This year, for the first time in its history, the TAVES Consumer Electronics Show was moved to a non-hotel setting. The 2017 TAVES venue was the Toronto Congress Center in Etobicoke. This suited the organizers goal of transforming TAVES from a predominantly high-end audio show, to a true, all encompassing Consumer Electronics Show. This transition began in earnest last year where the organizers did a great job in combining high-end audio with other aspects of consumers electronics, like robotics, virtual reality, electric vehicles, media technology, telecommunications and more.
Given the differences between a hotel and a convention center in terms of layout, logistics, environment and atmosphere, there were quite a few challenges to overcome. There were obvious advantages like easy access to the venue by many modes of transportation, plenty of parking and access to a lot more space for exhibitors. There were also a few disadvantages like limited on-site restaurants, coffee shops and fast food eateries, although there were plenty of these within a fairly short walk from the venue.
The Toronto Congress Center is right on the takeoff flight path of Pearson Airport and while parking my car, I got a scarily close glimpse of the underbelly of a couple of large aircraft even before the wheels were retracted into the fuselage of the aircraft. Needless to say the noise was quite deafening. However, once inside the convention center, the very loud aircraft noise was hardly detectable, obviously, due to some great sound insulation.
The companies that opted to exhibit in the Mirvish Lobby Suites lucked out as they got rooms that were great for displaying and demonstrating their high-end audio and video equipment with hardly any ambient noise from the outside.
On the other hand, those that chose to exhibit in main pavilion had to contend with fairly compact rooms with black drapes for walls and not much control over the temperature inside the rooms, especially since many of them preferred to keep their room doors closed because the ambient noise in the main pavilion was quite loud and permeated into the rooms raising the noise floor quite exponentially.
As usual, the check-in logistics at TAVES was silky smooth with friendly, knowledgeable, and courteous staff that made the process quick and painless. Although there were long lines to enter the show, it moved quickly and so everyone was in good spirits.
I began my show coverage with the Bryston Room. James Tanner the Bryston VP gave me the tour of all the new products. First up was the Bryston 21B cubed, which is a three-channel amplifier that was designed to provide amplification for the Bryston active loudspeaker system. Fully active loudspeaker systems dispense with passive crossovers found in conventional loudspeakers by inserting the crossovers before the amplifier. The benefits include increased flexibility of filter shapes, the ability to make fine-grained adjustments resulting in improved on and off axis response, direct coupling of the loudspeaker to the driver, and relatively higher SLP with lower distortion. The 21B cubed puts out 700 watts into one channel and 400-watts into two channels. It retails for C$9000.
Next up, James showed me the BAX1 Crossover, which retails for C$3495. This is a DSP crossover that Bryston has specially programmed for specific models of their active loudspeakers. It has two channels of analog to digital conversion converted at 96kHz/24-bits and then passed on to a DSP core that performs the 3-way crossover function for each channel and applies the filter selected by the user. The three bands of audio per channel are then passed to six DACs followed by fully discrete balanced analog outputs that feed three amplifier channels per loudspeaker. James then moved on to the Bryston 24B which is a 6-channel power amplifier that puts out 2 x 300 watts when driven in stereo mode. This unit retails for C$9000.
Bryston has also introduced two new subwoofers, the model T-12, which incorporates two 12-inch driver units driven by 600 watt of power and goes down to 12 Hz +/-3dB. It retails for C$5200. Its smaller sibling is the T-8, which retails for C$4100 and has two 8-inch driver units and it goes down to 18Hz +/-3dB.
My next stop was the Krell/Oracle/Gershman Room, which featured the new Gershman Posh Speaker that retails for C$149,000 a pair. Eli Gershman told that that he put in only the very best parts into the Posh, including the top-of-the-line Mundorf Capacitors. The cabinet was finished with 4 layers of lacquer. I spent some time listening to the Gershman Posh and found it to be a very lively speaker with good sound stage and vocals, which was a bit on the forward side, but very involving.
This room also featured the new Oracle affordably priced, entry-level Origine, which is manufactured in Canada. The Origine has an outline shape that resembles the flagship Delphi Turntable. It has feet borrowed from the Oracle CD players and a platter inherited from the Paris MkV Turntable. It retails for US$2600, which includes the Origine Tonearm and an Ortofon 2M Blue Phono Cartridge.
