In the YG Acoustics-Audionet suite, the sound on playback of Jake Shimabukuro's ukulele wizardry came closer to matching his live performance than in most rooms, perhaps as a result of the excellent match between the Audionet Max monoblock amplifiers and YG Acoustics Sonja XV loudspeakers.
The CES 2017 demo of the TAD Micro Evolution One ($12,495/pair)shown here with Jonathan Derda of MoFi Distribution, the importerprovided convincing proof of the engineering skill of TAD's current Japanese designers. The sound (with all TAD electronics) was simply superb
Based in the Czech Republic, Acoustique Quality is a highly sophisticated loudspeaker design and manufacturing facility that uses the latest technologies, including 3D modeling, five-axis machining, high-precision cutter saws, etc.
CES 2017 was the occasion for the North American debut of Dynaudio's Contour series of loudspeakers. There are four models in this range, all manufactured at Dynaudio's newly expanded R&D and manufacturing facility in Skanderborg, Denmark.
A 2017 CES Innovation Awards honoree, the HiVi Swan MS-10 ($4000 per pair) is a wireless active stereo system that resembles no loudspeaker that I've seen. (I kept thinking that it looks like one of those "ergonomic" office chairs.)
Dennis Bonotto, new International Sales Manager for Nordost, joined the company's Michael Taylor to introduce Nordost's new top USB cable, the Valhalla 2 USB ($3500/1m)
At CES 2017, Japanese manufacturer A&M Ltd. announced the expansion of their Air Tight amplifier line with the ATM-3211 all-triode, 120W monoblock ($72,000/pair).
In response to requests for a more affordable cable that's truly high end, High Fidelity Cable founder Rick Schultz has introduced the company's entry-level Reveal interconnect ($699/1m pair) and speaker cable ($1399/2m pair).
Cocktail had their new brawnier and refined X-50 server/player on hand. And I'm comparing it to the previous X-30 model, which I'd seen at previous shows. The new X-50 feels much heavier and looks built to kill in a solid black case. On the front is a similar layout to the X-30, with a CD slot on the left and a slightly larger color display on the right.
I was thinking this was a nice $1,000-2,000 product as Questyle's representative was going over the features: 3 types of headphone jacks (regular unbalanced, 4 pin balanced XLR and 2.5mm balanced), USB/Optical/SPDIF inputs on back, swithcable gain via three small switches on the bottom, and AKM AK4490 DAC chip inside.
British manufacturer RHA, known primarily for their in-ear headphone models, had the new Dacamp L1 for the first time at CES. Beautifully built and feeling hefty in the hand, the new headphone amp and DAC sports independent processors for each channel. Three knobs along one side control gain (there are three settings), bass and treble, and inside is a 4000mAh lithium ion battery that RHA claims will give you 10 hours of play time.
It's safe to say our experiment bringing Jake Shimabukuro to CES this year as a live music reference worked out pretty well. Response was overwhelmingly positive and we're sifting through the comments and will start filing reports on each of the seven rooms we visited over the next week or so.