Montreal hi fi expo


I just returned from the Montreal show and it was great fun. It was relaxed, the people were informative and open, and there was some outstanding sound. I loved it.
Without trying to pitch anyone in particular, there were some rooms that stood out soundwise in my opinion:
The Plitron transformer room, where there was an Arcam CD player and a pair of handmade push pull tube amps with huge Plitrons driving Merlin VSMs...astounding depth, beauty, and resolution. I don't remember the name of the amps or preamp.
Also excellent sounding, the Gamut electronics (CD and pre as well as amp) with Gradient speakers and $12k Fadel Arts speaker cable network.
And the sony multichannel SACD demo using relatively inexpensive player+preamp+ speakers (the amp was a Pass 5 channel X-series). Made me wonder about throwing huge money at speaker systems (it was a very short demo and may have ben more impressive in the short term than it would be in the long term).
Any impressions folks?
tacs