The Audio Eden Room featured the JBL K2 Speakers in Ferrari Red (C$80,000) driven by the Mark Levinson 536 power amps (C$42,000), 526 preamp (C$29,000) and fed by an SME 15 Turntable with a V5 arm and Dynavector cartridge (CS20,000). Mark Hamelin of Audio Eden played some lovely tunes to a well-attended room. The sound was very musical with good PRaT and tight well-controlled bass.
The "Audio by Mark Jones" Room is always a popular one at TAVES and this year was no different. Mark was his usual hospitable self, welcoming visitors to his room and fielding any questions that they may have about his gear with great patience. This year, instead of using Magico Speakers like he has done before at TAVES, Mark opted to showcase the Focal Sopra No. 3 Speakers, which retail for C$24,000 a pair. These were driven by CH Precision M1 Reference Power Amplifier (US$51000) and fed by the CH Precision P1 Dual Mono Phono Stage (US$31,000) and CH Precision C1 DAC (US$32,000). The analog front end included the Kronos Pro Turntable (US$38,000), Kronos SCPS Power Supply ($13,500), Kronos Black Beauty Tonearm (US$8500) and the Lyra ETN MC Stereo Cartridge (C$13,000). The digital source was the Aurender N10 8TB Music Server that retails for US$8500. All this equipment was displayed on a Massif Audio Design Rack made by Trev Doyle. Cabling was by Nordost.
The sound reproduction quality reflected the great care that Mark usually takes in setting up the system. It was smooth and very involving with a wide and deep sound stage and oodles of air between the instruments.
A regular at TAVES is Steven Huang if Audio Sensibilities. Steven introduced his new Signature OCC Silver Digital Cable that has a 20 gauge rectangular OCC silver geometry that mimics Siltech's top-of-the-line cable but at a fraction of the cost. A 1.5-meter length retails for C$800.
I was ushered into the Vivid Room by Ed Stone and was given a demo of the system that included the Vivid Giya G2 speakers (C$66,000) driven by the Acoustic Arts Tube Preamp II – Mk2 (C$15,380) and a pair of Acoustic Arts Mono II Silver Power Amps (C$24,770). The analog source was the Acoustic Solid Turntable with three tone arms—Albis STB-213 and a Jelco—(C$10,739 for all three), with Benz Micro Gilder SL MC Cartridge (C$1190). This was mated to the E.A.R. Phono Stage (C$8000). The digital front end included the E.A.R. Electronics EAR CD (C$10,000) and the E.A.R. DAC/Transport (C$18000). All the cabling was from the Cardas Clear and Clear Beyond range. The stand used was by HRS and included the S1 1921-RD Silver (C$3135).
The sound in this room was airy and open with superb vocals and well controlled bass. There was also very good mid-range saturation and smooth highs.
The Kevro Room was hosted by brother Sheldon & Jeff Ginn and Jeremy Brown and as usual, was set-up immaculately. Acoustically, this was one of the best rooms of the Show. It was also refreshing to see components priced at levels that even those without deep pockets could afford.
The speakers were the Monitor Audio Silver 500, driven by the Roksan K Series including the K3 Integrated Amp (C$2500), K3 Power Amp ($2000), K3 CD player (C$2500) and K3 DAC (C$2000). Cabling was by Tributaries.
The sound in this room was truly superb. Sheldon played some George Benson live in Concert vinyl recordings and it was glorious! The presence was unmistakable and the dynamic contrast was outstanding. This was easily the best sounding room at TAVES 2017 for total systems under C$25,000.
One of the biggest surprises of TAVES 2017 was to be found in the Totem Room where Vince Bruzzese the Totem President, proudly demonstrated his Tribe Tower speakers in Satin finish (C$5350). These petite speakers put out a very large sound stage and sounded incredibly full, especially given their extraordinarily small footprint. The bass, that Vince claimed, went down to 30Hz at minus 3dB, was so robust, visitors to the room were seen looking for a hidden subwoofer. The speaker sports a dome tweeter with Neodymium Magnets and the cabinet is made from MDF reinforced with Boro Silicat for superior dampening. Vince made the very bold claim that his Tribe Tower was suitable for rooms ranging from 10' x 10' to even 40' x 30'.
According to Vince, going forward, Totem speakers are going to focus on models with very small footprints but without compromising on the big and full sound that audiophiles look for. I would say that he is off to a great start with the Totem Tribe Tower!
The Audio One Room at TAVES 2017 manned by Juri Saulgriezis featured the B&W 705 speakers from their new 700 Series. They retail for C$3000 per pair and can handle 140 watts per channel. They were driven by Bryston B3 Cubed Amplifiers fed with a Macbook through a Bryston BDA-3 DAC. The sound was par for the course for speakers in this price range.
