Pursuing the Ultimate Music Experiences

Audio Federation High-Fidelity Audio Blog
 by Michael

High-end Audio at CEDIA 2008

Well, the title of this post is kind of a misnomer, huh? There IS no high-end audio at CEDIA – just the hope that someone might be able to buy some of this and that and string together a system that might be worth listening to.

All of the photos below are in the main CEDIA show report in much larger [up to 9X] versions.


Halcro in red – and I presume any designer color. We always liked their style – and now it is even more stylish. Yeah, some people do indeed like their amps to have a more conservative [shiny gray box] look, along with their speakers ]a tall skinny box with cloth on front], their cables and power cords [skinny black things… okay, we ALL want them to be bendable… at least a little bit :-)], and it is good to see some one breaking the mold [again] [and unlike today’s REVEL :-)]


Wilson announced the MAXX 3 [or is it MAXX III? or MAXX Series 3?]. It is looking a lot like the Alexandria, which they also brought and we include a photo of below for comparison purposes. The tweeter is now in a separate cabinet and is adjustable. Other changes? I do not know.


The Wilson Alexandria X2. First time they were able to meet my camera, and, although finger-print-rich CEDIA attendees had a field day, so did my trigger finger.


The new Martin Logan CLX. Part flat panel, part round panel. We heard it at T.H.E. Show driven by Ayre.


The new Boulder CD/SACD player – on static, albeit plugged in, display. Uses a memory-cache to take the transport out of the loop as much as possible.


Sonus Faber now has desktop speakers. They come with real binding posts – so not really computer speakers – but excellent looking and the Electa Amatuer-looking ones on the right are wrapped in what feels like real leather [just like the front panel of the old Sonus Fabers].


The big KEF speakers. Driven by Musical Fidelity and Neli says she say a DVD player source – and they sounded like it. I heard an evenness in both the freq response and dynamics – and so perhaps if they get passed an actual musical signal they might actually produce music – I’d like to hear that someday.


Mark Levinson also has a new CD/SACD player. I think we should be seeing Blu-ray players, not more SACD players – but whatever. At $15K it had better be good – competition these days is fierce.

That’s about it. Nordost and Acoustic Zen were there. PS Audio was there for the first time I think. We did not see Shunyata – in fact there were fewer booths this year, smaller booths, and fewer people. A sign of the economy, or the show getting bored with Denver?

The T.H.E. Show only had 3 rooms – but steady traffic [it was actually better traffic than many exhibits on the main show floor were getting if they were not on the main arteries – and even some poor companies on the main arteries]. Neli thought we should have brought the little Audio Note system to TH.E. Show – a slam-dunk best of show for many people, and the others would hear something to think about for a long time. Oh well, shoulda woulda coulda.

In any case, CEDIA will no longer be held in Denver – it is moving to Atlanta and the Indianapolis. About 95% of CEDIA is at CES each year – maybe I should ignore all the car sound and cell phone and computer sections of CES and spend my Main Conference hours only on static display audio and video next year.

In any case, as many of you are eagerly awaiting, RMAF is next month [and we are still trying to figure out exactly what to take, Argh!] and so another show report is just around the corner…

in CEDIA 2008 / High-end Audio HiFi and Stereo / Show Reports 0 comments
 by Michael

CEDIA 2008 Denver – Show Report Preview

We received our CEDIA 2008 Expo Show Magazine last week. There is one of these for each day of the show – and there are often lots of stories about high-end audio.

I thought I’d show you all a few of them – and why we actually go and take photos at these shows [and also because they are in Denver – a hop skip and jump away].


The main convention floor. Yeah, it is about … 1/6? the size of CES. But,that IS STILL darn big.


Mark Levinson is still alive and kicking.


The theme for speakers at the show, last year especially, was speakers that were hidden away. Who wants to see those ugly things anyway? But this company is capitalizing on what WE all know – speakers are often works of art.


Simaudio and home-theater


Cable news. The gossip is that Esoteric is branding AcroLink cable. And hurray for anybody who tries to do away with RCA connectors [and spades, please].


People also write about personnel changes in the industry.


Halcro and Wadia [I know what you are thinking :-)]. Yes, sad to say, McIntosh is about the only tubed gear at this show.


Theta – somehow, though attrition and persistence in large part, they have made it to the top of the heap in surround sound processors [from the perspective of someone who does not cover HT and who will pipe digital through EMM Labs foregoing the fancy shmancy digital babel that is the high-end video world of today].


Parasound…


Paradigm…


Revel is still hanging in there… and in fact coming out with speakers quite frequently these days…. is perhaps not in the avantgarde style and wicked price performance of old.


Anthem…


A music server that looks like a jukebox with a computer screen [GUI] interface to Music Giants catalogs, lossless and uncompressed audio, etc.

in CEDIA 2008 / High-end Audio HiFi and Stereo / Show Reports 0 comments
 by Michael

Photos from downstairs

Just a few odds and ends… OK. Yes. Audio porn. While it still gets through those parental filters.


The Kharma Mini Exquisite.


