Best Speakers at RMAF 2011...?

In the Marriot, the ATC 50s sounded nice on Saturday (after some room tweaking), the high end Sony's sounded nice, the Josephs too. I noted Mr Joseph, who is a great guy, was wise to set up his speakers at an angle in the room.

In the Hyatt, the ATC 150s sounded quite good depending on source. Some of the 2 track master tapes we played back sounded awesome (Led Zep 2 and 4) .

(I am biased as can be, I work with ATC on the pro side!)

The biggest problem (in all rooms) was separating the sound of the room from the speaker. Most people I heard talking about how "bad" a speaker sounded made absolutely no mention of the bad room-quite unfair. Most of the rooms were untreated by its occupants and of course, speakers sounded awful in them (regardless of brand). This is quite odd as quite a small amount of treatment would fix a lot of it.

Brad

@audioconnection: I had heard that the midrange driver on the 2 is now the same as the 5 but this is the first I've heard that the tweeter is also the same. So, does this mean the 2,3, Treo, Quatro, and 5 all share the same tweeter and midrange?

Focal Utopia Stella, AudioPhysic Avanterra, DeVore Gibbon 88 and the small Egglestones sounded good to me in different price points. The Evolutions must be excellent transducers as they were part of a five figure system. I suspect their cables alone are several times the cost of the speakers. Did not care for the Avalons. The Sashas matched well with the Doshi tube electronics. Also several YG rooms were decent. Last but not least the Revel studio 2. Time was insufficient to go back for repeat sampling and select the "best".

I really enjoyed the Lindemann BL10 speakers. Tiny speakers with a big and very detailed sound, reaching down much further than the small size would have suggested. No need for subs, at least not for my taste. They did not seem to fight too much with the room acoustics, either, and the Lindemann electronics driving them seemed to be an excellent match.

Also worth mentioning: the YG Anat Reference II Signatures, as this was the very first time I had a chance to listen to properly set up YG speakers and was able to appreciate their sound. Very different from previous shows, where the YG's I had seen and listened to disappointed and sounded miserable due to apparently inadequate setup.

Transaudio (Brad),
I agree. One of the things that amazed me at RMAF 2011 was that several manufacturers still seemed quite oblivious to the importance of setup. One of the clear audiophile sins seemed to be placing very large speakers in very small rooms, without any form of room treatments. This was even quite common among experienced manufacturers, who've been to dozens of shows over the years.

I heard a few speakers, which normally sound great, but were hampered by very bad rooms or setups. I normally like the Thiel 3.7's. However, they sounded rather "whitish" or slightly harsh in the high frequency range at RMAF.

On the other hand, I'm thankful that finally more of the exhibitor rooms have realized that "louder" is not necessarily better. Perhaps that and the combination of high resolution audio kept my ears from bleeding by the end of the show...!

Pefstratiou,

Just curious, what did you dislike in regards to the Avalon Ideas...? Perhaps too forward or...? I'm always curious about what people listen for, as tastes vary. I thought they sounded very dynamic. On the other hand, I'm not sure if they'd be forgiving of bad recordings.

Anybody hear any killer monitor sub-woofer combinations?