At the "Toronto Home of the Audiophile" Room, I found Francis Chung and Mike Lang energetically demonstration his gear to a room full of very enthusiastic audiophiles revelling in the great sound in this room. The gear included the new Triton Reference Speakers (C$11,000 per pair) driven by the venerable Pass Labs X350.8 power amp, Pass Labs XP12 Preamp (C$8099) and Pass Labs XP17 Phono Stage (C$5999).
The digital sources included the PS Audio DirectStream Memory Player (C$5399), the PS Audio DirectStream DSD DAC (C$7799), and the Berkeley Audio Design Alpha DAC Reference Series V2 (C$27,300). The analog front end was the Clearaudio Performance DC Turntable with a Clarify Arm and Concept MC Cartridge (C$5795). Cables were by Gutwire, Siltech, and Kimber Kables. The rack used was a Solid Tech creation.
I spent close to half an hour in the room, totally captivated with the sound, which was one of the best of the show. There were oodles of texture and tonal shading in the music irrespective of the genre that was played. The sound stage was deep and well defined and the bass was very tuneful.
At the Karsh Room, Richard Kohlruss demoed the Pylon Opal Monitors from Poland (C$999) driven by the Hegel H90 (C$2200), which outputs 60 watts per channel but sounded like it was capable of delivering much higher power levels. This component includes network streaming Apple Airplay and a variety of other digital and analog connections for each home theatre integration. The sound was relaxed and effortless with a smooth high end and bass that you could feel in your gut.
I entered the Triangle Art room with high expectations because Tom Vu and Hugh Nguyen have a reputation of never disappointing their audience. For this show they paired the Triangle Art Master Reference Turntable (US$39,900) fitted with the Osiris Mk2 12" Tonearm (US$6800), Apollo MC Cartridge (US$8000) with the new ACA Seraphim Prime Extreme speakers (US$35,000) using Teo Audio Reference speaker cables (US$44,000 for a 9-foot pair) and Teo Audio Kronon interconnects (US$3200 for a 1 meter pair). They used the Triangle Art Reference Tube Monoblock Power Amps (US$18,000), Reference Tube Pre Amp (US$18,000), and the Reference Tube Phone Stage (US$13,000). The Seraphim Prime Extreme speakers have their crossover network housed in a separate enclosure, which many visitors mistook for a subwoofer. The finish on the speaker and on the separate crossover network was exquisite.
According to Hugh, this new model represents the very best in crossover design and parts that are available. Tom also had his entry level Concerto Turntable (US$4990) fitted with a Zeus cartridge (US$4000). Both turntables sounded incredibly good and represent some of the best sound I have heard from turntables at their respective price points.
Despite the less than ideal acoustics of this room, the system sounded bold, brash and totally alive. The tone and timbre was spot on, the sound stage was wide & deep, percussion had real visceral impact and vocals were rendered with incredible presence. This was easily one of the top five best sounding rooms at the Show.
Frank Fazzalari of Coherent Audio is a regular at TAVES and this year he introduced a new model called the Model 5. These speakers are so efficient (91dB) they were driven with ease by a Triode Labs 2A3a, which outputs just 3.5 watts per channel. Like his other speakers, the Model 5 is co-axial design which images with pinpoint accuracy and images incredibly well. It has a 5" woofer 1.7-inch compression driver with a crossover at 1500Hz. These speakers retail for C$2195 a pair.
At the Max Fidelity Room, I found Frank Fabian demonstrating his Candor 455CNT (C$2400 a pair) and 465 CNT ($3200 a pair) speakers. The material used on the woofer cones is carbon nanotubes on polypropylene. The silk dome tweeters also have a nanotech coating to make them humidity resistant. Given their relatively affordable price, these speakers sounded surprisingly good especially their bass reproduction, which was robust and full-bodied.
The Blue Circle Room had the Marten Django L Speakers (C$11,500) driven by the Blue Circle NSW Power Amplifier (C$11,500), NSC Pre Amplifier (C$11,500), BC660-12 Power Conditioner, and Gutwire cables. George Taylor demonstrated the system, which was a bit on the dry side but with vocals that had good presence and body.
JVC-Kenwood had two rooms demonstration their latest projectors, the DLA-X990RB with a very aggressive price of C$9999 and the DLA-RS4500 (C$45,000). The picture quality from both these projectors is the best I have ever seen. The colours really popped and I could see extremely fine picture details that totally blew my mind.
