TAD Speakers Sing

TAD Speakers Sing

Jan 14, 2011
TAD didn't appear to be demonstrating anything new in their large penthouse suite at the Venetian, but designer Andrew Jones was getting such an enormously involving sound from the Compact Reference CR-1 stand-mounts ($37,500/pair plus $1800/pair for stands) that I had to stop to take an extended listen. Jones had some of HDTracks' new 24/192 files that he was playing with Amarra and one track, featuring Hammond organ, double bass and drums, had the audience stumped. (The fellow in front of me even held up his iPhone and ran a song ID app, only for the screen to flash "No Match.") Then I twigged: it was a jazz arrangement of Pink Floyd's "Money," with sound to die for. DAC, preamp, and power amps were also from TAD.

Estelon Speakers from Estonia

Estelon Speakers from Estonia

Jan 14, 2011
The Estelon speakers from Alfred & Partners ($43,900/pair) were one of the hits of last year's RMAF, so I made a point of taking a listen to them at CES. The ceramic-diaphragm floor-standers were being used in more than one room—Conrad-Johnson was also using them, in their first "live" Show dem in two decades—but I was drawn into the Kubala-Sosna room by the sound of Jimi Hendrix playing "Born Under a Bad Sign." Source was a Korg DSDx2 recorder, which Joe Kubala had used to record the track from LP, and the sound, with Audio Research Reference 5 preamp, Tenor 350M monoblocks, and Kubala-Sosna Excitation cables, was rich, full-range, and clean. The speakers are internally wired with K-S cable.

Vienna Acoustics The Kiss

Vienna Acoustics The Kiss

Jan 14, 2011
Austrian Vienna Acoustics set up its own distribution company in the US in 2010 and when I popped my head in the door of their suite at the Venetian, I saw they were demming the Kiss speaker ($16,000/pair) reviewed a year back by Wes Phillips. (The rest of the system comprised Ayre KX-R preamp, MX-R monoblocks, and DX-5 "universal audio engine, with Transparent cabling.)

The Kiss looks like a stand-mount but it is really a floorstander with an integral stand. The sound in this room really flattered piano, whether it was a 24/96 file of a jazz trio featuring a Fazioli instrument, or Glenn Gould's 1981 reading of the Bach Goldberg Variations, remastered from the analog backup tapes.

Rosso Fiorentino Siena

Rosso Fiorentino Siena

Jan 14, 2011
Pride of place in the Avatar Acoustics room at the Venetian went to the four-way Siena speakers ($24,995/pair) from Italian manufacturer Rosso Fiorentino. The designer teaches electroacoustics in Florence, but is a graduate from the University of Salford in the UK. A pair of aluminum-cone 8" woofers in a separate sealed enclosure are combined with a 6.5" paper-cone midrange unit (a ScanSpeak Revelator), a 1" silk-dome tweeter, and what appeared to be a Murata "ultrasonic generator," to give a specified response of 35Hz–100kHz, –3dB.

The Siennas were demmed in a system comprising Dr. Feikert turntable and tonearm, Abbingdon Music Research CD player, phono preamp, and integrated amplifier, with Acoustic System racks and cables, but I will hand over to Jason Serinus for some additional thoughts:

Volent Paragon VL-2

Volent Paragon VL-2

Jan 14, 2011
The Paragon VL-2 Signature ($8600/pair) from Hong Kong-based Volent Corp. combines a unique dual-ribbon tweeter with a titanium/graphite-sandwich–coned woofer in an attractively curved enclosure filled with wool. Frequency range is specified as 30Hz–60kHz, impedance as 4 ohms, and sensitivity as 88dB/2.83V/m. Driven by MSB's M202 tower amplifiers and MSB digital source, the sound was much larger than I was expecting from these stand-mounts.

Zu Goes Its Own Way

Zu Goes Its Own Way

Jan 14, 2011
Utah-based Zu Audio does indeed goes its own way, with retro, almost-full-range pulp-cone drive-units used in high-sensitivity designs. (See Art Dudley's review of the $4000/pair Essence in the October 2009 Stereophile. All of Zu's speakers have been moderately priced, so I was not expecting to see and hear a design costing $40,000/pair when I went into the Zu room at T.H.E. Show.

The Dominance uses three 10" paper-cone drivers, each with a whizzer cone, to cover the range from 27Hz to 12kHz. Each is in its own sub-enclosure featuring Zu's proprietary ZuRG loading (See AD's review) with the outer two tuned identically and the central drive-unit adjusted to give a bit more upper-midrange energy. There is also a downward-firing 15" subwoofer, covering the octave below 27Hz, and completing the line-up are two horn-loaded ring-radiator tweeters operating above 12kHz. Unusually, these are placed at the top and bottom of the Dominance.

For the dem, the subwoofer was powered by a Pass Labs XA30.5 but the main drive-units were driven by a 1.5Wpc Yamamoto SET amp. Yup, just 1.5W, but the Dominances still managed to fill the room with sound. Lows were tight and extended; imaging was tangible; jump factor was startling; but I couldn't get away from a touch of character in the mid-treble imparted by those whizzer cones.

windows sound drivers for Ayre / USB async Dacs - results of some fiddling

Forums
Computer Audio
Submitted by neiltingley on

I've got the ASIO4ALL drivers installed finally after a bit of fiddling.

I tried the AQVOX drivers on my non-media server windows 7 PC and they installed easily enough but the beep every minute or so they impose on you with the trial version is extremely annoying and off-putting.

Sadly the uninstall does not work and did not remove the drivers from my system so I can't use my baby DAC until I figure out a way to properly clean out the installation.

windows sound drivers for Ayre / USB async Dacs - results of some fiddling

Forums
Computer Audio
Submitted by neiltingley on

I've got the ASIO4ALL drivers installed finally after a bit of fiddling.

I tried the AQVOX drivers on my non-media server windows 7 PC and they installed easily enough but the beep every minute or so they impose on you with the trial version is extremely annoying and off-putting.

Sadly the uninstall does not work and did not remove the drivers from my system so I can't use my baby DAC until I figure out a way to properly clean out the installation.

sonus faber choices

Forums
Loudspeakers
Submitted by neiltingley on

Hi All

Would you go for a used pair of Sonus Faber Guarneri Homage from 2002 or a new pair of a Cremona M Auditors.

Not sure how much I ought to pay for the Guarneri but they have not been used much I'm told.

I only listen to classical / jazz and have a Pathos Logos and Ayre DAC and some decent JPS Labs cables.

Any good alternative to Sonus Faber around to $5000-$7000 US ? Quads are an option but I don't have the space right now.

Advice please ?

Subscribe to
Advertisement
Advertisement
Advertisement