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Stephen Mejias and John Atkinson take a few minutes in the hall to catch up on the day's events. That's Telarc's Amanda Sweet in the background.
Wasn't she just in the background of John and Stephen's picture? We posed her next to the Los Angeles Guitar Quartet's Spin and she really lit up. It's an impressive sounding SACD—and the group is playing at HE2006 tomorrow. Did I mention the concert was free?
John Atkinson and Jonathan Scull handicap this year's F1 season. You didn't think they were this animated about audio, did you?
Stereophile's music editor Robert Baird, caught in the middle of his Garrison Keillor impersonation.
No, that's not a hearing aid growing out of Michael Fremer's pinna—he's the official HE2006 spokesperson, so he has to keep his phone on 24/7. HE says he hasn't heard any truly balanced stereo soundstaging yet, for some reason.
Onkyo teamed up with guitar manufacturer Takemine to produce a loudspeaker that sings like a musical instrument. Takemine's acoustic voicing technology, combined with Onkyo's innovation in driver design, made our LAGQ Spin sound vibrantly alive.
Onkyo says the D-TK10's ring-drive tweeter produces flat frequency response out to 100kHz and its AeroAcoustic Drive port duct gives the woofer unusual control for a 10cm driver. Onkyo also credits the A-OMF diaphragm for a significant amount of that bass control, too.
Price tbd.
Onkyo held a press conference that really made us smile. It was all about stereo.
The $699.99 A-9555 employs Onkyo's vector linear technology to correct the high distortion that plagues most PWM designs. VL technology modulates the signal with an integration circuit rather than a comparator, which, Onkyo says,"cancels" the positive and negative pulses of transient distortion. Onkyo claims this effectively smoothes the analog modulation and "removes" the error.
The A-9555 puts out 100Wpc into an 8 ohm load and 200Wpc into 4 ohms.
And did we mention that it has a phono…
David Wilson remarked that he debuted the original Wilson WATT (Wilson Audio Tiny Transducer) almost 20 years ago to the day. Today, he showed us the WATT/Puppy 8 ($27,900/pair). Wilson, as always, a polished presenter, also noted that it was appropriate for him to give the new speaker its premier in a city noted for producing sequels, although he promised that, unlike Hollywood sequels, the WATT/Puppies have gotten better with each new chapter.
For me, the most memorable line of the presentation was Wilson's remark that the original WATT was noted for being unforgiving. "Wilson has…
The assembled media lost in a musical revery listening to Cantus sing "Shenandoah" at the debut of the Wilson Audio WATT/Puppy 8s.
HE2006's official keynote address was delivered by Gary Sasaki, president of DIGDIA, a company that helps companies understand the ways that digital entertainment creates growth opportunities for savvy businesspeople.
Mr. Sasaki explained that mature technologies, such as analog TV, have limited growth potential, but entrenched audiences, whereas emerging technologies frequently offer more potential than genuine growth—that is, until an unanticipated development generates mainstream interest in what had previously seemed an unlikely direction. Take the Web explosion of the last 10…