Herb Reichert

I mentioned earlier how uncolored, detailed, transparent, and image-specific an open baffle loudspeaker can sound. Unfortunately, not all open baffle speakers are created equal, and making a coherent and musically satisfying open-baffle speaker is much more complex than just bolting a few drivers to a sheet of plywood. The question any loudspeaker designer must ask is, how far should I go? When is done right?

My three-day reconnaissance suggests that Mark Schneider and his company, Linear Tube Audio, scored big at CAF, downstairs in the Headphone Lounge and with a room I and many showgoers thought was a candidate for Best Sound at Show.

Walk through the glass entrance doors, then twenty paces straight ahead, and you find yourself standing at the lip of a dizzying precipice, with a full panoramic view of the Rockville Hilton’s vast LP-filled atrium. To your right is a spectacularly lit glass wall that measures about 25’ high by 75’ wide. Above the glass is a giant banner baring the turquoise Valve Amplification Company’s logo: VAC. Standing in front of the wall are groups of urbane sophisticates: handsome men in suits, beautiful women, bright-eyed children. This envy-inspiring display is assembled by The Audio Company out of Marietta, GA; who describe themselves as “purveyors of hi-end luxury audio.”

The lighting in the Krell-Alta Audio room was bleak, gray, colorless. The only color in the entire room was the blue from the lights on Krell’s never-before-played-in-public K-300p phono preamplifier ($TBD), Krell Illusion line-level preamplifier ($7700), Krell Duo 300 XD amplifier, and Krell CEO Walter Schofield’s shiny blue jacket.