The CES 2011 Show Report … new style… is now over in the galleries:

CES 2011 Home Audio Show Report

This is where the CES 2012 show report will be, in addition to being also here on this blog.

Let us know what you think!

Only got a little over a month to go… still gotta get my flu shot [always seems like a good idea before rubbing elbows with 140,00 other people with uncertain hygienic habits. So all you who are also going, you may want to consider this as well…].

We will not be exhibiting at CES this year. Audio Note will also not be exhibiting at CES this year.

This means that Neli will be free and able to hobnob with the industry bigwigs while I, I get to lug my 50 lb. camera around trying to take several million photos and expose my ears to all sorts of slings and arrows of outrageous fortune 😉

Can’t wait!

[Guess it was a successful CES. Impressive. Though numbers at the CES part of high-end audio, I would say, were lower and at THE SHOW part of of high-end audio… higher.]

“The International CES® today announced that 31,677 industry professionals from outside the U.S. attended the 2011 International CES January 6-9, 2011, in Las Vegas, Nevada. Up 30 percent from last year, international attendance at the 2011 CES set a new record for the show’s 45 year history. An independent audit, performed by Veris Consulting LLC, confirms CES’ status as the world’s largest consumer technology tradeshow and North America’s largest annual tradeshow of any kind. Overall, the 2011 International CES welcomed 149,529 technology attendees during its four day run.”

OK.

Done with the photos and I hope people can see that:

1) There just were not a lot of contenders for best of show
2) Of those, many were using laptops as sources, which almost always severely compromises the sound quality of a system at this show
3) Of the remaining, many were just trying to attract attention and did not focus on the creating the best sound that they could.

So…. better than RMAF, sound wise, as usual, but not as good as previous CES’s…

I think I detected a more relaxed attitude about the defacto train-wreck that is high-end audio and the doom and gloom dire predictions of the future are now almost as quaint and boring as playing Diana Krall all day long.

All the people using laptops to demonstrate the sound of their equipment (as opposed to just demonstrating that it, in fact, works) are like car dealerships sending a sales associate with bad breath and B.O. along with every person taking a test drive. It ain’t helping your case, people.

Let’s see, what else….

Clueless show reports by 2nd and 3rd tier magazines are still all the rage [I’ll let them decide if they are 2nd or 3rd tier :-)]. Jeez I wish these people would get a different job – perhaps even a job they are actually good at? Hmmmm… maybe the next post should be about how to detect a clueless review?

One of these days we have to stop buying crazy audio gear for just a darn minute and get me a decent camera [Yeah right :-)].

I like Las Vegas a lot better when it is warm, say 70 degrees during the day. Maybe next year…?