I'll let you know if anyone in Chicago does a demonstration of this gear. My friend Bob (Hectic) is a great guy and has done some very cool get-togethers to show off his AV123 gear. He recently had some people over to show off the new reference speakers and some other AV123 stuff. Hopefully, he'll be getting the new Emotiva and Strata equipment. Oh, and the new CD player. I'm really looking forward to hearing it. It looks amazing and the preliminary reports on AV123 from beta testers (or tester, I have only read posts from MadDog or Sadono, can't remember) are very positive. All their stuff very cool looking and I haven't heard anything from AV that didn't sound very good.
Please keep us posted if you hear anything about launch dates on those new speakers! I've got to hear them.