Heathrow show this coming weekend - who's going?

I'll just state the best and worse for me.

Audiosmile, best small speaker set up, beat the guy using 3k Neat standmounters, foo free setup as well.

Best room, ABC audio, cohesive, accurate timbre, good timing and attack, lovely.

One trick pony: MBL, but what a trick.

Best value: Zindak, v30 integrated, £995, sublime.

Biggest surprise, those Tannoys, jeses wept, how good were they.

Bad sounds..

Tom Tom, bad speakers and bad attitude from the Swedish guy.
Prologue- frankly just sounded shit.
Coherant room, maybe i'm missing something it just sounded bloody awful.
Guy with the sp10 and the Hecos. sounded awful.
Nuforce and Chord: two examples of why class D and smps will be the death of us.

 

I like this cross - forum discussion.

SQ I really liked that Heco room, and the Coherent one too, but only on the Hi Def stuff. Fully respect your views on the BC front end but I am sure you would have noticed an improvement with the streaming. It just sounded so much more life like and I was sitting at the back of the room when that came on. It might not have alleviated all your concerns but hopefully some. Still, if you've heard a few of their demos and always thought the same it maybe wouldn't have mattered what front end was playing. Do you think it's the Focals? Tony did mention that some people find them (generically) a bit 'shouty'.

I suppose it goes to show that there is either a huge amount of horses for courses in these things or I'm cloth eared (quite possibly).

One of the reasons I wanted to go was to see how my thoughts on sound compared to others. There are certainly areas where my opinions differ from others but some where they match up exactly (see below).

It was quite illuminating for me and highlighted what some of my preferences are. I would certainly prefer blandness / politeness to spiky / over emphasised treble. It also showed that some sonic traits which are important to others just don't matter much to me.

The ABC audio guys were really friendly, they chatted about room treatment quite happily for 10 - 15 mins. Wanted to sit down in there but it was always busy. Sounded okay from the doorway.

The MBL room was impressive too. The sound was huge and really consistent across such a large room, one trick quite possibly, would have been nice to hear some real music instead of that awful awful over-produced 80's crap they had on when I visited. I'll bet they all listen to Hasselhof at home.

The chord room was truly awful; the Guru was really disappointing as I was expecting more from all the chat that there has been about them. I also though that the WAD room was a waste of time, normal speakers in massive space. A pity as I would really like to hear them in a proper setting.

 

Maybe they feared it would show some aspect in a poor light then. I was half expecting you to say leonard cohen or dj slipmat which i could have understood!

 

what speakers pathos used in their room?

 

Opera Callas Divina (?). They were certainly Opera Callas - but I disremember the actual model.

Sitting at the back of the room on Friday, it sounded excellent, sitting at the front on Saturday it was terrible. Friday was the only time I have enjoyed listening to Focals of any description. I normally find them brash and shouty.

 

I have just heard that ABC Audio won the 'room of the show' award, congratulations Mr Benge.

 

Yes, the ABC room by far the best sounding and the Absolute sound's Krell/ wilson.
Thumbs up Paul.

 

Coherent room, i was sat right at the front left, it was just a real mess acoustically, chnaging from hi to low res would have made no difference to it, shows are a cruel mistress.

Sp10 and puresound room, i was uber disappointed with that last year as well at Manchester.

i think for the most part though it really is horses for courses, you like what you like and gear either fits that or it doesn't. There are really relatively few just plain awful sounds.

Tom Tom and Chord seem to have been the worst this time round,

 

Did anyone take photos at the event?

 

I suspect SCIDB did, he normally does. If so, hopefully he'll post them here soon.

 

Hi Dev,

I'll put some on tomorrow.

SCIDB

 

The naim room was awful. Many of the rooms sounded generally quite shrill. The audiosmile and dartzeel rooms were among the best and the southsmith strain gauge dem was intriguing though it think it was ill served by the rather wearing klipsch speakers.

 

Went along early Sunday morn starting at the Renassaince. Audiofreaks may get a bad rap re attitude but at least they were out there making an effort to let us hear the things we only normally dream about. Good on them. The two dealers showing Avalons were very helpful and friendly, play a disk, no problem -while its quite. Both systems based around DCS players, Spectral amps with Indras and Karans with Ascendents and they sounded sounded good. Never liked the character of DCS based systems I've heard in the past and was pleasently surprised. The Audiofreaks rooms weren't so forthcoming though they did put on SRV Tin Pan Alley from a disc in thier pile. To hear it via the full Zanden, CJ ART2, Karan monos, Isis system was educational. A wonderful experience. Coming home though I'm surprised at how close the presentation from my system gets with this type of music!

