As I sat down, Walter said, “Herb, did you ever think the old Krell sounded hard, gray, and transistor…
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The lighting in the Krell-Alta Audio room was bleak, gray, colorless. The only color in the room was the blue from the lights on Krell’s never-before-played-in-public K-300p phono preamplifier ($TBD), Krell Illusion line-level preamplifier ($7700), Krell Duo 300 XD amplifier, and Krell CEO Walter Schofield’s shiny blue jacket. Before lighting-induced dystopian melancholy took hold, I was greeted by the dual grins of Walter and the always fun story teller Michael Levy, CEO at Alta Audio.
As I said in my storm-centered intro, Capital Audiofest is my favorite audio show because the people are real. There are not so many slick-suited international types like the old CES and the new Munich High End. In Rockville, MD, we have down home local audio dealers, like Roslyn and Russell Katz, who filled FIVE rooms with fine audio and the hall of the fifth floor with LPs. Their company (companies?) have two names: The Audio Hunters and The Vinyl Revivers.
Before I knew who she was, I saw Roslyn in the hall handing out chocolate chip cookies that she baked herself. She was vivacious,…
Staged by Cornelia and Michael Davis, the beautiful Audio Federation assemblage consisted of the Acapella Audio One music server ($6875), Audio Note UK DAC Five Signature ($98,355), Acapella LaMusika integrated amplifier ($110,000), new 93” tall, 450 lb. Acapella Audio Arts Campanile 2 loudspeakers with an updated spherical horn midrange (95dB at 8 ohms, $66,500/pair), and Acapella and Audio Note UK cabling.
Streaming a 16/44.1 file of the Mercury Living Presence version of Brahms’ Piano Concerto No. 1 in B flat major performed by Gina Bachauer, the sound was very large scale, clear, dynamic…
I’ve known DeVore Fidelity’s John DeVore a long time. Luxman America President Jeff Sigmund, too. I’ve reviewed a few of their products—DeVore and Luxman. These guys are salt of the earth. They’ve got tradition, they love music, they have a desire to create, a desire to serve.
Not to get all lofty here, but it’s good to know there are still true artists and great people at the core of the audiophile/hi-fi business. And while their room, presented by Jeff Fox’s Command Performance AV of Falls Church, VA, featured DeVore’s most expensive speakers and the new Luxman CL-1000 Preamplifier,…
Walk through the glass entrance doors, then twenty paces straight ahead, and you find yourself standing at the lip of a dizzying precipice, with a full panoramic view of the Rockville Hilton’s vast LP-filled atrium. To your right is a spectacularly lit glass wall that measures about 25’ high by 75’ wide. Above the glass is a giant banner baring the turquoise Valve Amplification Company’s logo: VAC. Standing in front of the wall are groups of urbane sophisticates: handsome men in suits, beautiful women, bright-eyed children. This envy-inspiring display is assembled by The Audio Company out of…
With so many megabuck rooms fattening the floors of CAF 2019, it’s easy to miss the smallish, sub-$10,000 systems making absolutely first rate sound. One such room was manned by MoFi’s Jon Derda: the Tenacious Sound/MoFi/Quad room.
After leaving Greg Roberts’ superb Volti Audio room, a Stevie Ray Vaughan guitar solo pulled me into Tenacious Sound lair across the hall, and there they were: the Wharfedale Linton speakers recently reviewed by Herb Reichert ($1199/pair, plus $300 for the stands). The Lintons remind me of my old Spendor1/2s: similar fatboy dimensions and equally room…
Amplifier designer Vinnie Rossi has the looks of a dapper clotheshorse. His gear is also stylish and eye-catching, kind of steampunk-techno. But there's substance there, too.
Rossie's hi-fi designs have advanced over 15 years at a furious clip. The latest evidence is the new Vinnie Rossie L2 Signature Edition Integrated Amplifier (L2i-SE, $18,995). The amp features a wide-bandwidth, zero-feedback, direct-heated–triode preamplifier design, compatible with 2A3, 45, and 300B tubes, and others. The output stage has a class-AB MOSFET topology, with a dual-mono power supply and custom-wound…
I’ve favorably reviewed both Gary Dews’ BorderPatrol amps and Greg Roberts’ horn-loaded Volti Audio speakers. Since I couldn’t afford to purchase either when I reviewed them, I was looking forward to seeing and hearing their wares at CAF.
BorderPatrol and Volti Audio maintained two rooms at the show, one gained when New York’s High Water Sound cancelled due to a family emergency. Room 316 included BorderPatrol SE-I USB DAC ($1350), BorderPatrol S20EXD amplfier ($19,500), Innuos ZENith music server (1TB, $4249), Innuos Phoenix USB Reclocker ($3,149), Volti Audio Vittoras speakers ($25,000…
Oswald Mill Audio (OMA) is known for thinking outside of the box, and its new division, Fleetwood Sound Company, looks to be extending that tradition.
Presented by audio veterans Chris Sommovigo and Vytas Viesulas, the Black Cat, MA Recordings, Fern & Roby, Fleetwood Sound room was operating the latter’s unusual-looking DeVille Monitor. Featuring a six-inch thick, solid wood conical horn made from “thermally induced” modified Pennsylvania ash wood, the DeVille, which is rated at at 94dB and 8 ohms nominal impedance, is an unusually nimble, natural-sounding and propulsive standmount…
GT Audioworks Loudspeakers, Pass Labs Electronics, Basis Audio Turntable and Tonearm, Mosart Cabinet
The other big room with spectacular sound on the Rockville Hilton’s atrium level featured products from Pass Labs, GT Audioworks, and Basis Audio.
Every year, Steve Rabitz, vice president of sales at Sound Insight in Massapequa and Huntington, NY, puts on a grand show in a giant blue-lit space dominated some really tall GT Audioworks planar quasi-ribbon speakers.
Greg Takash, GT Audioworks' personable engineer/designer, explained what distinguishes his planar ribbon speakers from other brands' long-established quasi-ribbons: “My speaker"—GT Audioworks only makes one…