We hear a dealer demo pair of Triolons (and Campaniles and Violons) just appeared there in the last few days.

And since we have the only dealer demo Acapella Triolon Excalibur speakers (the only Triolons of any kind actually) on the American continent, ….

We just think that with equipment this gawd-awful expensive, most people are going to want full-service, not full-discount. They need to have some recourse if something that they spent their hard-earned coin on is not performing to their expectations, they need someone who knows what they are doing and who actually cares about how the person’s system sounds.

This is above and beyond getting faulty equipment taken care of – there is no one in the high-end home audio industry that we know of who will not speedily fix or replace something that is broken. We just thnk there is more to being satisfied with one’s stereo system than just whether the equipment works or not.

[And, as a final note on the subject:

Yes, of course we are very disappointed, we put in a lot of hard work and broke down a lot of barriers between dealer and audiophile over the years, using the Acapella line to explore what could be done. But we are also very relieved – the animosity and … tomfoolery… were frustrating and emotionally hard on us, especially Neli. It is a good thing that we are done with this and it really is time to focus on making sure our other VERY high quality product lines get the high-profile treatment they deserve in the same style that we prototyped using the photogenic Acapella line. We will keep our NEWS page continually updated with the changes to, and expansion of, our website coverage.

Thank you everybody for your support during this transition. We really, really, REALLY appreciate it.]

For those who are curious, our Triolons ARE for sale. Please contact us if you are interested.

Information about our Triolons is here

We are saddened to announce that for the foreseeable future we will no longer be authorized dealers of Acapella Audio Arts speakers. We were the largest Acapella dealer on the American continent and by far the most visible experts on and advocates of Acapella in the world.

Since our first year of business, 4 years ago now, the person who is now the distributor has chafed against our approach to serving our customers and the audiophile community, as exemplified by the candor of the content on our website. After many years of his intimidations and ultimatums we are no longer Acapella dealers.

As our customers and a hundred thousand virtual guests know, we do not shy away from telling it like we hear it.

And we never will.

We just might have to regroup periodically.

Acapella makes some of the best speakers in the world and we will continue to think so and recommend their products, just like we sometimes recommend other excellent products we do not carry when we think they are the best fit for a particular person’s situation.

To our Acapella customers: we still stand by you and your excellent speakers 100% and will not hesitate to support you, with the same dedication as always, in the unlikely event you should ever require it.

The manufacturers of Acapella are some of the very nicest people we have met, are some of the biggest fans of our show reports and website, and are unabashed audiophiles at heart. Their English is not perfect and they are shy around people who do not speak German, and so they have few industry friends here in America who could have provided them some perspective on what is going on. If you see Hermann Winters and his wife Inge at a show, step up and say hello, welcome them to America, and don’t let their shyness discourage you. Through the shared passion for music and music reproduction, you will understand each other just fine, in English or German.

As for us, we are of course investigating a number of alternative speakers.

We are spoiled. Our next speakers have to excel at being impressive, emotional, jaw-droppingly real, and extremely powerful at communicating what the musicians are saying about what it means to be human. And what it means to be Alive.

For us, this is what music is all about.

Should we use this opportunity to continue to push ever farther against the state-of-the-art here at Audio Federation? Hee hee hee! OK, try not to give away the surprise, Neli…. Neli!!! Shhhhhhhhh…….

A lot of the Audiophile’s Guide needs a facelift – most especially the equipment racks and turntables, not to mention the categories that are still empty.

But the Speaker category is now down to 8 speaker manufacturers, and if it continues in the current direction it will be down to 6 the next time I get near it with the delete key…And one can forsee a future in which the last standing manufacturer gets the axe – all because the current approach is flawed in a number of ways:

It does not take into account that some speakers from a manufacturer are really much better than other speakers from the same manufacturer

It does not take into acount the different goals for a system, each separate goal possibly arriving at a different ‘best’ speaker.

It does not take into account room size and other possible constraints that affect the choice of ‘best speaker’

The new format will try to take these things into account by:

Listing speakers instead of just manufacturers

Adding categories to represent the different goals systems (people) have like ‘Impressive’, ‘Emotional’ etc.

Taking into account small, medium and large room sizes

Not sure how we are going to organize all this data yet. But we are working on it.

Then we can add manufacturers like Sonus Faber and MBL to the list of best speakers – as they do have privilaged places in the speaker world – with respect to very specific sonic goals – just not at the top of best of the ultimate.