After walking me through <a href="http://blog.stereophile.com/rmaf2010/the_naim_uniti/">the Naim Uniti display</a>, Naim’s David Dever then ushered me over to a second Naim room where the company was showing off its new NDX network player ($4750, shipping this November).
“Oh, this is new…and this is new, too. And, oh yeah, we’ve also got this,” went Music Hall’s Leland Leard around and around his busy room, a funhouse of hi-fi and vinyl.
Music Hall’s inexpensive USB turntable, the two-speed, belt-driven USB-1 ($249), uses an aluminum die-cast platter, has a groovy S-shaped tonearm equipped with an Audio-Technica AT3600L moving-magnet phono cartridge, and comes in a high-gloss black finish. Overall, it resembles something Run DMC might’ve brought to a gig.
<i>Photo: John Atkinson</i>
A dream machine for the used LP lover: AudioDeskSysteme’s record cleaning machine cleans both sides of an 12” record simultaneously, quietly, and thoroughly, without any effort from the user. Just push a button and walk away. Five minutes later, the record is clean and dry. At $3495, however, it’s expensive. Such luxuries don’t come cheap.
I enjoyed a conversation with Jude Mansilla, founder of Head-Fi, organizers of <a href="http://blog.stereophile.com/rmaf2010/canjam_at_rmaf/">the CanJam conference</a> which was sort of tucked away in the Marriott’s grand Rocky Mountain Event Center. The entire perimeter of the space was occupied by long tables, each showcasing headphones and headphone accessories from companies such as Sennheiser, Head-Direct, JH Audio, Ultimate Ears, CEntrance, Grado, Audeze, and Ray Samuels Audio.
Here’s a look at one of Jude Mansilla’s systems: Apple iPad, Head-Direct HiFiMan HM-801 portable music player, Grado Head-Fi Series HF-2 headphones. I took a quick listen and enjoyed the liquid midrange, the smooth, easy sound.
And here’s the new HiFiMan HM-602 ($439) which offers much of the functionality of the larger HM-801, but lacks that model’s modular headphone amp. It uses a Philips TDA-1543 DAC, offers 16GB onboard flash memory, and is about the size of an iPod Classic. Cool.
JH Audio, founded by Jerry Harvey (formerly of Ultimate Ears, and also known for his work as Van Halen’s audio engineer), had on display an entire line of in-ear monitors, from the single-driver JH 5 Pro ($399) to the 3-way JH 16 Pro ($1149). I listened to a bit of Tool’s “Schism,” from the album <i>Lateralus</i> (a John Atkinson fave), through the Ray Samuels Emmeline The Shadow (which was cute as heck), playing from an Apple iPad, and the JH 5. Nice! I was struck by the deep, grumbling lows, the expressive, truthful guitar tones, clarity of the voices, and the pure drive and impact.
There were lots and lots and lots of headphones at CanJam, a headphone lover’s paradise.