[Phil A]

Last year's CAF and this year's CAF are the only shows I've attended.  I've notice no one seems to show subs.  Any particular reason for his?

There were a few rooms with subs.  Soundfield Audio had active subs





Volti Audio had a sub (I think he crossed it over at 50Hz)



Oasis Speakers




GT Audio Works - may be others too

[Letitroll98]

Dan, great seeing you again. Not sure if you're the one who deprived me of Newcastles late into the proceedings Sat, but that'll teach me not to have a stash of my own.  Btw Dan, those were Cary amps, Kevin Kemp (great guy!!!) provided the Audience cabling and conditioners, as well as the rack.
 
I'll (bass) treat the room next year with some carefully placed Helmholtz resonators...in the form of some empty beer bottles

cheers,

AJ

No, I didn't get a one.  Sat there patiently waiting to be offered, tried to look thirsty, licked my lips a couple of times, nothing.  And since the room needed "some carefully placed Helmholtz resonators" I was ready and willing to contribute to the effort.

"...those were Cary amps, Kevin Kemp (great guy!!!) provided the Audience cabling and conditioners" 
Thanks for the correction, I edited my post.  I tried using a handwriting app on my phone for notes and as you can see, it didn't work out so well.

All the best.

[StereoNut]

Thanks for spending time in my room Stereo Nut...GT Audio Works

You're welcome!  By now (if you've read any of my other forum comments) you know that I was really impressed with your speakers.  So, my "circling back" to your room more than once was my pleasure!  It was also very nice to spend some after-hours time socially with the both of you over the course of the weekend.  I look forward to seeing you two at the next show.  Keep on making those great speakers.

[StereoNut]

It was great seeing and meeting all the AC guys. This show was full of a great bunch of people....

+1 

[doug s.]

It was great seeing and meeting all the AC guys. This show was full of a great bunch of people.

We were also honored to be showing with some great manufacturers.

I must say say the most interesting thing to see and hear were the organ pipes. The way these worked was equally interesting.

bill, sorry i missed you.  i stopped by a few times; actually was in that room a while; and i seemed to always miss you.  mebbe you saw me coming?     maybe next year...

doug s.

[doug s.]

Last year's CAF and this year's CAF are the only shows I've attended.  I've notice no one seems to show subs.  Any particular reason for his?

the swap meet audio room also had subs.  while i am a firm believer in active subwoofing, i asked charles to turn 'em off, as i wanted to hear the lenahans w/o any assist.     they still sounded mitey-fine.

and i also heard the volti vittori's w/o the sub; wery nice even w/o.  that set-up, btw, was the first time i ever heard a single sub, off to the side, that did not negatively impact soundstaging.  i was impressed...

doug s.

[dB Cooper]

Last year's CAF and this year's CAF are the only shows I've attended.  I've notice no one seems to show subs.  Any particular reason for his?

Same goes for full range planars. I guess they need a big (=$$$) display space and are a pain in the (_|_) to set up? I missed a lot of rooms but didn't see any electrostats anywhere, even in the guide. Unless you count the Stax headphones in the Woo Audio room.

Speaking of which, does anyone remember the name of these little omnis Woo Audio had?




And another shot of the intruguing Oasis speakers.

[StereoNut]

bill, sorry i missed you.  i stopped by a few times; actually was in that room a while; and i seemed to always miss you.  mebbe you saw me coming?     maybe next year...

doug s.

+1  Sorry I missed you too!  I must've been out roaming the Fest taking pix.

[AJinFLA]

No, I didn't get a one.  Sat there patiently waiting to be offered, tried to look thirsty, licked my lips a couple of times, nothing.  And since the room needed "some carefully placed Helmholtz resonators" I was ready and willing to contribute to the effort.

Hah, sorry, meant at the lobby bar Sat night...all out. Tried the Safeway Sat morning,  no luck. Sorry, too unfamiliar with the surrounding area and too busy with the room to do much more foraging than that. Ah well...
Btw, good meeting the 2 Bills also, the Purity one and the Nut 
Ironically, I saw the guy bringing in those pipes into the lobby and thought, ok, must be for the swap meet Sun. Little did I know it would be for that crazy contraption. Wish I had heard it!

cheers,

AJ

[saisunil]

I've posted these comments elsewhere (re: what other rooms at the C.A.F. had good sounding stuff besides the Swap Meet Audio room) but after thinking about it, I realized there maybe fellow audiophiles who only participate here on the AC forum.  So, FWIW...

