Manchester show

Ill be going on Sunday, well have to meet up.

 

I do believe a lot of rooms will be empty

 

Hi W-M,

So who's cried off?

All the manufacturers associated with AudioWorks are on board, namely Creek/Epos, RT Services (Accuphase/Spectral/Nagra/Orpheus) have 3 rooms, Henley Designs (Roksan/Pro-Ject), Sugden, Focal.JM Lab, Loewe (TVs), Philips (projectors), Quadraspire, Harman/Kardon, dCS, Monitor Audio, off the top of my head.

Has someone read the menu and decided that the kitchen is going to get too hot?

The chaos starts tomorrow with boxing up the kit!

Cheers,

Ed.

 

Hi Ed, so how many rooms are actually going to be occupied ?, the list below is about 8-12 rooms max, could you publish a 100% confirmed will be there list please mate cheers Wm

 

Hi W-M,

Well there are 4 dealers helping with the organisation, AudioWorks, Acoustica, Doug Brady, Sevenoaks. Each of us is twisting arms that we can twist (e.g. we don't have a lot of leverage in Salisbury these days (!), but Acoustica & Brady's do, but we can get, for example, dCS to come along. I think that all our suppliers except TEAC & Tivoli will be there in one form or another.

I don't know how the other dealers are faring, but I'm certainly expecting Naim, Rega, Arcam to be there along with quite a large array of smaller esoteric manufacturers and accessory suppliers. There will also be stalls selling vinyl and CDs.

It should be good!

Ed.

 

What makes you say this Wm.

 

Possibly due to the close proximity of the Bristol showcase, and over exhuberant booking of hotel facilities nothing more really Gazz

 

I wasnt taking the mic mate.

Dali have made some of the best speakers out there IMO.

Theres one pair they made a few years back, that are about the best Ive ever heard, ever.

I keep the model to myself though, because when they become available cheap one day, I want them!!



Chris

 

I was only joking Bottleneck

I heard some Dali speakers at a show in Manchester about 2 years ago, i to was really impressed. The rep said it took him a long time to set them up, and if a costumer wanted them part of the price was for Dali to send somebody out to set them up. Oh they cost £4000

 

From Denmark!?!?!?! 3,500 for the speaker, 500 for the factory engineer!!

NB
They arent just for costumers, but theatrical dressmakers, sewing and repairmen/women and in fact customers at large!

 

Probably

 

Who else is going Sunday?

 

Just noticed the joke, god i'm slow

 

I went to the show today. It was a little high end of me but it was good. The accustics were much better than the Practical HIFI show in October 2003. For some strange reason I walked away very impressed with the NAIM system they were playing.

Just one annoying niggle the lifts were very busy and there didn't seem to be any stairs anywhere. Also there were not as many rooms in use and the guide says.

The Henley Designs demo was very good, they had an RPM6 on demo and it blew me away.

I went today simply because there is more buses so it was easier to get and get back.

 

Hi,

I will be there today. Setting off in bit. I can meet up with anyone. I'll be in the bar around 1.00pm. Can't miss me. I'll be wearing a bright orange jacket & carrying funky record bag. I'll try & meet up with Hex Spurt for a drink.

SCIDB

 

Show Report.

This is a copy of what I've put on the Naim Forum:

I was there yesterday, and it was a change to actually hear some good sounds in a HiFi show for a change.

There was lots of Accuphase stuff and loads of JM Lab's speakers, due in a large part I think to Audioworks providing much of the kit.

One thing that did strike me though was how material dependent much of the demo's were. When I first ventured into the Naim room having come from the Chord room the first impression was how flat and lifeless the sound was, compaired to the 3D dynamics heard there, the Naim system was something of a shock (in a bad way). However when the CD was changed (to the 'eels' I think, don't know what the initial CD was) suddenly the system had life, dynamics, focus and soundstage (though not in the same ballpark as the Chord stuff soundstage wise). The inital Naim system I had been listening to was bare CDX2 82 250 SL2 (the Chord system was £30,000 +), then the XPS was added and things really started to make sense. Anyway enough on Naim 'cos we've all heard it.


More on Chord - The demo here was trying to dem different Nordost cables, but what struck me (as well as the massive soundstage) was how dymanic the sound was, I had the impression that Chord stuff was somewhat polite and dull from previous dem's but this certainly wasn't (again could have been the material)

Best sound at the show or me was the Audiocraft room where they were deming a Lindermans? CD player (I know it's a wine but I think what's what it was, I'd never heard of them), Laverdin amps and some cheap(ish) (£800) B+W speakers. These are valve amps in normal looking cases, the material was what you would expect for this type of equipment (no heavy rock or Dub or example) but the mid range was quite stunning, voices, sax etc were amazing.

Also some good sounds from some Huge Dali Speakers, 9ft tall 12 drive units + muliple ribbon tweeters, driven by a £2000 turntable (can't remember the name) with a simple looking parallel tracking tonarm (rather than the crane contraption you often see) and some massive Komato? amps (I should write some of these names down)

Also good sounds from a room showing one of the expensive JM labs speakers, driven by Dcs CD player and Spectral amps.


What didn't do it for me.

None of the Accuphase stuff really floated my boat. None of the AV demo's had much of a decent sound. Most of the lower end manufacturers (Rega, Arcam, etc) sounded just that.
The Sugden stuff mentined above was a bit dull for me.

