Absolute top tier DAC for standard res Redbook CD

Finished day 1. It's 9pm here and i arrived at 9am. I just had drinks with the owner of Volti speakers - what a nice guy!!! My flight left at 5:30'ish AM and I finished in the OR about 4 hours before that. I'm beat!

I ran from top to bottom and did everything in 7 hours. But I need tomorrow to actually reinforce everything and give the rooms that deserve it more time. Here are my first super initial impressions:

JM Labs Utopia and Vac put together what I heard as the best room at the show. It was live music. One of the most live sounding systems I have ever heard. It was also about a half million dollars I believe.

JM Labs also put a room with Stella Utopias and 3 full preamp/amp systems in the same room and switched between them: Soulution, Air Tight and Accuphase. I only heard the Stella's with Soulution and it was spectacular!

Vivid Giya 1 and Mola Mola put a great room together that was warm and musical. I was impressed considering I have not loved either Mola Mola or the Giya previosly.

Viper/Antipodes/Lampy had a bigger room. To me, the speakers were too big for the room and the Joule would have been a much better choice. The room sounded BIG. The music was BIG, everything was warm and Big. In a bigger room I could see that system being sensational. I just wish he had the Joule as I think it would have been a great room as opposed to a big room.

I finally heard Cessaro horns and now get what the full is about. They were wonderful!!!

Von Schweikert VR-55/YFS music servers/Constellation hit it out of the park for a small room. I can't wait to hear what it sound like broken in!

Rowland's new Daemon integrated is a tour de force of technical and acoustic mastery and made the YG Sonya sound the best I have heard them.

MSB DAC V and MSB amps with a pair of big new Quads showed how good Quads can be when fed a healthy diet of crazy expensive amazing gear!!!

ELAC introduced a floor standing speaker for well under a grand that sets a new level for everyone to keep up with. The tonal color and layering were dead on and they way outperform their price level.

Although I'm not a huge fan of either, VTL and Wilson made some nice music together.

Boulder's new music server is sick and it's $65k !!!

Cary Audios new music server is nice and it's $6k, or something like that.

AudioMachina and Einstein made killer may if together a that wa clean, accurate, with a deep soundstage and engaging music.

German Physics speaker has a soundstage I could jump into a swim around in. It was HUGE.

Volti is not only a nice guy but makes great speakers that sound terrific with Boarder Patrol gear.

That's not to say that others weren't great, just that I either forgot or didn't give them enough time. I'll be more rested and thorough tomorrow.

Finished day 1. It's 9pm here and i arrived at 9am. I just had drinks with the owner of Volti speakers - what a nice guy!!! My flight left at 5:30'ish AM and I finished in the OR about 4 hours before that. I'm beat!

I ran from top to bottom and did everything in 7 hours. But I need tomorrow to actually reinforce everything and give the rooms that deserve it more time. Here are my first super initial impressions:

JM Labs Utopia and Vac put together what I heard as the best room at the show. It was live music. One of the most live sounding systems I have ever heard. It was also about a half million dollars I believe.

JM Labs also put a room with Stella Utopias and 3 full preamp/amp systems in the same room and switched between them: Soulution, Air Tight and Accuphase. I only heard the Stella's with Soulution and it was spectacular!

Vivid Giya 1 and Mola Mola put a great room together that was warm and musical. I was impressed considering I have not loved either Mola Mola or the Giya previosly.

Viper/Antipodes/Lampy had a bigger room. To me, the speakers were too big for the room and the Joule would have been a much better choice. The room sounded BIG. The music was BIG, everything was warm and Big. In a bigger room I could see that system being sensational. I just wish he had the Joule as I think it would have been a great room as opposed to a big room.

I finally heard Cessaro horns and now get what the full is about. They were wonderful!!!

Von Schweikert VR-55/YFS music servers/Constellation hit it out of the park for a small room. I can't wait to hear what it sound like broken in!

Rowland's new Daemon integrated is a tour de force of technical and acoustic mastery and made the YG Sonya sound the best I have heard them.

MSB DAC V and MSB amps with a pair of big new Quads showed how good Quads can be when fed a healthy diet of crazy expensive amazing gear!!!

ELAC introduced a floor standing speaker for well under a grand that sets a new level for everyone to keep up with. The tonal color and layering were dead on and they way outperform their price level.

Although I'm not a huge fan of either, VTL and Wilson made some nice music together.

Boulder's new music server is sick and it's $65k !!!

Cary Audios new music server is nice and it's $6k, or something like that.

AudioMachina and Einstein made killer may if together a that wa clean, accurate, with a deep soundstage and engaging music.

German Physics speaker has a soundstage I could jump into a swim around in. It was HUGE.

Volti is not only a nice guy but makes great speakers that sound terrific with Boarder Patrol gear.

That's not to say that others weren't great, just that I either forgot or didn't give them enough time. I'll be more rested and thorough tomorrow.

To me, Kii was a disappointment. But it appears to me to be a speaker that really needs time to warm up and break in. So I will hold final judgement until tomorrow evening or Sunday morning.

Thanks for sharing your observations of the show. Much appreciated and looking forward to day 2 findings.

Consider starting your own Audiophile TV channel. That way we can tune in everyday and you can show us what gear you are reviewing. What do you think?

Hi guys

My name is Michael Broughton. I was hired by Merging technologies to put together room 1025 at RMAF 2015. This year in particular the success of the sound in our room goes equally to all the manufacturers who provided equipment. I wish to give them their just dues.

Merging technologies brought their new eight channel NADAC. Yesterday we streamed hi rez files over a network cable from a computer to the NADAC directly to a pair of mono blocks.

I will leave it to those of you who heard the room to give your opinions of the sound. But I will say everybody participating in this room is very happy with what we have accomplished.

Ayre acoustics graciously loaned us a twenty series preamp a pair of twenty series mono blocks and their seven series CD player.

German Physiks provided the Carbon MK IV speakers.

Purist Audio provided all the cabling.

And last but not least Star Sound Technologies provided the component platform, amp platforms, and speaker platforms.

ELAC introduced a floor standing speaker for well under a grand that sets a new level for everyone to keep up with. The tonal color and layering were dead on and they way outperform their price level.

These are Andrew Jones ELAC debut. He wants to put ELAC on the map before creating SOTA to compete with TAD. I'll probably order a set for HT.