In his report of the Rutherford Audio room, Ariel Bitran wrote, “There was something magical about this sound, and there was a sweet-spot to be found everywhere.”

Music Hall’s Roy Hall was excited about his new a15.3 integrated amplifier and matching c-dac15.3 CD player/DAC combo. Just as any good integrated amplifier should, the 50Wpc a15.3 includes a headphone output, front-panel mini-jack input, moving-magnet phono stage, and remote control. The one-box c-dac15.3 combines a three-input (optical, coax, USB-B) Wolfson DAC section with a CD player, itself based around a Burr-Brown 24-bit/192kHz-capable DAC. Build quality seemed excellent. Each unit will sell for $549. Music Hall just keeps churning out interesting, affordable products. I’ll look forward to learning more about these units later this year.

JPS Labs leaps into the world of headphones with the Abyss: a highly customizable head-gripping $5495 listening device. More info on these intense cans be found on their website.

Because I know Wes Bender and E.A.R.’s Dan Meinwald are always open to new sounds, I took the opportunity in the Wes Bender Studio room to play the title cut from Aidan Baker’s latest release, Already Drowning.

The Reception Hall was teaming with audiophiles and exhibitors expressing hellos and chatting about gear and music. Here’s a look:

Coincident Speaker Technology and NYC dealer Audio Loft demonstrated a system made of Coincident’s Pure Reference Extreme loudspeakers ($26,800/pair) driven by Coincident’s 75W Dragon 211PP monoblocks ($10,999/pair), Statement Line Stage ($5499), and Statement Phono ($5999). Source was a VPI Classic 4 ($8000) with a beautiful rosewood base and HR-X 12.7 tonearm mounted with a Dynavector DRT XV-1t cartridge. Cables were Coincident’s own, and the gear was supported by a Steve Blinn Designs Monarch equipment rack.

Mat Weisfield was ultra-stoked to tell me about VPI's new 3D-printed tonearm. I'll let Art do the explaining, but when I heard the VPI room, images were rock solid and full-bodied through the 3D printed tonearm and nascent VPI Classic Direct. A turntable created out of happenstance, when the chassis for the planned direct-drive Vanquish was not ready for the show, they stuck the Vanquish parts into a Classic chassis and the VPI Classic Direct (approximately $20-25k) was born. Resourceful, those VPI fellas.

Canned jazz: that inoffensive blend of 80s synths, smooth sax, and punchy bass guitar. There was a lot of this at the New York Audio Show.

Dupuy Acoustique, a brand relatively new to me, gave an effective demonstration of its Daisy Reflector ($995; patent pending), first seen at SSI in Montreal&#151a “phase-restoration device,” whose internal cabinetry and foam have been computer-modeled and CNC-machined for optimal performance.

Sennheiser had the largest presence at the constantly buzzing Headzone section at this year's New York Audio Show.