Overall not a bad show.

Main disappointment was there was no Naim AV setup, which I'd of liked to hear.

 

I second the comments about the sounds being pretty good - I would add that the better sounds were in the bigger rooms (natch) so some of the better equipment on floors 2 and 4 were sounding shite.

I really liked the Vienna Acoustics Strauss - sounded very good considering the Roksan equipment. The TT was far better than the CD in this demo.

Audiocraft was very good, although they had some serious electronics driving the Amphion spkrs. As these rooms were very close to each other it was interesting to hear two very differeant approaches, both sounding good.

I always enjoy the Wilson Benesch rooms at these shows (they always get a BIG room!) but at this one I wasnt that impressed. Maybe it was the very plinky plinky old man jazz trumpet that was playing - not my bag baby.

I really liked the SIM2 stuff - but then I am amere novice on AV.

cheers //lamboy

 

Hi,


Made the show on Sunday. Took an hour to get from the land of the Human League to the Radisson SAS. at Manchester Airport.

I must admit, there weren't any signs for the show but it was easy to get to. I managed to get into the free car park which was on the first turn off the roundabout that was in front of the Hotel.

The hotel is bigger than the Hilton, where the show was last time. There were a far few rooms. But it does seem exhibitors than last time. There was was a lot of expensive stuff.


There were, too my ears, some very good sounds.

I liked the Midlandaudiox-change/RT room with the Nagra power amps Acuphase cd player & VPI record player. This was very enjoyable to listen to. This was the best sound of the show. I dig those Valve power amps. As they were 50 watts per channel monoblocks, they did heat the room well.

I also liked the Audionote room with the TT1 , M2 pre & P2 amps with some Audionote Es speakers. This performed quite well. There were levels of colouration but it wasn't off puttting as the music flowed along.

The Pear audio room was another good one. Those weird looking Shaninian speakers, the funky looking Well tempered turntable. Produce good music. On the whole, it was sounding right. But I did get the impression that it could do better.

The HiFI + dem was to show the effects of a super tweeter & sub woofer to a hifi system. These did give a good overall improvement to the sound. I liked it. It made the music more enjoyable. The kit they were using wasn't cheap. The supertweeters cost £800, the sub £4000, the turntable (Blue pearl JEM) £48000, Cartridge (Lyra Titan) £2995, SACD player (Krell) £4250.

Add to that the cost of the Tom Evans Groove & Vibe pre amps, Rogue Audio M150 monoblocks & Amphion Krypton loudspeakers. Add to all this, the Voodoo Isolation stand, Nordost Valhalla interconnects, speaker cables and power cable and you are looking at near £100,000. eek: I did like the sound, it was top notch but I do think you can get better for less.

'A' Audiosolutions has some massive Dali speakers which were like skyscrapers. They use a Opus 3 deck with a Cartridgeman cartridge & some Korato amps. It was quite pleasant but the sound to my ears showed it needed a better front end. It wasn't awful but it should have been better. I think the speakers were over £20000.

Popped into the Avondale room for a very short while but there were some good sounds to be heard.

Didn't think much of the Chord room. The Naim room was alright.

Heard the new Quadraspire equipment stand in acrylic. I wasn't fully convinced that there was a big improvement everytime they went from the normal stand to the reference stand. There were differences yes but not always improvements.

There was a lot of Accuphase, DCS, JM labs & Spectral amps which on the whole sounded alright but expected better from some of it.


I didn't get to meet Hex (Chris) so maybe next time. I did meet Chris Gally & Kasperoff for a drink. The funky record bag trick worked.

All the people I asked played my records & cds. The main ones were

Showdown - Albert Collins, Johnny Copeland & Robert Cray LP

Joss Stone - Soul Sessions CD.

I picked up some vinyl from Diverse before I headed home.

Not too bad a day out, look forward to next years show.

SCIDB

 

Dean, what VPI were they using? And could you give us some info on the speakers? I must admit, the Nagra gear sounds lovely to my ears, heard the monos powering some Quad 989's and it was quite delightful!

 

First of all Sunday morning it was a mad rush, as the wind had blown the roof off my shed. I forgot to take some cd's with me. Getting into the show with my head still in bits I walked straight into the Harman Karman room and asked the rep are you Hex Spurt, he looked at me as if I should have been taken away to the nearest mental hospital. 'No he replied we are showing Harman Karman and Infinity speakers, maybe they sell them somewhere else'. It wasn't till this minute I realised what an idiot I must of look and quickery left the room.

I went for a cup of coffee and then met Hex Spurt, ED, spoke for a couple of minutes. It was a very enjoyable day, with lots to see. The Naim rooms, sounded awful to me, didn't impress me. Doug Brady was they're, playing a Krell CD player plus amp; the salesman must of thought he was in the NEC at Birmingham.

Did anybody hear the DCS into the Focal JM lab (next to the HIFi+ room)? The DCS room upstairs was ruined because all I could hear was the ARCAM room bass banging away. The Accuphase SACD CD demo was interesting. RT were demoing an Accupase, Nagra, Spectral (can't remember the speakers) and RT were keen to answer questions. Sugden was ok. I thought about buying the big Dali speakers but I hadn't taken a HGV with me to pick them up.

Pearl audio was nice. I spent about ½ hour in the SIM2 projector room very good. Shame I didn't meet other forum members maybe next time.