The DLA RS4500 has an unmatched dynamic contrast ratio of "infinity to 1". Greg Cameron of JVC-Kenwood was on hand demonstrating the projectors to an audience that was obviously totally mesmerized with the picture quality.
The Neat Acoustics Room featured the Xplorer Speakers that retail for C$6000 a pair. Doug Graham (Pic 19) gave me the rundown on these speakers, which are made in a place called Barnard Castle in England. Despite their compact size, these speakers put out an unusually large sound stage and were particularly good with female vocal reproduction.
Wynn Wong of Wynn Audio always put on a very stylish show at TAVES and this year was not different. This time he had two rooms. The first room, manned by Darren Li had Penn Audio Symphonia Speakers (C$30,000) driven by Karan Acoustics KAS600 Power Amplifiers (C$40,000), and KAS Mk3 Preamp (C$14,000). The speakers delivered impressive dynamic range and very tight percussion, but vocals seemed to be a bit recessed.
In his main room Wynn Wong had the Tidal Contriva GII Speakers (C$65,000) driven by Karan Acoustics M2000 Power Amplifiers (C$78,000 per pair), L-Reference Preamp ($24000), PH Reference Phono Stage (C$28,000), and fed with a Thales TTT Compact II Turntable made in Switzerland (C$18000). This room was exponentially bigger than Wynn's other room and the better acoustics reflected in the great sound that visitors to this room were treated to.
Although not on the same level as last year, when Wynn got the Positive Feedback "Best Sound of Show" nod, the sound quality this year was also quite remarkable and I could see that visitors lingered around in this room for much longer than usual, taking in the breathtakingly good sound reproduction.
According to Wynn, this year he decided to showcase components that were more affordable, because the feedback from visitors last year was that, although the sound in his room was outstanding, the components sported prices that were totally out of reach of all but the handful of audiophiles with extremely deep pockets.
New to TAVES this year was Ruel. In this room Terry Ruel showcased his 1-way full range line-source R-7 Speaker that retails for C$36,000. This price includes the amplifier and the DSP. The speakers hand-made in Moncton, New Brunswick, Canada from Baltic Birch from Russia and Finland.
What was unusual in this set-up is that Terry decided to connect his speaker using ordinary lamp cord rather than any fancy speaker cables just to make the point that his speaker sound good with any cable. The sound was clean, quite focused and well defined with a very large sweet spot, but the mid-range lacked the laying and saturation that I look for in speakers in this price range.
Tricell Enterprises is one of Canada's largest distributors of high-end audio brands and its owner Vince Scalzitti, is one of the most highly respected high-end audio titans in Canada. This year Vince had around half a dozen rooms at TAVES and one of them was the Transrotor Room where I ran into Dirk Rake, scion of the family that founded and still owns this venerable Turntable Company in Germany.
Dirk and Vince showed me the latest Transrotor range of Turntables, which included the Zet 3 Black with SME5009 Black Konstant Eins that retails for C$96,650 and the Fat Bob S TMD, TR-8500, Konstant Studio that retails for C$7725.
In another one of Vince's rooms I met up with Hermann Winters the owner and designer of Acapella Speakers. On demo were the Acapella La Campanella Mk III speakers that retail for C$31000. This model is a hyper spherical horn with a single point source for high frequencies increasing from three to five octaves from 700Hz to 20kHz. The sound from these speakers was truly magical. The ease with which they pressurized the room and the effortless way in which they delivered all the audible frequencies was quite astounding!
In yet another one of the Tricell Rooms I got to meet Mads Klifoth, the CEO of Audiovector of Denmark. He demoed his SR3 Avante Guarde Arrete Raw Surface speakers, which is one of the limited edition (only 100 have been made) series and retails for C$15,000. It was driven by the Unison Research Unico DM Silver Power Amplifier (C$4950), Goldnote P-1000 preamp (C$7500), Tube-1006 Class A Vacuum Tube Output stage (C$4000), DS-1000 DSD Streamer, Pianosa Turntable with the B5.1 Tonearm (C$4000), Hana SL Cartridge (C$850), and PH-10 Phono Stage (C$2000). The room also had the Synergistic Research Powercell 8 UEF SE (C$3650) and their HFT room tweaking accessory. All cabling was by Cardas Clear Beyond and Clear. The system rested on HRS racks
This room was always well attended and deservedly so because, in my opinion, it had the "Best Sound of the Show". Despite less than ideal room acoustics of this room, the sound reproduction was truly outstanding! It had all the dynamic range you could wish for, voices had the palpability that gets your heart aflutter, percussions were incredibly real sounding and horns had the "you are there' presence that gives you goose bumps galore.
