LATEST ADDITIONS

Take a look at this beauty, the Hartsfield from Classic Audio Loudspeakers, a tribute to the original Hartsfield, introduced in 1954 by the James B. Lansing Sound Company. In John Wolff’s version, a 15” low-frequency driver couples to a long exponential horn; above 500Hz, a 2” midrange unit couples to a horn-lens assembly, designed to provide wide dispersion and uniform high-frequency sound distribution.

Something about this speaker gets people feeling all romantic. When I walked into the room, I sat down behind a couple whose hands were joined and whose arms swung in the space between their separate chairs, happily and slowly, in time to the music. After they departed, their places were taken by a second couple. This time, however, the woman simply moved her seat as close as possible to her companion’s, creating a virtual love seat, so that the two could hold each other while the music played.

What the hell? Was this a hi-fi show or some sort of love fest?

I couldn’t blame them, though. The system was playing some extremely gorgeous, palm-in-eye-socket piece of violin music, and it sounded sweet, inviting, and nearly rapturous, with delicate, extended highs and easy, voluptuous mids.

Designer John Wolff said something about field-coils and 106dB...

Wow. Here’s a look inside the 200W BMC AMP M1 monoblock ($15,580/pair), with its massive 2-kilowatt toroidal transformer.

BMC stands for Balanced Music Concept. The company was founded by Bernd Hugo and Carlos Candeias, two audio designers based in Germany. BMC’s products are designed in Europe, but manufactured in China to keep prices down. While $15,580 is a lot of money for most anyone, BMC products contain a number of interesting design quirks, including modular construction for easy upgrades, Superlink signal transmission mode which “skips any coding process” and is said to create a wider soundstage with increased detail resolution, and Digital Intelligence Gain Management which eliminates the need for a preamplifier and allows a DAC to connect directly to an amplifier.

Whatever. Just look at the amp’s innards. The level of construction and detail look heroic! I wouldn’t want to make one of these things, but listening to it sure was fun.

Here’s a closer look at the BMC AMP M1 monoblock ($15,580/pair), rated to deliver 200W into 8 ohms and equipped with a massive 2-kilowatt toroidal transformer. That front-panel display looks like it could’ve come from the dashboard of my dad’s Cadillac. Vroom!

One of my favorite experiences of the show was getting to meet and speak with members of the Atlanta Audio Video Club (from left: Ken Green, Steve Gooding, President John Morrison, Dennis Juranek, Jennifer Dickinson, and a prospective member and longtime Stereophile reader whose name I regretfully cannot recall).

All those who attended Axpona were fortunate to have the Atlanta AV Club on hand, volunteering their time and providing many kind smiles. Members were stationed at desks throughout the exhibit areas, directing attendees to showrooms, answering questions, promoting raffles, and simply adding cheer to the event.

It was immediately obvious that members of the Atlanta AV club were eager to share their enthusiasm for hi-fi and music. Surrounded by this sort of passion and dedication to music and sound, we can be sure that the hobby is in very good hands.

A selection of RealTraps room treatments sit quietly in a quiet room. Discounted prices on RealTraps treatments were available to interested attendees, and many exhibitors used the popular panels to help tame their unwieldy rooms.

Evolution Home Theater is an Atlanta-based dealer carrying products from B&W, Pioneer, Marantz, Pro-Ject, Arcam, Sony, Musical Fidelity, Definitive Technology, and Sonus Faber, among others.

While in the Evolution Home Theater room, I enjoyed speaking with Andy Ritz, whose Ritz Interiors offers a wide selection of solutions for room treatments, specializing in whole-room custom treatments but also happy to provide single panels for smaller jobs, each project available with customizable fabrics and designs for “a true theater look and feel.”

I also enjoyed chatting with B&W’s Eric Joy, who told me that the company’s new P5 headphones (seen here) have been a great success. Indeed, I’ve even started seeing people in NYC sporting the good-looking headphones. At just $299, the P5 might offer the discerning music lover a fine alternative to Monster’s Beats by Dr. Dre headphones.

I sat down and listened to a system made of the P5, along with a suite of Musical Fidelity V-Series components&#151V-CAN headphone amp, V-DAC, and V-Link asynchronous 24/96 USB to S/PDIF converter&#151tied to one another and to an Apple iBook G4 by AudioQuest cables. There was nothing muddy about Muddy Waters singing “You Can’t Lose What You Ain’t Never Had.” (So true.) The sound was perhaps a little laidback, smooth, and seductive, with a good sense of air around Muddy’s voice, a weighty, well-defined bass, and great tone to the guitar.

A look inside the Qualia & Co. Indigo Blue Reference preamplifier seems to reveal solid construction. Qualia products, manufactured in Japan, are scheduled to be available in the US sometime this summer.