RMAF 2007

Audio Note UK, shown at RMAF by its US distributor AudioFederation.com, chose the Denver Show for the world premiere of its first USB-input DAC. The DAC 0.1X, an entry-level product that features neither anti-alias filtering nor oversampling, and uses a teeny little 6111WA dual-triode output tube that is said to behave like a 12AU7 but last a staggering 100,000 hours, was making fine sound paired with a complete line of Audio Note components and cables.

Musical Fidelity/Era Design distributor SignalPath's David Solomon is also interested in the desktop and enthusiastically demmed the new Peachtree Decco for me. The $700 tubed D/A processor/60Wpc integrated amplifier has a rear-panel bay that will accommodate the popular Sonos ZP80 WiFi media player and will take either digital or analog signals to its own, higher-quality DAC circuitry and output stage. It also has a USB input. The revolution is here.

I was impressed by the extremely full-range presentation of the VMPS RMD-60 loudspeaker ($9950/pair) paired with the VMPS Very Solid Subwoofer ($1850)—especially with the system's admirable bass control. Part of the credit goes to Bybee special-effect Golden Goddess AC cables and speaker bullets, Bolder Cable interconnects and cables, the rest to the Eastern Electric M156 monoblocks (160W into 8 ohms, $7000/pair, based on the EL 156 pentode tube), and Bolder's Statement Level Modded Squeezebox 3 ($1300). If The Bolder Cable Company’s display sounded this good with brand-new amps that were not yet broken in, I look forward to hearing it again once everything is fully ready to strut its stuff.

The sound in the large PS Audio room was impressive. Despite, at one point, my trying to listen to music over three conversations at once, the system on display,—all PS Audio save for the Avalon Ascendant speakers and JL Audio subs—was distinguished by its full midrange and inviting warmth. The sign on the poster behind the system—"Perfect Power Without the Box"—refers to the company’s forthcoming rack, which will have a power conditioner built into the bottom, additional power filters for every component, and the power itself carried by the tails of the rack. The initial plan is for an 11" wide rack designed for smaller, "lifestyle" components. (I’m one of those folks more concerned with having a life than displaying a lifestyle, but a chacun son gout). A desktop version is also planned.

I really enjoyed the mellow sound created by the USB-input Benchmark DAC 1 and the Studio Electric T3 loudspeakers. The speaker, with its 87dB sensitivity and 4 ohm impedance, is distinguished by the 6.5" broad-band drive-unit, encased in a stainless-steel sphere, that handles frequencies from 50Hz to 4kHz. Although you can see the diminutive silk-dome tweeter in the photo, the side-firing 8" woofer, which handles the single octave from 25–50Hz, is missing from view. Very, very nice.

Well, not really. But the Thiel CS3.7 speakers set-up in the Denver Audio Designs room could be driven either by an all-Bryston system—the new BCD-1 CD player ($2395), BP26 preamp, and a pair 7B-SST monoblocks—or an all-Simaudio Moon system: SuperNova CD player P7 preamp, and W7 power amp. I listened to "Comfortably Numb" from Pink Floyd's The Wall with both set-ups and the differences were both audible and surprising. The Moon system favored David Gilmour's paradigmatic guitar solo; the Bryston the contribution of David Mason's drums and Roger Waters' bass. I could have lived with either.