[dB Cooper]

I grew up in an age when audio parts dealers had largely become con men's cesspools praying on the scientifically illiterate by pushing scams like boutique wires, green pens, fancy hockey pucks, etc. So I do not at all lament their disappearance.

Only thing on that list I did not see at the show was the green pens. Lots of cables you could tow a car with.

[Phil A]

VPI  + Joseph Audio

[Phil A]

Monitor Audio  -  IQ Home Entertainment

[Phil A]

Overall, I think the best bang for the buck room was Odyssey easily

[Phil A]

I also thought the GT Audio works were really great speakers at their price points =

[Phil A]

GT Audio Works

[doug s.]

a few comments.

best sound of the show for me was the highwater sound room.  fantastic.  the horning eufrodite's are to die for, imo.  but at $24k they should be.     the show pair was (still is?) on special for $12k.  if you have the coin, go for it!  the ancillary gear was also way-spendy, but i am convinced you could drive the eufrodite's (~98-100db efficient) with gear far less expensive to similar result.  with the dearth of turntables at the show, should i really complain that they offered no digital playback?     but seriously, it would have been nice for me to be able to compare a few of the digital samples i brought to other speakers i listened to.  the winyl i brought sounded fantastic, as did everything else i heard - folks brought great stuff, and the proprietor jeff catalano is a font of knowledge about winyl and has a ton of his own excellent discs.  i probably spent a third of my time in that one room...

classic audio - i was extremely disappointed.  i expected to hear great things after last year, being conwinced that the room last year was why they did not shine.  the room was much better, (still not perfect), but the sound was congested, thick, no soundstaging whatsoever.  not what horns are supposed to sound like. 

proac in the synthesis/deja vu room - having a pair of proac mini monitors, and familiar with several other proacs in other systems, i can safely say proac should sue deja vu for the way they butchered the sound of the speakers they were demo'ing at the show...   

vintage in the daja vu room - excellent timbre and dynamics, but no true low end, and diffuse soundstaging.

jantzen - excellent sound, close to the best?  but, really hard to get a handle on it, in such a tiny room.

daedalus - the smaller speakers on the 6th floor sounded way better than what i heard in the big room.  the talk was how difficult the big room was to get set up, but sorry - no way the thick low end was because of the big room.  the bigger daedalus' definitely went lower, but at the expense of definition.  like the daedalus sound and want bass?  go w/the smaller ones, and actively cross over to subs.

volti - i still love the vitara's, but the new mid-line speakers now cost more than the vitara's did last year, and the vitara's are now pushing $18k.  and for some reason, i was not blown away like i was last year.

soundfield acoustics - i thought that aj-in-fla's offerings were quite nice at $3500.  but then.... i heard:

the philharmonic three's.  best sound at the show?  no, but close.  2nd best that i heard.  and they could have been ebst-of-show, maybe, if in a better room?  while not cheap at $3300 retail, anyone who says there's no value in hi-end is mistaken, imo.  these things are killer!  better than the salks, right next-door, imo.  the salks were nice, the philharmonic three's are nicer.  and frank at ava is doing something right - killer s/s amp at $1700, killer ~$1300 tubed preamp.  with a tape loop!     remote available...

odyssey audio room w/lorelei's - nice, good $6k system, but mid-fi compared to the philharmonic-ava room.  suffers the same problem that the big daedalus' suffered from - trying for too much bass at the expense of definition.  still a nice sound, tho.  (mebbe crossing the mains to subs at 80hz would make both of these sound better, while allowing for true low end?)

the big gt audio works - normally i don't even bother to listen to planars cuz they're not my cuppa.  but i am friends w/charles cuz he's a bud.  sounded better than i expected, but definitely those big boys need a bigger room.  and i have never heard dynamic drivers properly integrated w/ribbon midranges.  maybe if the room were bigger?  mebbe if the x-over point between mid and bass were lower?  in any event, i found a thick low end, and detail not what it should be for ribbons.  room too small?  but, pleasant enough sound; i simply want it all!     (oh, and charles - take the adwice of others - lose the qol!    )

silnote audio - the speakers sounded like speakers more than music.  had the right detail, the right extension, the right timbre.  but somehow not drawing me in...  (sorta like the big salks, imo...)

legacy audio - i only heard the middle pair, not the whispers (which i thoroughly disliked a few years ago, at another show i attended).  this time, i thought the sound nice - detailed, extended, airy.  but zero soundstaging.  not sure why they would have these speakers set up so close to each other when they had such a large room to work with.  maybe if they were set up better, the soundstaging would be better?

final thoughts?  need speakers on a budget?  get anything from philharmonic - even the mini monitors i heard briefly ($850/pair?) sounded great.  even if you can spend more, (a lot more), the philharmonic three's might be all you need.  audition them against the (more than 7 times more costly) horning eufrodite's.  and the jantzen's.  and the volti vitara's.  and mebbe the smaller daedalus'...  add subs to taste.     and check out ava-frank's gear - the powerful s/s amps if you have a difficult load to drive.  and especially his tubed preamps! 

doug s.

ps - last final thought - thanks, phil a, for taking a pic of me w/a chip in my mouth!   

[doug s.]

VPI  + Joseph Audio

a room i missed that i wanted to hear.  definitely i spent too much time in the high water audio suite.   

doug s.

[doug s.]

Overall, I think the best bang for the buck room was Odyssey easily

definitely decent sound, imo.  but i will stand by my prior statement of "mid-fi" sound compared to the same price system in the philharmonic audio room, which was vying for best sound at the show at any price, imo.   

ymmv,

doug s.