Besides the high quality components, I am quite certain that the true-to-life, soul satisfying sound quality, despite the less than desirable room acoustics was also, in part, due to the room correction measures from Synergistic Research. It is so refreshing to find that the system that sounded the best to my ears did not have a 6-figure price tag that would be only a distant dream for the vast majority of audiophiles.
The last of the Tricell Rooms was Sonic Artistry and had Johnathan Badov and Edgar Balian hosting. This room had the Gold Note XT-7 Loudspeakers (C$26,000) driven by Soulution 511 Monoblock Power Amplifiers (C$34,500 each), 520 Preamp (C$26,000), 550 Phono Stage (C$20,500), Synergistic Research 12 UEF Power Conditioner (C$8500), Active UEF Ground Block (C$3650) and speaker cables, interconnects and power cords also by Synergistic Research.
While in this room I also met Andrew Wiederspahn, the Operations Manager of Synergistic Research who explained to me the various technologies behind their products and promised to send me some of Synergistic Research room correction products for a review in Positive Feedback, so look out for that. Also displaying his products in this room was Trev Doyle who proudly showed me his unique rack with legs made out of the very rare Spalted Maple and shelves crafted from the equally rare and exotic Ebonized Ash.
The sound in this room was very revealing and intricate with great rendition of both male and female voices. There was a lot of air between the instruments and the sound stage has extraordinary width and depth.
The Von Gaylord Room had the world's first liquid cooled amplifier that puts out 200 watts per channel in Triode Mode! Ray Leung gave me the rundown of the various products on display and played for me his new V8 Speakers, which sports an 8-inch fibreglass woofer and a 1.5-inch titanium dome tweeter. Given its compact dimensions, the V8 put out an impressive sound stage and had great transparency even at relatively high volume levels.
Next up was the Altronics/Stereo 2000 Room where Miles Roberts demoed the system which consisted of the PMC MB2 se Speakers (C$40,800) Hegel H30 Preamp (C$9000), Hegel H30 Power Amplifier (C$20,000), HD30 DAC (C$6000), Mohican CD Player (C$6000), and Lumin U1 Transport (C$7950). The rack was Stillpoints ESS34-20-4/Ultra 6 (C$24,419), and the cables, interconnects and power cords were from XLO. The sound in this room was quite impressive with very tuneful bass, smooth highs and well-saturated, lush midrange.
Another regular at TAVES is Venture, which is a father and daughter team of Hoo Kong Ngoo and Lee Ming Ngoo. Here I sat down to an audition of the Quantum Signature Active Loudspeakers (US$150,000), VP200D Preamp with integrated DAC (US$60,000), VP100P Phono Stage (US$32,000), and Triangle Art Master Reference Turntable (US$39,000).
So how did all these mega-buck components sound together? Like a true mega-buck system! The sound was magnificent, especially when Hoo Kong played some orchestral pieces. When I closed my eyes, it is not hard for me to suspend disbelief and convince my brain that was indeed in the presence of a live orchestra in one of the great performance venues of the world.
This year Plurison, the giant high-end audio products distributor out of Quebec, had a very small presence in the main hall. The only speaker that they had on display was Focal's newly introduced Kanta Series of Loudspeakers. The model at the stand was the Kanta 2. Michelle Plante and John Bevier gave me the rundown on the technology behind these speakers.
The cone material is made out of flax that they claimed, was able to resist break-up even under very trying conditions and so distortion is kept to a minimum. The tweeter is beryllium and the retail price is C$12,000. This model will come in 8 colours.
I will round out this Show Report with a non-audio product that caught the fancy of many audiophiles at TAVES this year. The company is Eccentricities of Wood and the artist behind these works of art is Russian born Canadian Olga Oreshyna.
Olga, who lives in Ajax, the same Ontario Town that I do, uses driftwood to make works of art that can be hung on a wall to good effect. The aspect of Olga's works of art that intrigued audiophiles at the Show was that they make great diffusion panels and so if you are willing to pay twice to three times the price of conventional diffusion panels, you can acquire one of Olga's works of art and let them serve the dual role of giving you better sound while also beautifying your listening room. Now if that is not an artfully sound decision, I don't know what is!
