Axpona Shout Outs

Pmotz - Austin Acoustics was on the main floor at the far north end of the building. I will post a picture later.

Agree the MBL room did not disappoint. Sunday they played Jump by Van Halen at near concert levels and it was eye popping, even if that's not your bag.

My second favorite room was Destination, I guess I'm becoming a sucker for horns in my old age. Though not all the horn rooms were good, IMHO.

The Von Schweikert/ VAC room was clearly best. It was all there - micro and marcodynamics, naturalness, nuance, aliveness and beauty to the sound. I watched them set up as they struggled with a nearly square room, and they were able to get great imaging from listening position but as mentioned, imagining was reduced in other positions. They have set up these speakers to image wonderfully across a range of positions in other rooms, just not able in this room in this short a period of set up time.
Also liked Tidal, Revel, they were showing the smaller MBL and they do indeed disappear as a source but have a bit vague center image, Sonos Faber and Nola sounded OK. Magic Q5 presented well, For me second place was I really liked the Legacy speakers with Raven tube amps.Wilson better than I have heard them but still prefer VSA and others.

To each his own on the sound, though I will say I intentionally stayed away from the MBL room since the three or four times I have heard them in the past it was painfully loud.  Rock concert level is NOT my thing, note my comments on the two live concert.  As for lines into rooms, I didn't see a single line outside of a room, I did go into a few rooms where it was obvious I wouldn't find a seat so I just left.  Quite honestly the show was well attended but not "over" attended, I expected more people.

One thing I forgot to mention, the show is moving next year to Schaumburg, about ten miles away.  Check out the AXPONA website for details.  Won't be as convenient to the airport, but it's a newer hotel and supposedly "better", we shall see.

Magico S3 room was great. Odyssey. Salk speakers. Raidho with AAvik. Paradigm Persona. A few more favorites. Modwright/Daedalus. 

Wish somebody(s) would estimate the average age of those who attended.