[jarcher]

I agree that the sanders had the potential to sound a lot better with better amplification - and if the Merrill represents state of the art in ncores, I was somewhat underwhelmed. Ie the sound was too hard and somewhat grey and unmusical (the opposite of, eg, Van Alstines amps). They were also being driven abusively loud on ocassions to the harm of both the sanders and surreal audio speakers, the latter of which at the left channel was actually damaged before my very eyes and ears. User error, but feel bad for the dude.

As for channel d : would appreciate you qualifying your comment that it "sucks" for the dear readers benefit.

[James Romeyn]

Sanders at CES a few years ago sounded fantastic, with your head in a very tiny sweet spot only inches wide...and don't turn your head either!  Soundlabs setup by Bob Crump a few years back (his last show prior to his untimely demise, RIP) had much larger sweet spot, which makes sense considering how much larger are the Soundlabs (4' wide and floor to almost ceiling, plus located 1/3rd into a larger room).  First time ever hearing the Blowtorch.  That demo kicked butt, among the best ever.

It's too bad Roger West doesn't do many smaller regional shows because they are likely the best stats extant.  Big and costly though!     

[dB Cooper]

Well, big and costly wouldn't be a deterrent.

As for the Sanders, he discusses the issue of directivity on his site, saying (paraphrasing) that the imaging on axis is better than "conventional" speakers, and off-axis "no worse" than conventional designs. I found the image to be fantastic if you had the chair between the tape marks- and nonexistent otherwise. The same was more or less true for all the big planars but most obvious on the Sanders. The hosts freely admitted that the presentation was significantly different at each chair. They are the perfect speakers for someone who doesn't ever want to have any friends over to listen to some music.

To me, the ribbon tweeters and planar mids found in the Salk, Philharmonic and Raidho speaks (among others), matched the big 'stats for the things they do well, and can actually be enjoyed fully by more than one person at a time. That is my preference. What we are really talking about here is two conflicting design goals: frequency response vs. power response. The Sanders approach (FR) aims to remove the room from the equation by strongly beaming the sound at the listener and eliminating reflections. The other way requires attention to room effects, but pays off IMO.

Back on topic, a shout-out to Gary Gill for doing a very big job very well. Hope he continues to have success with the show.

Didn't make any of the live music this year but did get to an interesting talk by Mark Waldrep, check out his site at realhd-audio.com.

[BobM]

Some additional coverage over at Stereophile by Art Dudley

http://www.stereophile.com/category/capital-audiofest-2013

BTW - still waiting for a picture of those Volti speakers and the Boulder amp that many people seemed to love.

[Phil A]

I'd also like a shout out to John Gatski of everythingaudionetwork.  He had his stack of DACs (article on his website) and it was a very useful comparison.  It helped me decide what I'm going to do in a secondary system.

[Phil A]

There's also a picture of the stack of DACs on Stereophile's coverage about half way down the page -

http://www.stereophile.com/content/capital-audiofest-day-two-part-one

[jhm731]

Thanks for the pictures Phil A.

More CAF pictures here:

http://parttimeaudiophile.com/

Did you hear the Volti Audio Vittoras?

[Phil A]

Thanks for the pictures Phil A.

More CAF pictures here:

http://parttimeaudiophile.com/

Did you hear the Volti Audio Vittoras?

I believe he had them last year.  They sounded good (and those type of speakers are usually not necessarily my favorite - but they also were not all that cheap).  I missed a bunch of rooms this year as I focused on stuff I want for a secondary system after an upcoming move (vs. just browsing as in prior years) and I spend a good portion of Friday chatting with Dan Wright as I never met him before.  I will be moving early next year and have a pair of Ohm Mirco Walsh Talls sitting in the cloest of the house I am moving to.  I have an amp but wanted a preamp with HT Bypass (and bought one) that is reasonable and a DSD DAC that is reasonable (I like a secondary system that can do music decently and is a bit different than the main one and I will probably buy the DAC soon).  Will have a couple of other systems but those are more for strictly HT or guest rooms (they won't be terrible just a little less serious).  Have all in ceiling speakers and a 92 inch screen that folds into the ceiling in the master bedroom as it is not for serious listening and feeds the outdoor speakers).  Thanks for the pics too.

[Phil A]

More CAF pictures here:

http://parttimeaudiophile.com/

PS - Good thing you did not capture me in any of the pictures and downgrade the looks of that nice audio gear

[roscoeiii]

(I like a secondary system that can do music decently and is a bit different than the main one and I will probably buy the DAC soon). 

I'd hold off on buying the DAC for that second system as long as possible, especially if you are buying new. DACs seem to be one of the fastest changing segments in audio these days. And more and more DSD stuff is pouring out everyday.

[Phil A]

I'd hold off on buying the DAC for that second system as long as possible, especially if you are buying new. DACs seem to be one of the fastest changing segments in audio these days. And more and more DSD stuff is pouring out everyday.

At $850, it's not a huge deal.  But I might wait (will see how I feel later).  It would be one less things to move (not that it is that big).  At that price I can always put it in a 3rd system.  The few I've seen used people have been selling for around what a new one costs so it is not something that can be had much cheaper, at least for now.  In the secondary system, it won't see tons of use so as long as it worked I would not feel the need to upgrade to something else.  If it were the main system, I'd definitely wait.  We'll see how low I can get it for.  While I don't use the secondary system much, I do miss a DAC since I sold my Emotive XDA-1 many months back.  I did not use it for music much, but now I don't use it at all except for HT.