The Helium² has long been one of Stereophile's long-term reference monitors, so I was expecting good sound when I went into the VMax Services room. And apart from the ubiquitous upper-bass boom that afflicted the standard-sized rooms at the Hilton Bonaventure, good sound was what I heard.

The Amphion Argon1 standmounts ($1995/pair) were being driven by a Hegel H4A amplifier, a Hegel P4 preamp, a Hegel CDP2A CD player used as a transport, and a Hegel HD30 DAC ($1995).