Well, my elevator-friend, I was true to my word: I did seek out the Larsen room, shared with Danish speaker company Gamut, and very much enjoyed listening to the speakers—so Thank You for the…
search
"Have you heard the Larsen speakers?" The person posing this query was one of CES attendees in the elevator with me at the Venetian, who looked at my badge and noted my affiliation. "No, I can't say I have. I don't think I've even heard of them." He then proceeded to tell me that he owned these speakers, and loved them. They were exhibiting at the Venetian. I promised to check out the Larsen room.
Speaker designer Paul Barton is not known for coming up with new models willy-nilly, so a new model that represents a potential advance in sound quality—rather than just meeting a particular price point—is a significant event. The new speaker is the T3 ($7500/pair), and represents collaboration with a different overseas manufacturing facility than earlier models like the T2.
All the drivers are new: a titanium-dome tweeter with ferrofluid neodymium magnet, a compressed felt/fibreglass-cone midrange unit with mastic compound coating and rubber surround, and a woofer of similar…
I have long admired the sound of the Danish-made Raidho speakers, but have found it difficult to relate to their prices—except for a small two-way, all well north of $10k/pair. I was then pleased to find out that there's a new Raidho-affiliated brand name: Scansonic HD. The speakers are made by Raidho on an OEM basis, and are generally of similar design but without all the refinements and hand-built construction of the Raidhos. The top-of-the-line MC-3.5, priced at a more modest $5000/pair, sounded very good indeed, with a clean, dynamic sound, and great imaging. A lot like the Raidhos, in…
Dynaudio, which often exhibits with Simaudio Moon electronics, this time was doing a demo (with Mick Tillman in the photo) of their Contour S 3.4 LE speaker ($7850/pair) in a system featuring the Octave V110 integrated, T+A Elektroakustik music player/CD transport/DAC, and In-Akustik cables. The V110 uses K120 tubes, and costs $11,800 including the Super Black Box capacitance upgrade module. (An optional MM/MC photo module costs $600.) I think this may be that first time I've heard Dynaudio speakers driven by tube electronics, but, in this system, they did not seem handicapped in any way.
Walking the halls of the Venetian, you often hear music emanating from the rooms, the sound prompting you either to want to check it out or to walk on by. I was attracted by the music coming from the room identified as Crystal: a clear, lively sound that could be appropriately described as "crystalline." I assumed that the exhibitor was Crystal Cable, which I knew to make some excellent speakers, but which have prices above my CES report coverage limit of $10k/pair. Nevertheless, I went into the Crystal room to have a closer listen—and discovered that the exhibitor was not Crystal Cable, but…
The MB100 was on display last CES, but did not start shipping until mid 2014 for $6k, so I'll include a quick recap here. There is a 1TB internal drive for music storage (up to 24/192 PCM) and networking for external drives. iOS or Android app or TV interface controls the MB100 and support for Spotify, Pandora, SiriusXM, Rhapsody and TuneIn is included.
Though still sporting the classic Mac look, there is plenty of new tech packed into the D150. USB gets you up to 32/192 PCM as well as DSD 64/128 and DXD 352.8/384 and there are also two SPDIF and optical connections. There is a custom DIN connector for connecting a McIntosh CD/SACD transport such as the new $3,500 MCT450 (available in a couple months).
There's also a high quality headphone amp and Mac's "Advanced Quad Balanced" DAC section. Price is $3k.
You connect the B1 to the analog input of your system and then pair it with your bluetooth smartphone or tablet and you're off and running. The Cambridge audio DAC I reviewed a couple months back had this capability built in and my guests loved using Bluetooth to play music from their phones over the system.
Inside is a 24 bit DAC and Sam Tellig raved about the aptX B1 last month in Stereophile. The B1 should be available for purchase starting now for $189.
Seen last year in prototype form, the production version is here and as shown above, consists of two units: the RF transmitter is the smaller grey thing (on the left) that connects to your computer or tablet/phone, with the other unit, the receiver, connecting to your audio system. HRT claims that RF has sonic benefits over Bluetooth for sending a signal through the air.
The RF signal can cover a distance of up to 20 meters (bigger antennas can get you more range) and send up to 24/48 PCM which is decoded with HRT's analogue reconstruction filter and a high-quality output amplifier and…
There are two versions of the dsp coming: the dsp for android devices (the red version above) and the i-dsp for iOS stuff (the white version shown below). Both will retail for $69.95 with the i-dsp arriving in a couple months and the dsp here now.
The photos above show how the end of the i-dsp version covers the lightning adaptor for a clean and less cumbersome look. Both units handle up to 24/96 PCM. HRT's Greg Fowler says he likes to use the dsp in his car streaming Tidal from his Android phone connected to the aux input.