Jeff's Kalina's Post
I went to the Axpona audio show this weekend. For the first time in my four years of Axpona, I went for two days. Why two days? Primarily because when tickets went on sale, there was a deal for two day passes. I was glad I did two days as I had a lot more time for detailed exploration and comparison of the vendors. There has been some talk lately about how the Hi-Fi demographic is primarily aging white men and what the industry can do to appeal to a broader, younger audience. While that generalization may be mostly true, I was impressed by the diverse demographics of attendees at the show. There were women there! And young couples, and people of color, and teenagers with their GenX parents. I also felt the crowd, on Saturday at least, was larger than in the past - even pre-pandemic.
I was eager to see some of the new products I've been reading about, and since PS Audio was on the first floor, I went to their room right away. Paul McGowan was showing of his new Aspen FR-30 and FR-20 speakers. There must have been a buzz because the booth was constantly crowded. At first listen, and as first listen of the day, these new speakers were impressive. Lots of air movement made for impactful lows and room filling sound. As I listened longer I began to feel the might be a little boomy overall with slightly smeared or harsh high-end. I decided to withold judgement until I'd heard some more systems at the show. Turns out, when I returned to the room later to listen, my opinion stuck. Admittedly I may have been comparing his speakers to those costing $100,000 more than his, but even after listening to comparably priced systems, I think there may be better speakers in the same price range.
Next up was the ultra high-end dealer Quintessence Audio Lab's room, which I never miss at this show. To me the system they put together around the Sonus Faber Aide Reference speakers is as probably as good as it gets.
Yes that box in the bottom left of the photo is part of the speaker cable. I guess if you're spending $150,000 on a set of speakers why not go for the cable with the carbon turtle attached to it. The realism of this system was astounding. Totally clean, clear, and loud. I assumed the source was digital, but on further inspection it was actually a record playing on a Clearaudio Statement V2 turntable ($155,000) with the new DS Audio Grandmaster optical cartridge ($20,000). Unfortunately I didn't get a photo of those, nor the amps which I believe were all McIntosh.
Ever since I bought my pair of Goldenear Triton 3+ speakers, I've visited the Saturday Audio Exchange room to listen to the Sandy Gross designed Goldenear Triton One.R which have similar tonality to my plebe model, while blowing them out of the water. Goldenear was sold to Audioquest a few years ago. Given my personal opinion of Audioquest, I've had doubts about the future of Goldenear. They were displaying the brand new T66 (~$8k) which according to the rep, has a re-designed, improved crossover and mid drivers.
While it sounded good and maintained some of the tonality of the Triton speaker range, I didn't feel it lived up to the One.R that it is replacing. It might be comparable to the Triton 3+. Still a decent sounding speaker though. I do like the new hard side finished cabinet. It has more eye appeal than the original Goldenears which were covered with a black "sock". On the other hand, the sock saved money vs a glossy finish while not impacting performance.
I was impressed with number of speaker designers who were personally demonstrating their new speakers. While in the Definitive Technology room I noticed that the person sitting in front of me was none other than Sandy Gross. I guess he was checking out how the speakers he designed have evolved since he left the company. There were clear design similarities between the Definitive Tech and Goldenear speaker lineups.
One of the rooms I was most interested in seeing was the MoFi room which was displaying the new Andrew Jones designed SourcePoint 8 and 10. Well luck has it that Andrew Jones himself was doing a demo when we walked in and we learned all about the design theory and challenges in bringing the new speakers to life.
Apparently both the 8 & 10 share the same voice coil, neodymium magnets, and surround and only the cone and box size differs. It's amazing to hear so much sound out of what appears to be a single speaker in a small-ish box. They're great sounding speakers and I think the concentric drivers do something right with these speakers.
I was also excited for the chance to finally hear the Dutch & Dutch C8, the specs of which I've drooled over. Listening rooms at Axpona are in the hotel rooms. As a rule they're terrible spaces for speaker listening. Too small, cramped, no treatment. You can hear room resonances when someone is simply speaking. Vendors often go to great lengths to try to tame the room with difussion, absorption, bass traps, and keeping the speakers as far from the wall as possible. Not so in the Dutch & Dutch room.
The speakers were pushed into the corners and the window drapes were wide open. Martijn Mensink was there pushing the speakers to high levels. They sounded amazing. The cardioid polar pattern and integrated DSP really works. The 8c had no F@#%s about the room, only delivering clean and clear direct sound. There was plenty of low end but they might still benefit from a subwoofer. The 8c is definitely on my wish list.
There are plenty of strange ideas and products at Axpona as well. The Hill Plasma Tweeter might be at the top of the list.
It uses a modulated plasma flame sourced from a tank of helium to produce audio waves above 1000 Hz. The best part of the demo was when the flames were physically extinguished (blown out) and the high-end suddenly disappeared. They sounded very smooth and clear "airy" but I'd love to see some measurements, particularly distortion. I also question the practicality of the design given a helium gas supply is required. It was an interesting and fun experiment and demo none-the-less.
I'm just a audio hobbyist and consumer with a penchant for objectivitvism and a streak of skepticism. For me Axpona is a place to see new speakers, compare components and learn a few things about the industry. Sure, there's plenty of snake oil across the whole show, but I simply choose to ignore it. Although one person did launch into some nonsense about blind testing being invalid after I made an off-hand comment to someone else about a rediculous power cord. Overall I find the show best for speaker comparison, because honestly how do you compare components whose specs are so similar across multiple listening rooms? You can however get to look at what's new and talk to the designers and other experts. I highly recommend attending Axpona to those with interest in the hobby. And let's continue encouraging the refreshing diversity of attendees.