Art Dudley and I didn't so much enter Hyperion Sound Design's room as get dragged in by our ears. Standing in the Hyatt's hallway, we heard some close harmony quartet singing that sounded mighty darn real.

We went in sat down and were given a demonstration of how to run a demo right. The room was modestly treated with RealTraps, the speakers were artfully placed to minimize boundary issues, and the music was playing at sane levels and was absolutely mesmerizing.

The best part? "You can buy the whole system, including four channels of single-ended tube amplificatiion,for under $15k," said Albert Wu.

Shown here are the HPS-968 loudspeakers ($6000/pair), which feature Hyperion SVF(Synchronous Vibration Flattop) midrange driver, which is run from about 150Hz to about 3kHz. "That makes it sound open and coherent," Wu said.

Exactly the words I was thinking.