Finally heard Accuphase

@westcoastaudiophile What do you mean "unethical"? I'm anonymous and everyone has a right to their own opinion. 

I'm grateful to hear the responses here. Some people agreed and others provided insight.

@hgeifman 

Correct. I said all this in my original post if you read it carefully. 

I wanted to hear it at home, but I thought the show would at least impress me. 

However, in real life the chassis were impressive. I think most of your $ goes there.

Well as a comparison, the Audio Note room blew them away. Clarity, realism, low noise floor, instruments sounding real in the room, etc.

Oh, just saw this video of one of the rooms I'm refering to.

https://youtu.be/OyGaklvHrVE?si=GSxGHfKmBTTwTwnn

I stayed about a minute before I got bored. Musically I could hear the information that I know was in the album, but the presentation was so flat, poor imaging and just sort of "starter level" to me. No Pratt or energy. 

It's not really _bad_ at all,but the prices.... I mean, seriously guys?

@freediver I heard Soulnotes driving the big YG. It was just ok to me. Wonder if Accuphase would have been better. (But the sound was much better than the Accuphase rooms).

@ckr1969 Well, this was CommonWave setting up one of the rooms...they are pretty picky/"opinionated" about pairings.

@mihorn 

"I hear thick veiled and glare sounds which makes me a headache and blur vision."

Exactly how it was for me IRL. Extremely veiled. 

And in the gryphon room, the guy says, "I'll play this sax solo that sounds really good" and it was so horrendous, the glare was scorching my ears and I had to walk out after seconds. Some of this stuff is worse than sound we encounter in daily life, PA systems, movies theaters bluetooth speakers etc but at astronomic prices.

I've always thought DIY and boutique companies are better than the big names. This show confirmed it.

@thriftyaudio what did you find disappointing about the AN room? The Snell box designs are certainly very different from electrostatics. 

@thriftyaudio By the way, I heard AN at a private dealer. I compared these field coils from the show ($65k) with their lowest end speakers of the same shape. I found the lower end ones (around $7k I think) to sound more emotional and soulful. The bass was looser but it just made things more enjoyable and lively. The wood cabinet seemed to vibe a bit more as well.

I thought their field coil was sonically denser but not as lively. That might have been what you were hearing.

Keep in mind most of whats in AN is japanese. Accuphase won't use as high end japanese components inside their gear. I think AN looks amazing with the lid off. 

Solid state with tons of capacitance power tanks will always sound flat and no energy or prat. I also never found Devore speakers to engage me. I wonder how pass labs sounds compared to Accuphase. I never heard it.