Heathrow show - best rooms?

Pants. Wish I'd known Brian would be there - I'd have squeezed it in somehow.

As it was I had a stag bash to run...

 

Pics ?

 

lol... would you believe this was the ONE room with a ''no photographs'' sign in it?

what can you say?

''no free publicity mr Wavac, either then!''

 

Hmmm ... less input from you in the future?

 

Nigh on impossible to get even into the Wavac room on Sunday mid afternoon. Seemed to be exactly the same people sat in the same spot for hours - even the guy at the door in his coat was the same one - we went back 5 times to try for a listen over the whole stay at the show. Ended up with a very quick look and listen before heading off. While it sounded ok - it flippin should have - what with a total of three seats to go around! Why oh why were we expected to listen to 'There's a hole in my bucket dear Liza' is sort of beyond me on such a system.

 

Marcus - no, not my wedding...

 

Yes they had the pre amps .....not certain if they would be better than the desen ?? they sounded pretty good and the wad gear could distinguish the lathed disc ...much to the designers suprise.

 

Wavac/Audio Acoustics Room. No pictures my arse!



the Wavac Line stage & power supply (I think)



The 150W SE mono blocks with lots & lots of Tango iron on board. Beautifully made.

 

man!!

could you have not got one of the foxy Wavac bird at least?

mmmmmmmm wavac bird..

 

Murray how do they get 150 out of them, is that the radio transmitter valves?

 

...and to think the room I was helping out in was only about 10 metres down the corridor - yer nicely!

 

Why exactly didn't they want pictures, I thought it was a hifi show, not a CIA conference.

Jeez that segment of the hifi market is strange....photo's equal potential marketing you dimwits

 

Audio Acoustics

I did not make it to the show this year, but only a couple of things would have been of great interest. Mr Bhatti's Audio Acoustics would have been one of them; although I would not be so impolite as to mention his wife in any way other than to say that she is nice to talk to. Wavac amps do have a really great sound, those speakers are close to silent (a great achievement) and the cables are "world reference standard". The CD player in use last year although very good was less than perfect - anyone know what they were using this year?
I'd love to hear some great rock music played through this gear, and a really good turntable would be interesting too.
If I were to use equipment of this standard I'd install it in the best possible listening room; ie anechoic. Too good for a normal living room!
The next project for Mr Bhatti should be to build some speakers with the ability to reproduce the lowest possible bass; as that is the one area he hasn't covered (or so I believe).

 

looked like myriad ...the room sounded good but not that good...the cost of the system playing when I was in must have been close to £400k but sound wise was only marginally better than the mac's at £50k...and that was woith different material ...may have been a good move to have heard the same on both.

I noticed the no photo signs...but I just ignored them ! I've a nice in focus one ...I'll see if I can reduce it to post.

 

I'm surprised how different people hear different things at shows.
Am I the only one who thought the Big PMC's were unbalanced?
The top and mid were fantastic with a huge soundstage and real presence but that bass was so irritating. It was so indistinct that I couldn't tell when one note ended and another began and most of the time I couldn't even tell what instrument was playing. If the bass didn't work in a room that size then what chance in your average living room?
I did the demo in the Border Patrol room of the two cdp's and to my ears and to two other punters in the room the Opus won easily with a much more defined bottom end. £2K cheaper too.
I didn't like the LV's. I've never heard them sound particularly special and I'm not sure what all the rave reviews are about.
I heard the BP with Art Emotions at the summer show and that setup was just magical.

I really liked the Mac room and couldn't fault the sound. Those blue meters are a bit gay but they grow on you. I can't imagine many people buying speakers that look so wierd tho' no matter how good they sound.

The room with the ypsolon stuff was very impressive and outclassed most other rooms there. I was also impressed with the big Avantguards. Imagine walking out of a shop with those under your arm.
I noticed lots of rooms using Consonance gear. I'm not sure why as it always sounds a bit dull and flat to my ears

Overall tho' I thought the show was ok whilst being abit low key.
I also thought some of the rooms made an effort with the music this year. I didn't hear Dire Straits once!

I think the only thing I really wanted to take home was the girl on the hotel reception although I don't think I could've got her past the wife.

 

Thank you all for your nice comments.

