Only one question followed me to the 14th floor of Hotel Irvine: Will floor 2's unprecedented number of good-sounding rooms be repeated on other floors during T.H.E. Show Newport?

"Dear TSA, These are Hi-Fi components. They are magnetic. Nothing active. Thanks."

On the first night of the show, a standing-room-only assemblage of friends, associates, and supporters gathered in a huge, tented outdoor pavilion to bid adieu to Richard Lawrence Beers (July 26, 1949–January 26, 2016), co-founder of The Home Entertainment Show.

Was it really possible that so many excellent sounding rooms, both large and small, could be located on a single floor?

A Game of Thrones vibe hit me when I visited the room hosted by Texas-based distributor Believe High Fidelity…

That so many of the 19 rooms I entered on the second floor of Hotel Irvine sounded really good is nothing short of a miracle…

During the second part of my first day at T.H.E. Show, I paid a visit to the Hotel Irvine's Woodbridge Room—a poetic name that gelled with the quality of the gear on display…

After the speakers totally disappeared, all that remained was truly glorious, open, clear, extremely seductive, and supremely musical sound…

Millennials are—allegedly—the scum of the earth. They're a load of lazy, self-absorbed, uninformed, whiny twerps who are in for a rude awakening. At least, those are what seem to be the highlights of the fraction of internet drivel I've come across.

Stereophile Editor John Atkinson and I drove down from deepest Hollywood to arrive at T.H.E. Show Newport late on Thursday night, in time for the public opening the following morning…