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Fun with Nico in the Totem Room

I could barely make my way into the Totem room. The crowd stretched out into the hall. When I finally found some space, I made sure to have some fun.

"May I see the photo?" Totem's Nico Bruzzese asked.

"Sure," I said, bringing my little digital camera around for him to see.

The look on his face. I laughed.

"I know where you live," Nico threatened, "I've got your shipping address!"

I think he was trying to say that he didn't want me to post this photo of him standing beside the Native American mask. I'm sorry, Nico. But please feel free to use…

Coolest Tunes @ the Show

Elina Lamm spinning discs in the very smooth Lamm Industries suite. It gets my vote for Most Comforting Music at the Show.

Louis Armstrong, take me away.

So there I was, part of a motley crew of HE 2006 attendees and fellow travelers, groovin' with deejays Ming and FS and their four turntable assault at the Friday night rave that ended day one of HE 2006. Unfortunately, no one else was there.

So we adjourned to an upstairs hotel room where we were exposed to an assault of another sort. Now it’s only my opinion but some of the "components" that are in the rooms at the Sheraton Gateway at LAX are less than whatcha might call Hi Fidelity. Under the television, there was a musical device, bolted to the shelf of the entertainment center.…

Use a Transistor . . .

. . . Go To Jail. An appropriate license plate parked out front of the Sheraton at HE2006.

Right Place, Right Time

Dr. John brought down the house Saturday night at HE 2006, where the crowd brought him back for an encore.

Bardaudio Wireless Wonders

Sonneteer/Bardaudio's Haider Bahrani holds the $425 Bardone TX wireless audio transmitter. This device can broadcast an uncompressed CD stream wirelessly up to 50 meters (164 feet).

Bardaudio Wireless Amplifier

Sonneteer/Bardaudio also makes a wireless receiver that houses a 25Wpc stereo amplifier. The Bardthree amp/receiver comes in several varieties, priced $1,225-1,350, and can be used to stream full-bandwidth tunes to another room, or to a set of rear channels in a hard-to-wire spot.

Sonics & Immedia

The Immedia room proved an isle of sanity amidst the clamor. As I entered, the folks were playing Analogue Productions’ HQ-180 pressing of Chet. Heard through Joachim Gerhard’s somewhat diminutive, 90 lb Sonics Allegria speakers ($15,000/pair, shown above with Immedia’s Allen Perkins), the trumpet sounded far bigger and lifelike than speakers this size “should” make it sound. Equally impressive were the amazing depth, height, and width of the soundstage. No small part of the credit is due Perkins’ Spiral Groove SGI turntable ($20,000), Immedia RPM tonearm ($2995), Lyra Skala cartridge…

Simaudio & Dynaudio

In the Simaudio/Dynaudio room, the sheer size and weight of the bass commanded equal respect. This was some of the finest low bass extension I have so far encountered at the show. (The bass impact of the new Wilson Watt/Puppy8s also deserves mention). Imagine my surprise when, after my audition, Simaudio’s Costa Kouliisakis told me that he had not yet succeeded in getting the room to deliver all of the deep bass extension the equipment was capable of producing.

The system, which also had a most listenable high extension, included the Simaudio Andromeda player ($11,500), P-8 preamp…

Optimal Enchantment from ARC & Vandersteen

Saturday’s first taste of the real thing for this writer came in the form of midrange truth. The location was the third floor Santa Cruz room put together by Optimal Enchantment, a Santa Monica-based high-end retailer whose 25 plus-year history in the business perhaps grants it the right to so audacious a name. The amps were Audio Research REF 610 monoblocks, each of whose twenty glowing 6550 output tubes help account for their 600W output and $40,000/pair price tag. Speakers were an industry given, the Vandersteen 5As, the cable Audioquest, and the turntable a Basis Debut Signature ($…