as possible (on purpose) to demonstrate the usefullness of the devices in taming all sorts of room issues. ... Yes - it was that effective.


Tim, glad you had to opportunity to hear first-hand what true room correction can do. It's magic, and once you hear it, you have to have it.

I highly recommend the Lyngdorf or TacT gear. it's the next best thing to the roll-your-own I do with speaker processors.

When hearing DEQX or TacT demos, nearly everyone who has that experience is in a 'must have' mode. :cool:
 
I, too, was on the verge of pulling out my credit card for the Lyngdorf processor! However, I subsequently asked some folks in other rooms what their take was on Lyngdorf/TacT type room/speaker correction. Surprisingly, more than a few said (more or less) that at "first hearing" these processors seemingly "correct" major room anomalies, but with extended listening you realize they "suck" the "musicality" out of your system, sacrificing pinpoint imaging, soundstage depth, and detail, that renders the music artificial. That caused me to pause, and research this topic further. My dilemma is that WAF prevents me from incorporating PERFECT speaker placement and acoustic treatments in my Family/Listening room. A simple processor that transparently "fixes" everything sounds fantastic, but at what musical cost? I wonder if the Lyngdorf or TacT components are available on a "try before you buy" basis???
 
Alan, perfect analysis my friend. This was what I was wondering too as in the past I've learned that inserting anything in the signal chain has had detrimental effects (remember graphic equalizers?).

The local Lyngdorf dealer has an inhome trial policy and he will honor the show pricing through the end of the month. I'm going to take him up on the offer and insert it into my system to decide for myself what the effects are.

FWIW, another member of the forum has PM'ed me saying that he is doing an in home audition this week as well, so I'll be interested in hearing what he has to say.
 
Merlin/Joule Electra

Merlin and Joule Electra have been a synergistic combination over the years, and this years RMAF was no exception. The Joule Electra VZN Grand Marquis amps are real jewels and sound wonderfull in conjuction with the very refined Merlins. These aren't "exciting" sounding components for the sake of HiFi, but they are very dedicated to the pursuit of musical reproduction. I've never been motivated enough by the combination to put them on my short list, but I've also never had a bad experience listening to them either. The Audio Aero universal player is also something special. Refined is the best way to describe this system...
 

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ModWright

The ModWright room was making some seriously BIG music thanks to a "slightly modified" Transporter, a funky purplish-pink Redpoint turntable, a whole slew of the ModWright electronics and the unique, but quite good sounding Studio Electric speakers ($7900.00 pair). Dead Can Dance "Toward the Within" sounded etherial and other worldly - exactly what I expect Dead Can Dance to sound like. The Studio Electric speakers were also the transducer of choice in the Benchmark room.
 

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Esp

The Bodhran SE speaker ESP was showing this year was smaller than the speakers they brought last year, but it was a great choice for the room they were in. These speakers sounded great, especially on some solo cello pieces that they were playing when I first came into the room. Supported by a full complement of Lamm electronics, the AMR player that I though sounded like poo in the AMR room the day before sounded great in this system! Synergy exemplified. Great sounding room.
 

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Reference Audio Mods

Reference Audio Mods had a slew of battery powered elcetronics and some nice conventional box (OK, more like coffin's) type speakers from Tonian Labs ($37.5K). Their stuff was really great to look at with lots of beautiful woodwork - but it didn't really fire my rocket. Very clean sounding, and a deep black background, but no real OOMPH! I guess being entirely off the grid had something to do with it. They were also showing their Oppo MAX - a $2495.00 upgrade to your $200.00 Oppo player if you're so inclined.
 

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Blue Circle

Former contributor to these pages Gilbert Yeu (he's got a pair of Staement E2's as well as a pair of Pink CLS's - I kid you not) brought his company Blue Circle back to the show again this year and his room was sounding good. He was demonstrating a new Hybrid Integrated amp (called the DAR I believe). When playing the sweet sounding cut "Immediately Blessed" from the Blue Coast Collection disc, through the J.M.Reynaud stand mounted speakers ($6500), the sound was very natural and realistic.
 

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Audiomagus

A company that was new to me this year was Audiomagus. Carrying a full line of super tiny electronics from a company called King Rex, and feeding an equally small set of speakers from a company out of China called John Blue, I wasn't expecting much from this system AND THEN THE MUSIC STARTED!

I was blown away! It was nowhere near anything that you would call the best sound of the show, but it may very well qualify for the "Best Value Pound for Pound". The music was tight, detailed and much bigger in scale than you would ever expect from such a tiny package.

At $1500 for the ENTIRE SYSTEM including cables and stands, this might qualify as the ultimate bedroom or office system. Great Fun!
 

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