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ISSUE
21
RMAF - the People's Show, Part 2
by Dave
and Carol Clark
Ty Lashbrook of Tyler Acoustics and his Linbrook 2 loudspeakers. A true southern gentleman! And Ty's wife is the real deal too!
Jeffrey Catalano (Horning) of High Water Sound. The Horning Hybrid Perikles speakers were mated with the Tron Syren preamplifier with phono-preamplifier, Tron Cantata amplifier (see below), and a Harmony/Reimyo CDP. This system sounded very sweet from the upper bass on up, but clearly lacked impact in the mid/lower bass. Jeff had tuned the speakers to sound the best with the room and as such had to sacrifice a lot to make them work. With the Eno disc, there was no bass energy in the room (as it should and did elsewhere). Marshall has reviewed the bigger Hornings and found the bass to be stellar for such a configuration, ... goes to show what happens at shows.
Very pricey, but very cool stuff!
TW Acustic Raven AC table, DaVinci Audiolabs tonearm, and Dynavector cartridge. By far one of the cooler tables at the show!
GR Research showed their Raw Acoustics RA8 speakers with the Dodd Audio 50 Watt amplifiers (see below). This sounded very nice and did not over-drive the room. I really like what I hear from the Dodd stuff, perhaps we should ask for a review. Quite reasonable and very nice on the eyes (and ears).
Jim Wang Harmonic Technology. His smile is genuine. The guy never frowns! He lights up the room ... like his cables! CyberLights ... get it?
DCS Elgar + Dac, DCS Verdi SACD transport, DCS Purcell D to D converter, DCS Verona External Clock, Thor 30-watt amplifiers, TA2000 tube preamplifier and phono-amplifier, and CyberLight cables all used in the Audiophile Source room. Seated is Michael Broughton.
The Thor amplifier.
The Thor TA2000 preamplifier. Nice to see Thor back in action! Good stuff ...not cheap, but sound marvelous!
Star Sound Caravell speakers (Sistrum platform) made the connection in the Audiophile Source room ... nice!
Sota Millennia table, Helicon cartridge, and TriPlanar arm ... sweet!
Cabasse loudspeakers, the World Power PowerWing, Einstein CD Player, Gill preamplifier, Art Audio Carissa Signature amplifiers (see below), and Crystal Cable made a very big and robust sound. Liked these speakers at CES and liked them here too. Unfortunately the guys running the room made it seem like we were at some dorm party and simply were into their own thing―musically and interactively!
Ray of Sound showed with Horning Speakers and the Audio line, which they are the US importers for... Gary Alpern and Ray Lombardi.
Audion Silver Knight MKII $2995. Way cool stuff and fairly reasonable for English gear!
Gini Systems brought the whole kitchen! Well almost ... they bring in a ton of stuff, but featured the AS (Audio Space) 6M-300Bpp $3990, AS 6M-300Bse $3990, Pre-2 $3990, and 6V6 mini power module $990 (all shown below). The is room sounded pretty good, though we did not play our reference disc.
The smaller, more colorful Gini stuff, Audio Space's Mini-2004 ($990) integrated stereo amplifier (13 watts per channel). Cool! See the iPod? Quite common to RMAF this year.
The Gallo room featured their giant speakers to produce a very nice sound. Small balls make big noise! Used to round out the system were an Onyx tube amplifier and a Resolution Audio CD player.
Anthony Gallo, the man himself.
Ofra Gershman and the lovely Al Stiefel ...oops, make that the other way around... standing outside the APL Hi-Fi room.
The Red Rock amplifier up close and personal.
Gershman Black Swan speakers $30,000 pr, Red Rock Audio mono amplifiers, Magnan cables, and a Modwright preamplifier were used in the APL/Gershman room. We really liked this room as the new speakers filled the small space with a powerfully musical presentation. Deep bass (actually as deep as the rooms would allow―many rooms suffered from bass issues, so one had to forgive the systems as they were not at fault) on the En disc had quite an impact and was pleasant to the gut.
The Audio Magic featuring their line of AC conditioners, amplifiers, and cables. Jerry Ramsey stands next to his full line of gear.
Way cool in the Audio Magic room.
The Zero-One music server/CD drive served as the source for the Stealth DAC. Jerry used a custom stepped attenuator and all 4D cables (the big 4" stuff) to make his music.
The Green Mountain speakers and Shakti Hallograms in the Audio Magic Room.