Report from Rocky Mountain AudioFest

This is the first show I've been to since the late 80's. Now I remember why I stopped going after only two. Still, I've enjoyed the social aspect of it. Great to finally meet Albert Porter. It's astounding how bad some of the most exotic and expensive gear in existence can be made to sound through the intervention of a hotel room. Albert told me the building is not grounded and the AC is fluctuating around 109 volts to make matters worse. There have been some standouts for me though. The Ayre/Vanderstein system would be in my top 5. Quicksilver is finally manufacturing the 300B amps I've been loving for years - the midrange is magic. I was really impressed with the Innersound / Sanders room - amazing imaging way beyond the edges of the speakers. I wasn't as wowed by the big guys who require a second mortgage to join the club...some were impressive, but none really grabbed me by the balls and made my short hairs stand on end as I might expect from something of that caliber. I'm very impressed with the Bel Canto Ref1000's paired with Pioneer speakers here. They aren't perfect, but they do a whole lot right. That's all for now...I'm on overload and need to take a break.

Marco

Just back home to Seattle from three days there with my friend, Peter. Had a great time overall, and it got better from day two as I had more enthusiasm hearing a greater number of better sounding rooms. There were still plenty of compromised rooms, but I guess I didn't let them damp my enthusiasm as much. The highlight for me was in meeting some great folks there. Peter and I shared a van to the airport and a nice conversation with Arnie, one of the founders of Audiogon, who was very responsive to some of our constructive criticisms of recent directions the site has taken and left us with hope that some things may change in the near future. Got to spend some more time with Albert, who is as fine and fun a person, and as much a gentleman as one might imagine from his contributions here. Too many nice conversations and great folks to recount.

As far as the exhibitors, we somehow managed to save the best for last, though certainly not intentionally. In second place for me was the Daedalus / Art Audio system. At the top of my list, was the last room we listened in literally shutting the room down as we lingered for as many cuts we could get them to play. The MBL room playing their larger speakers was truly breathtaking. Utterly astounding and the closest to the illusion of live music in the room from virtually any corner of the room. Effortless. I'm glad we took it in last as it would have made everything else a bit of a disappointment in comparison.

There are a few more rooms I enjoyed listening to, among them, in no particular order, some of the memorable ones for me from today were:

A.R.T. Loudspeakers from Scotland
Proclaim speakers
Blue Circle
Studio Electric Speakers and Amp
Atmasphere
Modwright
Quicksilver (back again)
Vanderstein/Ayre (back again)

Overall for the weekend (we did not get a chance to listen in every room...not even close), top 5 for me:

1. MBL
2. Daedalus / Art Audio
3. Proclaim / Red Rock Audio
4.(Roger) Sanders / Innersound
5. Pioneer / Bel Canto

I had a great time, but I think this will last me another ten years or so before I need to try it out again. I look forward to reading other's impressions.

Marco

I thought the Wilson Maxx sounded spacious and real. Does anybody find the Sophia 2 and Watt Puppy 8 boxed in?

I was surprised that I liked the sound of the Sophia 2, as I'd heard it before at a shop and did not like it at all in that setup. The Maxx2 did not grab me, though I don't recall whether it was sounding "boxed-in". It was one of those rooms that I did not spend much time in. My objection to a whole lot of the rooms is that they sounded overdamped...somewhat muted and restrained. This almost always was in systems using the short wall of the room, for some reason. Mike Sanders told me that there room started out being much to bright and lively and that they had to work to tame that. They were in one of the larger rooms which were in the minority. Two of the rooms I liked best, MBL and Sanders/Innersound, seemed to use little or no room treatment at all. The Sanders/Innersound system used very narrow speaker placement straddling one of the room corners. His speakers couldn't have been more than 4-5 feet apart yet they were imaging monsters frequently rendering images well beyond the outer edges of the speakers. The Proclaim also used a corner-straddling setup, as did a few others.

Yes, there was too much to hear and not enough time, I'd agree. A few other good rooms I'm reminded of by other's posts...and I'm sure I'm still leaving some others out:

Audiokinesis and Apogee both had me engaged and sitting more than just a minute and tapping my toes. Ralph Karsden (Atmasphere) was telling us about a new single-driver speaker from a Japanese manufacturer that had an active electromagnetic (hope I'm getting that right), ultra-efficient driver. We tried, but never found the room in the tower. Did anyone hear those speakers and or can recall the name? Ralph could not recall the name, but thought it was on the 10th floor. He seemed very impressed by the design as he'd been thinking of doing the same thing himself.

The impressions here are a good illustration of how subjective all this stuff really is. A room that may have one person completely engaged may send another turning tail for the next room. On more than one occasion I went into a room where someone was leaving commenting how great the room sounded, yet when I went in what I heard there did not thrill me at all.

Marco