CES 2013

In one of the 14 rooms at CES using Kubala-Sosna cabling, Joe Kubala showed me one of his three forthcoming Distribution Instrument boxes ($TBD). Variously named Quartet, Sextet, or Octet for the number of outlets, this high-end power distribution system is, in Joe's words, "the most neutral way we know to distribute power to our cables." The case is Corian, and each outlet boasts a direct path back to the 20 amp IEC connector. Expect an official unveiling at AXPONA Chicago in early March, which Stereophile will cover room-to-room.

Lamm Industries introduced the new LP-1 Signature dual-mono phono preamplifier ($32,790), with two separate chassis power supplies. Each channel uses two high-transconductance triodes without feedback. The new phono preamplifier was used in a system with Lamm ML-3 amplifers ($159,490), an LL-1 preamplifier ($42,790), connected to a pair of Wilson Audio MAXX3 speakers ($69,500/pair) with Kubala-Sosna cables throughout. Music was played on a Kronos turntable ($32,000) fitted with a Graham Phantom II Supreme tonearm ($6000) and a ZYX Universal II cartridge ($8,495). Vladimir Lamm was also using two pairs of his ML2.2 monoblocks ($37,290/pair) to drive a pair of Verity Audio Lohengrin loudspeakers ($120,000/pair) in an adjoining room. The sound in both rooms was spacious, smooth, dynamic, and full.

Not content to stick with DACs, Light Harmonic is adding a new music server to the line up. The Source chassis is comprised of two parts: The bottom section contains the company's proprietary digital power supply, a hard drive bay that can accept four 2TB drives in a RAID array and also a Blu-ray disc player. The top half contains all of the processing circuitry and music server software.

Price is stil to be determined but I was told that the Blu-ray drive will be able to rip up to 24/192 PCM off of any Blu-ray disc inserted in the machine. Additionally, an iPad mini will be included with each purchase, loaded with a custom remote control app suite and a pre-configured wireless access point for plug-and-play setup. Ship date is estimated to be around the middle of the year.

Philip O'Hanlon always provides some of the very best show demos, and this CES was no exception. As before, he had a suite atop the Mirage hotel, featuring Vivid loudspeakers and for purposes of this report, a new Luxman DAC. Music was provided by O'Hanlon's Mac Mini running Audio Nirvana and Pure Music and consisted largely of wonderful high-resolution rips of vinyl tracks.

The DA-06 will be available in May for $5,990 and can accept PCM up to 24/192 as well as DSD/DXD and 2xDSD. Digital inputs are upsampled and processed at 32/384 and there are USB, SPDIF, AES/EBU and Toslink inputs on the back.

Earlier in our show report, Jason Victor Serinus visited with Hans-Ole Vitus of Vitus Audio, as well as Vitus’s son, Alexander, whose own company, AVM-TEC, introduced its Alluxity line of amplification components. Here’s a photo of father and son together. I love the fact that the enthusiasm and wonder for high-performance audio runs through the family.

“We didn’t even have to force him into it!” Hans-Ole Vitus said of his son’s interest in audio.

Larry Greenhill, who was covering expensive amplification at CES for Stereophile already blogged about the Constellation preamp and power amplifiers that were being used to bi-amp Magico's top-of-the-line Q7 loudspeakers ($185,000/pair). But here's a photo of the speaker, which was connected with MIT cables. AC conditioning was courtesy of Shunyata, racks by HRS. The sound in this room was magnificent, whether it was Lyle Lovett's "The Boys from North Dakota," Leonard Cohen's 10 New Songs, or my own live recording of Cantus performing Curtis Mayfield's "It's Alright." Oh my!