Positive vibes

• Tidal "Piano Diacera" Speakers ($58K/pair) and Audio Power Labs Monoblocks ($178K/pair) - Great sound, but "stupid" expensive!  (I rather buy my summer beach bungalow somewhere for that kinda dough!)

• Devore "Orangutangs" - Beautiful to look at & listen to, but not $$$ cheap!  (At least for my budget!)

• Joseph Audio "Perspective" (I think?) - Kinda strange... one day they were great, another not so much!?!

• Classic Audio T-3.4's & AtmaSphere Amps - Wonderfully sculptured speakers.  Dynamic, yet sensuous music.

• Daedalus "Athena" (I think?) & Carver Amps - Exquisite woodwork, great tone and plenty of tube power.

Personal favorites

• Swap Meet Audio "Lenahan S2R monitors" - The more I listened to other speakers at the show, the more I realized what a value the Lenahans are at $3450.00.  Miracle Audio sub system was a great addition to them, but it almost doubled the overall cost.

• Oasis - Their floor-standers sounded great. Very unique! My winner for the most unusual design award!

• Soundfield Audio "Overtures" - Great range, very dynamic and well balanced overall. Worth saving up your $$$ for!

• GT Audio Works "GTA-2's" - Ribbon/planar/dynamic driver "hybrid" towers (with separate sub-woof cabinets for each side) that sounded real, real nice. Very well integrated, with cohesive sound top to bottom. Nice cabinet work, clean lines and a "no-brainer" price of $2995.00.  My winner for the "Biggest Bang for the Buck" award!

• Conn Church Organ Pipes with Bogen amps - Room filling sound. A huge soundstage isn't enough to describe what you're hearing here.  It's more like a Phil Spector-like "Wall of Sound" !!! My winner for the "Most Creative in Audio Repurposing" award!

Thanks for "listening" to my opinions.  

Nicely done!

I liked your positive tone ...

[AJinFLA]

Same goes for full range planars. I guess they need a big (=$$$) display space and are a pain in the (_|_) to set up?

I think the guy at LSAF with those gigantic stats (7' H x 4-5' W?) in those shoebox rooms (that made CapFest suites look like auditoriums) disproved that notion. They practically filled the entire wall! Wish I could remember the name/find a pic. Room 224 iirc. Sounded surprisingly good too.

Edit: Hah, found it:




cheers,

AJ

[J_Fav]

Thanks for posting all the great pictures!  I took my camera, but it decided first thing Saturday morning to refuse autofocusing?  So after about 6-8 terrible shots, I just put it back in my pocket. 

Overall this was a very strange show.  Attendance was low, there were times where I was the only person walking in a hallway.  And the room after room of vintage, or vintage looking stuff was a real head scratcher.  Are people buying that stuff these days? 

I like to start with the good 

Both the Tidal setups were fantastic.  Very fast, very articulate, very engaging.  They could sound a bit lean at times, lacking some "meat on the bones".  But the vast majority of the time, that was never a concern and instead you're just immersed in wonderful sound.  The bigger Tidals with the Solid State amps I thought sounded better than the smaller ones with the (very cool) tube amps.  The solid state setup was more balanced and fleshed out.  It's all out of my budget anyway. 

The Joseph Audio floorstanders were also very nice.  Top couple octaves were good but not great, but the rest of the spectrum was excellent.  Nice fit/finish, and reasonably priced.  I imagine these will win lots of fans with no real weaknesses and plenty of positives. 

The Daedalus speaker and setup were nice, too musical and lacking resolution for my taste ... but I can understand why somebody with different taste would love these.  I love the craftsmanship, superb work!  If I had a separate room with a Scotch bar that was meant for chilling out, these would be perfect in there.  Anybody want to loan me $50K to build an addition on the house 

The MBL setup was fun, and more balanced than I've heard them.  The soundstage from MBL's is always a treat, but usually comes at a cost of accuracy.  This time they sounded very accurate to my ear, and kept that immersive soundstage.  I spent a lot of time in that room. 

And I don't have any info written down (and am too lazy to look it up), but the speakers that had the Lowther as a midrange, and the 4 8" subs mounted vertically at the back of the speaker ... those were very nice too.  They had a nice dynamic zing to them, engaging without the beamy-ness of Lowthers, and more resolution instead of just through the midrange.  Interesting design that worked. 

The setups I was more or less indifferent on:

Legacy as usual failed to impress.  They sound good at times (never great), and poorly integrated at others.  It could my preconceptions about seeing a speaker with 47 drivers in it, but it sounds like a speaker with 47 drivers.  It tries to work as one unit, but is never able to do so convincingly. 

