New Products

In a near-repeat of my visit to the Gershman Acoustics room at 2019’s Toronto Audiofest, I got the chance to meet up with the Toronto-based company’s Ofra and Eli Gershman and also Krell COO Walter Schofield.

Who knew I’d meet Paul Simon—the Paul Simon, pop star, the shorter half of Simon and Garfunkel—at the Toronto Audiofest?

It's not often that I come across a piece of gear at an audio show that I pine to own. The Simaudio Moon 40th Anniversary Limited Edition system is in that category, but I'd better hurry: Production is limited to 40 systems.

They say staring is impolite, but as I listened to the music from this system in the American Sound of Canada room, it was hard to keep my eye from wandering to gaze lustily at the assembled gear.

In the mood for an under $20,000 audiophile-grade system? Excellent, because I found one in the room sponsored by Wired with Sound.

Next up was another great-sounding room (it felt so good to be back!). Hosted by Mark Elias, owner of retailer Soundstage Fine Audio, this room boasted some high-grade gear, starting with Vandersteen’s new, dark, and handsome KĒNTO Carbon speakers ($49,000/pair), which Vandersteen representative Brad O’Toole seemed rightly proud of, as well as of the company’s 150Wpc solid state, zero feedback M5-HPA High-Pass monoblocks, which were powering the KĒNTO's higher-frequency drivers.

Another fun room was the one sponsored by Centre Hi-Fi, a Montreal-based audio dealer that decided to add a flagship division called Genesis that offers higher-performance and higher-priced products than it normally sells.