The Audio Note Kegon Balanced from the front


The Audio Note Kegon Balanced from the side


The Marten Coltrane, showing off its bottom port.


The Audio Note E/SEC Signature speaker with 8 hand rubbed coats of lacquer, in MADRONE burl with piano finish .


A closeup of the finish.

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 by Michael

Playback Designs MPS-5 versus the EMMLabs CDSA SE

This was a rather hurried back and forth shootout that lasted about an hour to an hour and a half. Neli and I were somewhat at an advantage, because we are very familiar with the system – and a very high-resolution system at that.

The system consisted of the Marten ‘Coltrane Supreme’ loudspeakers, Lamm ML2.1 amps, and Lamm L2 linestage. Cables were a mix of Nordost ODIN, Valhalla and Jorma Design PRIME. Powercords were Elrod and AcroLink. All components were on HRS platforms (and the front end on the HRS SXR equipment rack) except the Marten speaker crossover [Hmmm… we got to get this boy a M3 too].


[More photos of the PD in the previous post]

The Playback Designs MPS-5 (PD) only had about 300-400 hours on it so far, so we assumed that it was enough like the CDSA that its break-in process would be go through likewise phases of dynamic compression before opening up at around 700 to 1000 hours.

In some large sense the fact that the PD is still breaking in invalidates some of what we heard. But, considering how many of the reviews out there are of unbroken-in equipment – we thought we’d at least publish a few impressions to add a little sanity to the mix.

The short and sweet is that the PD is a very good player but I don’t think it beats the CDSA SE with the latest transport and software updates.

That doesn’t mean EMMLabs can rest easy – this player has a lot going for it – and it is similar enough to the CDSA [at this point] that it will cause confusion in the marketplace [though at $15K versus the CDSA’s 11.5K, there is a price difference – though the PD does offer additional functionality for the higher price tag by providing digital inputs on the back of the unit).

OK. Details…

The PD had very good PRaT which I thought was slightly better than the CDSA.

The PD had a slightly more colorful tone – which is not to say warm, tho it might be thought of that way – but more like the Kharma kind of exuberance – or that of analog. The Meitner is also known for its pureness of tone – and the PD was like that, only tipped up a little. I did not find it to be out of proportion to reality, necessarily, but it was a definite difference from way the CDSA was interpreting the CD.

Another difference was that either the soft notes were made more prominent – or the midrange and highs were made more prominent – which I think resulted in several more sonic differences [according to my mental model of what is happening]:

1. The soundstage was more forward. This was neither more or less pleasant than the CDSA – it just WAS.

2. There was more ‘perceived’ resolution – a lot of the subtleties of the music were more evident [note that this differs from Dave’s interpretation – by I think I have an explanation for this further on]

3. There was a higher noise floor

4. Because lots of very soft sounds were now more in evidence there wasn’t a clear demarcation between images in the soundstage.

5. This lead to a feeling that there was a larger presence, more of a oneness or wholeness to the stage – perhaps even more ‘continuousness’ where notes flowed well into each other.

All this elevation of low-level detail also to a feeling that there was [is? have to remember – this player isn’t broken in yet, and although the CDSA doesn’t sound like this when it is breaking in – this is not the CDSA] an innate lack of dynamic range between the quietest note and the loudest – and that there was ‘fuzz’ between the musicians. I felt that there were too many ‘cues’ [very low level subtle sounds like the sound bouncing off the guitar] telling the ear where everything was and concluded that there was some information that really shouldn’t be there – that things were moving around too much and too large – and that it also tended to make the notes rounder – even though the notes were great there were just a lot of other sounds around the note that was filling in around it – perhaps making it *seem* rounder.

So, in conclusion, this is a very nice player but CDSA SE owners do not have anything to worry about, …yet. However, if they look in the ‘solid-state players less than $50K rear view mirror’, they will see a new player has appeared out of nowhere where before there was none in sight.

Emm Labs is a company with equipment in most pro studios in the world. This is Playback Design’s first product.

I am hoping that Playback Designs and EMM Labs continue to diverge with respect to the sound of their equipment – both to reduce the potential of litigation [the head engineer at PD is from EMM Labs] and to offer the audiophile more choices.

Our heartfelt thanks go to Dave for lugging his player up all those stairs 🙂

—-

[Whew! Hard review to write, trying to be fair to both players and to both manufacturers who we like and respect – and one of which, Emm Labs, we represent in the marketplace. Also, people get so passionate about their latest high-end audio toy – one of the reasons magazines only publish positive, non-comparative reviews is just to avoid the poop storms :-)].

in Emm Labs / High-end Audio HiFi and Stereo / Reviews 0 comments
 by Michael

The TAS Review of the Burmester $65K 069 Reference CD Player / PRE

Let’s talk about TAS’s review of the $65K Burmester CD player / PRE.

If it was $650K then that would be something… but $65K. Pshaaah. This is US Dollars we are talking about. This new Burmie is less than the old $30K Burmie in real $.

