The Montreal Show: Salon Son & Image, Is Moving

Salon Son & Image, the unique consumer electronics show in Canada is moving.

August, 2009 – The Montreal based SSI are very excited to welcome you March 25, 26, 27 and 28, 2010 to our new location at the Hilton Montreal Bonaventure. A beautiful exterior garden surrounds a unique penthouse-style hotel having guest rooms all on the same floor, allowing our visitors to easily find their way while eliminating wasted time in elevators. The rooms, with windows that open to the outside, will certainly be more comfortable to exhibitors and visitors alike. Their contemporary design facilitates a luxurious décor, and their size is perfect for listening rooms. Moreover, the fact that they have reinforced concrete walls ensures a sound quality that was noticeably absent in recent years.

The long corridors of the Bonaventure Hilton allow us to distribute exhibitor rooms over a greater area in an intelligent way. This will virtually eliminate noise travel between neighbouring suites when the doors of the rooms remain open to ensure a smooth flow of traffic.

The large halls are all on a single floor just below that of the rooms, greatly simplifying the comings and goings of visitors. This also allows them to conveniently visit their favourite exhibitors more than once.

The layout allows each room and each hall to be a prime location. Visitors will save significant time moving around, without missing a single exhibitor.

Another very important improvement is that the receiving and shipping of goods will now happen indoors. Cold weather and lack of space will be a thing of the past, thanks to the huge loading dock inside Place Bonaventure.

And a piece of good news – as the SSI dates overlap those of the 150,000-visitor National Home Show which will be taking place at Place Bonaventure, we can take advantage of this traffic to attract new visitors.

Such an investment on our part during an uncertain economic situation is further proof of our comprehensive dedication to the promotion of the audio-video industry in Quebec and in Canada.

For more information please contact : Sarah Tremblay, Director Salon Son & Image, 2054 De Salaberry, St-Bruno, Qc J3V 4N6, Ph : 450-441-5989, Cell : 514-267-6231 stremblay@salonsonimage.com ; www.salonsonimage.com

Saturday Interconnect Shootout…

… though maybe not exactly a shootout as perhaps more a tasters test.


We performed the test on the downstairs system – the distance between the EMMlabs DCC2 DAC/preamp and the Audio Note Kegon amps was close enough [barely] for the 1 meter cables to reach.

We heard the TEO Audio MHD-1 “Standard” Liquid Cable interconnects, the Stealth INDRA with the newer connectors, the Audio Note U.K. PALLAS, Nordost VALHALLA and Jorma Design PRIME. Before this whole thing started we had the Nordost ODIN cables on the system for a few weeks.

There were all RCA cables. The TEO, PALLAS and PRIME were warm – the VALHALLA and INDRA hadn’t been used for a month or so.


We just leave the cables in place, and it looks so cool to see them all lying there. Kind of like having multiple tonearms, you can just “turn off, un hook, hook up, and turn on” to switch to a different sound entirely.

A long report will be forthcoming, I think, and the TEO and PALLAS writeups will be in the magazine.


The TEO speaker cable

The short and sweet is that the TEO is indeed liquid sounding – very much reminding me of an MBL sound or a clear-sounding CARDAS. The sound is round, and more forward/room pressurizing than the other cables in its price range. This is a sound that ‘comes to you’ rather than you having to ‘go to it’ – i.e. it doesn’t require your brain to work as hard as other cables in this broad price category do – not the last word in transparency, soundstaging and inner detail [which are all closely related], but you can just sit back and enjoy the music. Personally, I like them.

There are a lot of people we know who insist on this kind of sound – many are good friends who happen to be Canadians. Interestingly TEO is also manufactured in Canada [not to suggest there is a Canadian ‘sound’ but… well, is there one? And is this it?].


Another TEO interconnect (the PDL)

Oh, prices: $2500 for the TEO, about $4K for the VALHALLA and PALLAS, about $6K for the INDRA and about $10K for the PRIME all for 1 meter RCA interconnects.

The PALLAS, although considered a small signal cable for the backs of turntables and digital transports, performed perfectly in this large signal position between the preamp and amp. Sounded just like itself.

The PALLAS has one of the most evenly distributed soundstages and with an uncanny ability to keep separate and distinct the disparate threads of the music. The timbre and frequency response is very, very even up and down the range.

It does not have quite the blackness of background nor the uber resolution of the PRIME [not to mention the ODIN] but this is one of my favorite cables and I put it at a close 3rd place behind the other two. If you look at the relative price of this cable – you will know why we are so EMPHATIC about people taking a closer look.

T.H.E. Show Las Vegas moves to the Flamingo

Here is the announcement:

As you can see from the map, it is indeed closer…

This would probably save me about an hour a day, figuring it takes about 45 -50 minutes to walk from the Venetian to the Alexis Park, and only about 15 minutes to the Flamingo… But getting to the rooms in the Flamingo will take some amount of time, whereas at the Alexis you were just there.

Room setup will take longer, since at the Alexis Park you could more or less drive up to your room and unload. Dreyage and union issues at the Flamingo could be as bad as at the Venetian – which would cause people to decide the might as well exhibit at CES at the Venetian instead of THE SHOW this year. Then again, if the Flamingo actually WANTS US THERE, as opposed to the Venetian hating our guts and not letting us audiophile trash use the bathroom facilities, then maybe everyone will instead move over the the Flamingo.

Anyway, lots of unknowns at this point, I’m sure we’ll all learn more soon.