Its nice to see there are still a hand full of people who want to listen to there music only and without a systems opinion or interpretation of it.

Not getting in- The Audio Acoustics room -we distribute Wavac in U.K ,and parts of europe , was full most of the show and apologies to all who repeatedly tried to get in and had no joy. I personally would be more than happy to play any item to anyone who missed out .

Cost- NO our system was NOT400k! we will play a big system in september! on the contra although the Audio Acoustics and Wavac products are not inexpensive, when; what you get comparably with other high end options is taken into consideration value can than be appreciated. On the Sat we played the K2 (14k)and MD805 (16.5k)mono blocks yes agreed not pizza money but comparison to the imminent adjacent doors alone playing there 150-200k set ups ; the public repeatedly acknowledged our merits & note at a sixth of the cost. Not to mention we had a offer on the two for £23500 so you could have the whole set up in your home for 30k-40k with a decent front end!
Alas money and How much you get in this industry is really not linked,and its nice to actually pay hard earned money and get something for that,opposed to great marketed perceived perception. My products are relative ,the raw material is expensive ,nothing is off the shelf,the labour times are horrendous, the design process not straight forward and still I manage to price goods based on actual times/parts/cost not bs.

The gentlemen who requested I design a lower register- All who were at the show hopefully heard the bottom end of the K2 and Sapphire on Sunday. The sapphire will play Every instrument down to 20 Hz (apart from a 27-ft organ pipe down to 17Hz in a 32-ft room ) and from a sensible size real world wife approved speaker. The speaker has no low frequency box resonance and can easily be interpreted as lacking bass -when what it is lacking is box coloration ONLY as witnessed and commented on by many on sunday including Paul Messenger who could hear the pronominal bottom octaves a forte of the Sapphires if anything. None the less there are two more models to be launched this year that will deliver lowers registers one down to 16 Hz and the other 19 Hz, the 19 Hz budget model "Zahrah" is expected around 5-6k and would be the one to listen to.Than there's the OWD -

We do not live in anechoic Chamber- if u have a big box-resonating away (hotel)within this u have a large number of independent box(rooms) within which you place another box(loudspeaker resonating away) what chance have you got to get this to represent a listening lounge in a typical home -None! so if i have a loudspeaker that does not resonate I have address issue one and i need to do all I can to give the end user a Slim idea of what my product do hence the treatment. Our systems in a "normal home environment will out perform by miles the level of performance you get at a naff hi-fi show even if you were to stuff the whole room full of acoustic treatment.

The chap who requested what c.d. player I was using -well the same one I always use the Weiss the difference was this year we launched a new Resonance Mk11 mains cable, that made more than a noticeable difference and to boot its a grand cheeper @£2000 1m yes 2k for wire! but as you said convinced people I had a different high end source altogether.

Yes the Lady spinning the disc's -eye candy- and my boss is my Wife-ill say no more.

In the meantime,any questions or if you are after a opportunity ,do not hesitate to call me, happy listening
shabir 07968388118 www.audioacoustics.co.uk

 

Yeah - the hotel staff could have been a bit more accommodating and let the room users move a few of the ceiling tiles to allow air flow in the void without that damned resonating rattle that any decent full range speaker could produce

Particularly bad on Leftfield and Massive Attack in our room

 

The wavac room The sound was fantastic ...but so were the prices of the kit...I may have misunderstood the question...on the Saturday we toted up cdp £10k dac ? £10k amps pre/power £50 ish Don't forget to add in the £66k worth of speakers and only knows how much for all the cables.... So you not going to have much change from £200k To put into perspective ..that more than my car and house are worth put together By £50k!

This wasn't even money no object HiFi it was beyond that.....this is not mean as a criticisms rather more a balance. Though it did tick all the right boxes sound wise...

Oh yes the myriad has the logo sweep over the name and the weiss under it !

 

Who the hell pay's 50k plus for hifi, only to have it immediately worth 1/3 the price?

On a semi sensible note - the £3k opus v £5k Esoteric X-03 sounds interesting. Any other comments on these two?

 

4wd

I heard a demo of the opus 21 vs the new Leema CD player.

Interesting result - similar sounding, with the Leema having a little more bass.

All in an unfamiliar system in a show etc..