The Polk Audio stuff has potential, but sounded to me like it was just designed to be more bass heavy than needed.  It's nice to see a Best Buy retailer attempt to build high end stuff, but they need to realize high end buyers aren't impressed by tipped up bass. 

I was very much looking forward to the Philharmonics.  Dennis Murphy obviously has a solid rep as a designer, and the components look to have tons of potential.  But on tracks where instruments or vocals would transition from the woofer to midrange panel, the transition wasn't seamless.  I really wanted to like these, and still would say they're a good choice for the price, but better top to bottom integration is something I'd want. 

The Soundfield Overtures did some things right too, enjoyable at times.  I didn't care for the look, and thought the sound was often confused.  Focus was lacking, and the top end was very unrefined to my ear.  Overall build quality left some to be desired, but still they offer decent value for the price.

The GT Audio Labs stuff was also a good value, but still needs a bit of tweaking to be something I'd consider. 

No point harping on what I didn't like at all, safe to assume that at a small show like this if it's not on the above list, it's in the didn't like category.  Just my opinion, not that it matters if yours is different 

[doug s.]

+1  Sorry I missed you too!  I must've been out roaming the Fest taking pix.

hey!  are you a stand-in for bill baker?   

doug s.

[StereoNut]

hey!  are you a stand-in for bill baker?   

doug s.

The only way I could possibly be a stand-in for Bill Baker is if you vertically cut me in half! Then you'd have two Bill Bakers. Well, three if you count the original!

[StereoNut]

Nicely done!

I liked your positive tone ...

Thanks!

[Letitroll98]

Thanks for posting all the great pictures!  I took my camera, but it decided first thing Saturday morning to refuse autofocusing?  So after about 6-8 terrible shots, I just put it back in my pocket. 

Overall this was a very strange show.  Attendance was low, there were times where I was the only person walking in a hallway.  And the room after room of vintage, or vintage looking stuff was a real head scratcher.  Are people buying that stuff these days? 

I like to start with the good 

Nice post and I couldn't agree more.  Welcome to AC.  And no worries about the camera problems, if I may be so bold, I'll just stick my pictures as inserts.


               

Both the Tidal setups were fantastic.  Very fast, very articulate, very engaging.  They could sound a bit lean at times, lacking some "meat on the bones".  But the vast majority of the time, that was never a concern and instead you're just immersed in wonderful sound.  The bigger Tidals with the Solid State amps I thought sounded better than the smaller ones with the (very cool) tube amps.  The solid state setup was more balanced and fleshed out.  It's all out of my budget anyway.

               

The Joseph Audio floorstanders were also very nice.  Top couple octaves were good but not great, but the rest of the spectrum was excellent.  Nice fit/finish, and reasonably priced.  I imagine these will win lots of fans with no real weaknesses and plenty of positives.

They had a better setup last year, none of the top end sizzle evident here.


               

The Daedalus speaker and setup were nice, too musical and lacking resolution for my taste ... but I can understand why somebody with different taste would love these.  I love the craftsmanship, superb work!  If I had a separate room with a Scotch bar that was meant for chilling out, these would be perfect in there.  Anybody want to loan me $50K to build an addition on the house 

               

The MBL setup was fun, and more balanced than I've heard them.  The soundstage from MBL's is always a treat, but usually comes at a cost of accuracy.  This time they sounded very accurate to my ear, and kept that immersive soundstage.  I spent a lot of time in that room.

               

And I don't have any info written down (and am too lazy to look it up), but the speakers that had the Lowther as a midrange, and the 4 8" subs mounted vertically at the back of the speaker ... those were very nice too.  They had a nice dynamic zing to them, engaging without the beamy-ness of Lowthers, and more resolution instead of just through the midrange.  Interesting design that worked.

These are Horning speakers from Denmark, in the High Water Sound room.  The nut running the show is Jeff Catalano, a real joy of a person.

The setups I was more or less indifferent on:

               

Legacy as usual failed to impress.  They sound good at times (never great), and poorly integrated at others.  It could my preconceptions about seeing a speaker with 47 drivers in it, but it sounds like a speaker with 47 drivers.  It tries to work as one unit, but is never able to do so convincingly.

               

The Polk Audio stuff has potential, but sounded to me like it was just designed to be more bass heavy than needed.  It's nice to see a Best Buy retailer attempt to build high end stuff, but they need to realize high end buyers aren't impressed by tipped up bass.

Yes, and the reason the bookshelf model sounds better, a real sleeper.
 