Second, even though Mr. Cordesman who reviewed the player seemed to like th Emm Labs CDSA better than the Burmie, without saying as much, I hated to see him perpetuate the misnomer about the sound of redbook versus SACD, especially on the CDSA.

A few SACDs do sound better than most redbook: DSOTM, Abraxus, … uh, any others? The problem is that, although SACD did have more resolution and a cleaner sound, say, 5 years ago – redbook keeps improving and SACD is kind of losing (lost) momentum. So, to my ears, a good redbook, which is most of them made in the last, 3-5 years, say, sound as good as most SACD.

Ah Ha! you say, then why get the Meitner CDSA when SACDs are not the cats meow anymore? Well, because redbook on the CDSA sounds better than the redbook on any other solid-state player that we have heard, tho we have heard that the Esoteric $50K+ implementation has some goodness as well.

And maybe this Burmie plays redbook well as well. Kind of hard to tell from the review. Mr Cordesman was moving things around …. Pass on Vandy 5s? Boulder on Hansen Prince speakers? Audioquest cables? Sounds like the system was/are tuned to his ears [and not mine! :-)] and subtleties are not what these system designs are going for.

All this is to say, RedBook is pretty darn good, the CDSA (and CDSD/DCC2) play redbook better than anything near them in price, and all those [many] reviewers comparing things to the Meitner players are just trying to avoid saying that the players under review do not sound as good, *playing redbook*, as the Meitner [assuming they have ears and a balanced system] and so spin it by back-handed compliments that imply the CDSA is all about SACDs. Only about 20%-30% of the CDs we play here on the CDSA are SACD. In fact, I never pay attention anymore to what FORMAT it is we are playing – and haven’t for years now.

There are not many ‘deals’ in audio these days, what with the dollar sinking and the flooding of the market of ridiculously priced equipment – the barrier to entry for new manufacturers so low. But the $10K CDSA is one. The Audio Note $4.5K/m PALLAS cable is another. The $4.2K Acoustic Zen Adagios. And uh….uh….uh…. down the list would be the $10K Audio Aero Capitole CD player and $7.5K Lamm LP2 Phono and perhaps their $14K L2 Reference as well. The SoundLabs [even the U1] and the Kharma 3.2. [and we like Odyssey but Quad prices have gone up significantly. Anything else? There are lots of ‘good values’ out there – but if people know of other ‘GREAT values’ out there, please post a comment]

Funny thing about all these great price/performance pieces in the high-end – is that they do not get as much respect from the people who look at price tags: on both ends. The brands are too respectable for the cheaper-is-better crowd and the prices are too low for the expensive-is-better crowd. So… only the people in the middle somewhere, dare I say ‘better-sounding-is-better’ audiophiles? seem to understand and can appreciate the balance of features and performance that makes something worth much more than its asking price.

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 by Michael

CEDIA coming up…

The next few months… the Olympics, the Democratic convention here in Denver, a fews days later CEDIA in the same place…. then, of course, The Rocky Mountain Audio Fest.

We will cover CEDIA and RMAF.

The convention…? Well, I guess I *could* take photos… of the microphone and sound system. Of the people, well, we don’t take photos of people. Too boring … or too embarrassing… depending on how you look at it. 🙂

We got a bunch of smaller stuff this summer – a lot of it burning in on the Nordost ViDar. We should be getting our Audio Note M9 Phono pretty soon now….

Haven’t bought much in the way of music… but Neli tells me she just bought a ton of classical and weird rock-and-roll (like Henry Kaiser … yep, that is definitely classified as weird ;-)) over in Princeton NJ. So, I guess we will have some new music to listen to after all. Or new old music. Or, they are used, so old old music.

Haven’t decided what we are taking to show in our rooms at RMAF yet. This topic always elicits lots of .. ahem… discussion.

September is almost here – and things always pick up as we move back indoors and the shows do help to spark ideas for the blog. 🙂

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 by Michael

Dusting

OK, this may indeed be the lamest post of all time… but dusting is something we have to do here a lot.

It is a dry climate, we live in the mountains, and we have a ‘mountain house’ which is to say it is not hermetically sealed. And we have a lot of equipment.

This means we end up dusting a lot [especially before auditions, and ESPECIALLY before auditions where a female of the species will be in attendance].


We have used these dusters, made for cars, for several years now.


The ones we get these days are pretty big – about 18 inches long [We have a lot of equipment, and furniture, and we are lazy – and this is kind of like having a double-wide vacuum cleaner – gets the job done twice as fast :-)].


They do have a special chemical that attracts dust – which is a lot better than just moving it around, like cotton dusters do, and a lot better than the spray EndDust-like products, which leave junk on the components which then seems to attract more dust than ever [BUT do NOT leave these just sitting on something, because the chemical will leach out of the duster and onto whatever it is sitting on – but if you do forget – hope is not lost: it does seem to evaporate over time].

Supposedly the duster works better after it is dirty…


But after awhile, it just seems WRONG to drag the dirty thing over nice equipment – like these speakers.

So we got the new duster ($9.95 at Target) and I thought you all might want to [or not :-)] see what we use before it gets put into use.

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