Venetian Floor 29
(Wing B Part 1)
CES 2008
T.H.E. Show
Las Vegas
January 2008

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We had just finished Wing A of floor 29 late yesterday afternoon. I did the walkies back to the Alexis Park to get a bite to eat [a very late lunch], uploaded 6GB of photos to the laptop, made a few DVD hard copies, then drove Neli's car back to the Venetian for the meeting with EmmLabs - to which I was late by only about 20 minutes.

The point being that half the show was over and I still had 4 Wings at the Venetian to do, all of the Alexis Park, and most of the St. Tropez.

Today we skipped going the the LVCC, which we had been visiting every morning. The number of rooms here at the Venetian, and having only completed about a third of the rooms at the T.H.E. Show, was making me nervous about getting to everything.

Now we proceed to what we are calling Wing B [which I should have called Wing 200, since all the rooms are in the 200s, but that is water under the bridge now], and this time we are, again, heading from the elevators to the end of the hall, where, if we should be so lucky to make it, we will go UP the stairs this time to the mirror wing on floor 30.

Some circuit boards have wide traces, which are thought to transmit signals better - but they also introduce potential electromagnetic skin effects [this board appears to have all skinny traces - and I can't tell if that one discolored area is a trace, the ground layer, or just left over annotation layer.

Many, in the hand-made component world, try to have as many wires as possible, for all sorts of reasons the main one of which is lower resistance, as opposed to boards like this that are largely circuit board 'traces'. Those 2 anomalous pairs of 2 orange wires you see in the middle of the board are likely corrections to a flaw in the specifications as submitted to the fabrication company [which more or less builds the boards these days, I think, as well as stuffing it and then soldering it in a wave-soldering machine].

The big four Ladder DACs are very prominent - but I do not know enough about DAC design to know what their inclusion implies vis-a-vis audio performance.

And, lest we forget, there is often the 'other side' or 'underneath'  to these boards / components where more circuitry may be hiding from the camera.

I mean, I used to think, when I first saw these rooms at shows, that J.A. and Mike Fremer and the rest might be here resting up from their intense listening sessions up and down the hallways. You know, comparing notes, typing in reports, deciding who has best of show. But, I hardly ever see the major reviewers at shows except perhaps Jonathan Valin [TAS], and Jason Serinus [Stereophile] both of whom I see about once each show, on average.

On the other hand, I ALWAYS see Dave and Carol [except this year not Carol. From Positive Feedback], Danny Kaey [Sonic Flare], Marja and Henk if they are attending [6 Moons], and Steve [Enjoy The Music].

Oh, anyway, lots of free magazines here. Of course, if you grab a few, you have to be up for lugging them around the rest of the show. And me, I'm barely up for lugging me and my camera all over the show.

We always root for Vandy's to sound good, but I was somewhat disappointed here. Kind of dull sounding, and lifeless.

Wonder what effect those placards on the sides have on the sound? Might be OK, I can't tell. It seems like nice times out of ten I am in the room with these speakers there is no sound playing. And I don't remember any sound playing this year, either. though apparently, from the photos, there was.

Either A) people are trying to freak me out by playing the turntable with the volume set to zero, B) the hotel has kept the volumes down so low I can't hear the systems anymore, or C) I am just not paying enough attention to what is going on around me. Neli would say "C" but she is always saying that.