                 

I was very much looking forward to the Philharmonics.  Dennis Murphy obviously has a solid rep as a designer, and the components look to have tons of potential.  But on tracks where instruments or vocals would transition from the woofer to midrange panel, the transition wasn't seamless.  I really wanted to like these, and still would say they're a good choice for the price, but better top to bottom integration is something I'd want.

I didn't hear them this year as I couldn't get in the room when they were playing, the door was always locked.  Another display that sounded better last year.


               

The Soundfield Overtures did some things right too, enjoyable at times.  I didn't care for the look, and thought the sound was often confused.  Focus was lacking, and the top end was very unrefined to my ear.  Overall build quality left some to be desired, but still they offer decent value for the price.

I think the lack of focus is designed in, a more "realistic" portrayal of the live event, but you have to be looking for that.


               

The GT Audio Labs stuff was also a good value, but still needs a bit of tweaking to be something I'd consider.

 

I think we both differ from some of the other comments here by a small margin, but I think you hit it right in the bullseye.  Here's a couple more pics.


               

There was a very sweet young lady hand painting acoustic treatments in the Daedalus Audio room, shown here with a gentleman who's wardrobe was, um, different.


               

A shout out to Sean Casey at Zu who was making his Def IV's sound much better than they did last week at another venue.


               

The Classic Audio T-1.4 Reference was impressing some showgoers with their presentation.  I wish I could remember that album he was playing.


               

               

The new VPI Traveler tables.  As a VPI owner I was hoping for a little more from this unit paired with a Grado cartridge.  The Classic IV also playing was stunning, perhaps the best table at the show.


               

These were very large.


               

And the show stopper for me was the Conn Organ Pipe System in mono driven by some vintage Bogen amps.

[doug s.]

...The Classic IV also playing was stunning, perhaps the best table at the show...

maybe.  but, perhaps not.  tho the vpi is a beauty, i think i would have taken the verdier la platine, if either were offered to me at no charge.   


and, i also thought the tw acoustic raven was excellent:



of course, it would certainly be difficult to do a comparison.  while the vpi is the best looking, i simply like the verdier's engineering.  something about a massive platter that is supported by a magnetic field.  and, w/o affecting the cartridge.

doug s.

[rollo]

I was there Friday listening to the Qol.   After listening for a bit and switching back and forth between engaged and bypass, I asked why the low end was not changed when engaged?  I was told the low end was not engaged with the unit, just mids and highs.

Unfortunately I did not have the time to stop back in the room later in the day as family issues arose where I had to leave, and I could not make it back over the weekend.   

Did the Qol make the sound better or different?  Hard to say at this time for myself with the limited time and frequency coverage.

Maybe some local shops carry it where I could listen to it running full range in the future.

     We were demonstrating the affect of QOL without the sub in place then with it in place. The difference in room fill was evident.
   We have Reps in many locations now so an in home demo is the only way to find out. At present we are SOLD OUT. Ordering a new batch.
   Yes John Atkinson will receive his review sample shortly from BSG Technologies. Review to follow.
   Doug S.thanks for photos and kind words. To everyone else again thank you we look forward to servicing your audio needs.
  AJ it a treat meeting you and demonstrating the M1 Monitors. They are KA BOOM for the buck. $1300 are you kidding me. Great job.

charles
 

[Triode Pete]

It was a pleasure to finally meet & greet a lot of you fellow AC'rs in person at the show. I hope you enjoyed the show and received some sonic enjoyment & hospitality in Suite 347 (Triode Wire Labs Room (LOL rollo!  ))...

Next time, I hope to spend a little more time in the other rooms, soaking in the sounds... The Conn organ pipes with the licensed Western Electric Bogen amps was a trip... made me think... wow!

Hope to see y'all at a GTG or Rave soon!  Perhaps I should host one in August?

Cheers,
Pete

[Roscoe Primrose]

stuff i got pics of included some home brew e-stats made by dave berning some 40 years ago. (dave and his equipment were at the show - great stuff and a great guy.  he does this at his house in beautiful downtown potomac md.)

The e-stats where made by the late Phillip Abraham, a friend of Dave's.  They now belong to Dave B.

  other cool stuff was the prewiously mentioned home brew turntable w/bong attachment,

Music always sounds better with a a bong in the room 

and some simple full-range drivers mounted on plywood that sounded amazingly good driven by ~$500 worth of home brew tube electronics and a $200 turntable/cartridge set up. 

That system did have a tube line stage, but the power amp is a variation on the FirstWatt F2J setup as a current source amp.  The power amp & speakers can be built for about $850...

Glad you had a good time at the show, too bad we didn't get to meet.

Roscoe