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This marks the end of our Florida Audio Expo 2020 coverage, but before I wrap things up, I'd like to mention a few more standout rooms with super systems.

The MC Audiotech Forty-10 ($35,000) is probably the most exotic speaker seen and heard at the Florida Audio Expo.

It's always a jolting, life-renewing Ka-BLAM when a new experience shatters your preconceptions of the order of things. From the moment you realize your dad isn't running right alongside you as you fly down the sidewalk on your first two-wheeler, to when you become a made man, these experiences forever alter how you view yourself and the world around you.

Rupert Neve Designs, the legendary pro-audio maker of recording studio consoles and other equipment for concert halls and beyond, has expanded its product offerings for the home-audio market—ie, music lovers and audiophiles—with its new Fidelice series, including a full-featured DAC/controller with Neve's analog circuitry and an AKM-based DAC chip inside, a phono preamp, and a headphone amp. The three Fidelice components share a retro-modern look with matte aluminum casings with inlayed mahogany wood on top, red-accented control dials, little throw switches, LED lights, and tiny text that reminded me a bit of my first piece of gear, an oldie-but-goodie Advent 300 receiver. Their form factor is distinctive too: trapezoidal with rounded edges, with the DAC housed in a larger chassis.

Offering a "sneak preview" before the official debut at AXPONA 2020, Endow Audio introduced the latest iteration of its speaker, the piano-black T35 ($19,900), a two-way with a patent-pending Point Array and a 12-inch woofer. It may be rather otherworldly in appearance (grilles are included) but rather unique in its approach. Basically, it consists of an array of nine full-range 3" drivers configured with a single 8" loading driver to create a point source. The woofer takes over frequencies at 100Hz (and below) via an inboard passive crossover. The T35 also contains patent-pending Passive Signal Processor (PSP) technology.

On Sunday morning I eased into my rounds with the Musical Surroundings folks: In conjunction with local dealer Sweet Home Audio, they presented a sweet-sounding, straight-up analog setup that featured several products at (relatively) more affordable price points than is sometimes the case.

AudioShield, now the distributor for Credo Audio of Switzerland, partnered with Florida dealer House of Stereo to introduce the Swiss maker’s EV Reference One speaker ($40,000/pair) in a system driven by a full suite of EMM Labs high-end electronics, with EMM’s DV2 integrated DAC with preamp stage and volume control ($30,000) and NS1 streamer ($4500) and Wolf Audio Systems Alpha 3 SX Audio Server ($9895) as digital sources. A van den Hul Grail SE+ phono stage and a VPI HW-40 40th Anniversary turntable served as the analog front end.