Spent 2hrs 'over the road' which curtailed the time I had at the main show. £12 + £8 parking (both more expensive than last year) for 1/2 the show from last year. Bit rich I think... Would have liked to have met the guys at Audiosmile but they were very busy (hope it was successful for you) and I ran out of time to go back. Other highlights - the Dartzeel room, great sound in a tiny room and the Martin Logan presentation offered a totally different - presentation. The chap running it was dire and the music they chose to use was pretty limited in scope but the sound that eschewed was very natural. Had to sit in the right spot though. I was initially on the left and the music was lodged in the left hand speaker. Some guys left so I moved centre and the sound came together. Others of note - the MBLs sounded good all around the room and the Coherent system was the best I've heard from them at shows. Interestingly the SRV track was playing loudly in an empty Creek/Epos room while I was there. Shouty and ill defined... re the opposite comments of others in this thread about the last two rooms, I guess it sometimes depends on what they are playing and how they might alter the set up.

I guess it was worth it because I'd never normally have the opportunity to hear some of the kit I've mentioned and I'm pleased that judging by the highest standards my kit sounds pretty damn good to me!

Thumbs up to Audiofreaks though thumbs down I'm afraid for the Chester Group.

 

I've been reading various threads on the show, and opinion seems to be polarised - either liking the Tannoy/McIntosh room or the Wilson/Krell and MBL rooms. After a spell with the various Avalons, I attended a HiFi+ lecture on equipment supports and isolation, and then trudged over the road to MBL again and found the treble really prominent. Then my turn came for the Wilson demo which was topped off(!) with a version of Black Betty, a song I really like, which really made me clench up from the searing treble. I'm firmly in the Tannoy and Avalon camp now. Maybe in 10 years time my hearing will have declined at the top end and I'll appreciate a more prominent treble response, but at 56 I'm too young for such stuff...
Oh and congratulations to the Audiosmile lads – a Cyrus amp and dinky speakers that put most other rooms to shame.

 

What made the Audiosmile room sound so good was of course the exotic very expensive speaker cable.....I've got a job lot at bargain price of £5 a meter if anyone is interested ....

By the way, the real winners of the show are the Chester group. Imagine charging buyers and sellers to meet and getting away with it.

 

Went on Sunday, good to meet Simon and Rob in their demo room and SCIDB over lunch.

As someone else said, it's as interesting hearing people's often wildly differing opinions on the sounds as having heard them oneself, it enables calibration of opinion on the forum!

I enjoyed the high-res digital in the Coherent room, though I'm not a fan of the focals in general. The Dartzeel room, the McIntosh / Tannoys and the MBL's sounded good to me. The Audiosmile speakers looked and sounded good, though I think for me size matters in speakers.

Oh, and don't people's tastes in music differ! Dev commented about a room emptying with classic rock, and my Rhapsody in Blue was divisive too, but isn't the preferred simple vocal and guitar just useless for testing a system?

 

Thanks for the kind comments.
The whole idea of showcasing the speakers with a modest amp and cheap cable was to show that you needn't spend a fortune on these things and that the speakers will work very well with the sort of equipment many folk already own.
I'm still amazed that the little Cyrus 3 put in such a performance given that we absolutely caned it for several days.
We had a library of 700 Cds in lossless on the mac ready for streaming and invited anyone sitting for a listen to spin their own discs - went from string quartets to Elbow to NWA, so no cheating by sticking to plinky stuff or old Nora

Thanks to everyone who popped in and I'm sure Simon will be along shortly with loads of pics.

 

Indeed Rob, it was a pleasure to meet you and Simon.
The Kensai's acquitted themselves very well indeed. Thanks for letting me try different styles of music too. (Laurie Anderson, Nils Lofgren and Elbow)

Some of the other rooms with hugely expensive kit didn't come close to your setup.
I hope it was a good show for you.

 

Hi there,

Did anyone of you visit Creek and Epos room.
What was it like???

 

Hi, I posted this on PFM too.

I appreciate the positive comments, it makes it feel worth the hard work I have slept about 13 hours today and I think there is more to come, lol!

A special thanks of course to Rob who helped all 4 days of the weekend asking nothing at all in return!

A couple of friends, Howard and Jimbo, made a video about the show (and made me do an interview, ahh!). When time permits it will be on YouTube. Howard flew to Japan on Sunday to launch his new album so it may be a little while before he can do the video.

Here are the photos I took. I got most of the way from my room down the main corridor but didn't do the whole show.

http://simon-someone.magix.net/
Select 'Audio&AV Show' from the left menu. High quality pics here if anyone wants them.