It's kinda funny, a lot of the rooms they highlighted were ones I though were less than impressive. Not so for the Wiener Lautsprecher Manufaktur speakers though, they sounded wonderful and were at the top of my list. But at $10k or so for the monitors they weren't cheap.
Art Audio's system sounded very nice, they had some monster monoblocks driving speakers that I think were their own (nothing I recognized, probably a new model). Totem had a nice room, as did Tri-Cell, who had some very cool little Elac monitors playing. Lots of sound from a tiny little metal box that wasn't terribly expensive.
A real standout was
Highland Audio. Their tiny 3201 speakers made serious music for a paltry $319cdn. You could put together a damn impressive home theater with them for well under a grand, and they'd be perfect for a small secondary system in the living room. But the best value of the show was unquestionably in the Omega room, where the hemp speakers and Vinnie's Lotus integrated & battery dac sounded phenomenal. I almost felt bad for Louis' co-presenter, whose big tube monoblocks & tank of a cd player were put to shame by the two little anonymous looking boxes.
Gary
