Good Audio Dealer in San Francisco

No mention of Century Stereo. They used to be great back when their shop was in the ghetto. Now that they've opened their "state of the art" shop in Saratoga, it's not the greatest place to go. Plus their listening rooms are horrible. Nice home theather though....And I suppose therein lies the problem.

Oh...You also can't listen too loud 'cuz the folks from REI next door will come over and complain. Yep, they shoulda' stayed humble in the ghetto.

But, if you HAVE to listen to B&W and or Revel, you're still better off here than anywhere else that I know of.

Bay Area Audio has some of the finest gear in the bay area - Thiel, Sonus Faber, Aerial, Krell, Audio Research, Martin Logan.

They are extremely helpful and allow you to listen for as long as you wish. I've been to all of the other places listed above, with the exception of St. Cecilia (I need to check them out. Sounds like a great place.) While they all offer some nice gear as well, I just wouldn't waste my time. There's nothing more frustrating than stepping foot in a high-end salon only to be met with rude sales people and no opportunity to audition...or just a very brief and poorly setup audition. I had this experience at The Audible Difference in Palo Alto. They carry some of the biggest names in audio - Wilson, Eggleston, Thiel, Revel, Vandersteen, BAT, ARC, Linn - but every time I've gone there I was brushed off and not given an opportunity to listen to anything. One time I asked if I could audition the Thiel CS-6s and they connected them to a 30wpc tube amp. They didn't have time to move things around and set them up properly. I listened to two tracks and bailed.

True enough 4yanx. I stopped in there one time to see if I could get a listen to a pair of Soliloquys and a pair of JM Labs monitors. The salesman wanted me to listen to them through an HT receiver. When I told him I was only interested in 2-channel, he tried to hook them up to a SimAudio integrated that was sitting out in the hallway. I guess I was supposed to put the listening chair out near the cash register!! I told him if that was the best he could do, then forget it. He seemed befuddled. I had forgotten about that place.

Take me back to the days of Elite Audio in Saratoga and Sound Goods in San Jose. They both carried some excellent gear had INCREDIBLY knowledgable sales people and were fun places to hang out. Bay Area Audio is the closest that I know of to the "old days" of hi-fi.

One more place to stay away from is Stereo Unlimited in Walnut Creek. I stopped in there to listen to some Magnepans. I figured that they HAD to be better than the only other BA Maggie dealer I know of (The Audible Difference). Was I ever wrong! The owner(s) sell their own aftermarket cables that are connected to everything. They also connect these funky tweeters to most of their speakers to increase the "ambience" or some such thing. The guy even wanted to demo the 3.6s with the speakers setup facing eachother. He said that it "sounds more like real music". When I finally convinced him to set them up in a more traditional orientation, he had his son drag them into position. He manhandled the speakers, leaving the external crossover hanging off the back of the speakers, dangling by the homemade wire and then dropped them onto the hardwood floors. He even bumped the 20.1s that they had sitting off to the side with the foot of the 3.6. I just cringed. On the plus side...they deal strictly in two-channel and carry some interesting tube gear such as Viva.