Capitol Audio Fest and the New York Audio a trend is emmerging

Just returned from the Capital Audio Fest Last week and the New York Audio Show this week.

Very few systems at either shows sounded great there were a few memorable setups.

I saw two distinct trends one was to setup up a system with really expensive everything no matter if that was a realistic pairing and the other was to setup affordable based systems that were well matched in price.

For example: at the Capitol Audio Fest, a pair of new Focal Kanta bookshelves at $6k a pair was put together with a Naim Uniti Nova, a $7.5k integrated amp/dac/streamer with inexpensive Wireworld cabling, about a $15k system that sounded fantastic.

At the New York Audio Show, Golden Ear’s Sandy Gross, was playing the Triton Reference a $8,5k set of speakers with a $3k Peachtree integrated amplifier, this system was a little soft to my ears but was still very musical. We have been kind of fans of the Golden Ear for years especially for Home Theater so were intrigued to hear them sound quite decent vs a few other demos where they sounded either way to peaky or just plain bloated and dull.

Compare these two excellent pairings vs at the New York Audio Show a set of the new Magico A3 at $10k with a $14k AVM amp but with Nordost Valahalla 2 speaker cable at $11k and a Nordost Vallhalla interconnects $8k and power cables $5k which then pushed the somewhat affordable pairing of the A3 and AVM amplifier at $24k to a system close to $60k! 

Magico A3                           $10k
AVM int                                $14k
Nordost Vall speaker Cable $11k
Nordost Vall interconnect    $  8K
Nordost Val power cable     $  5k
Nordost Power cond            ?
Source components             ?
  
                            total           ?

 I just don’t understand the logic of that pairing when the Magico A3 is being heralded as the most exciting $10k speaker a somewhat reachable price for many aspiring audiophiles and then paring the speakers with $40-50k plus worth of electronics and cabling.

As both an audiophile and a retailer we have always tried to recommend intelligent pairings your thoughts?

Dave and Troy
Audio Doctor NJ