HE2004 East
The Home Entertainment Show once
again returned to Manhattan's Hilton Hotel & Towers on Sixth Avenue, and it felt like
a homecoming. It's the third time the HE extravaganza has used the Hilton, and the show,
the hotel, and all of us audiophiles seem to have developed effective survival strategies.
Maybe I'm just a Pollyanna, but I thought it went about as smoothly as a big show could.
I was disappointed, however, in the decision this year to
forgo the musical component of past shows. There was a big concert on Friday night, of
course, featuring Joan Osborne, Tom Scott and the New York All Stars, Carla Lother, and
Nicole Henry, but the parts of the show I'd always loved best were the small musical
events that went on throughout the three days open to the public. They gave us all time to
sit and hear the real thing, to decompress, to meet our friends, and to recharge our
batteries before re-entering the fray.
I suppose that the loss of these musical events is just
part of the process of shifting the focus of the show away from its roots as "the Stereophile
show" and closer to its broader mission of representing Stereophile, Stereophile
Ultimate AV, Home Theater, Connected, Photographic, eDigital
Photo, Shutterbug, Home Toys, and Best Stuff. But the
mini-concerts were always so homey and pleasant. I missed them -- and so did most of the
people I spoke to in the halls.
We weren't completely without musical choices, however.
There were jazz and blues "lunches" featuring the Mario Rodriguez Group and
Honeyboy Edwards, as well as a wonderful evening harpsichord recital of J.S. Bach’s Goldberg
Variations. I hope these become the foundation of a new set of traditions.
Vinh Vu
Robin Wyatt
Omega Grande 8
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Another high point was Glacier Audio's presentation of
master bassist Abraham Laboriel and his keyboard accompanist, Ron Feuer, who alternated
with prerecorded presentations played through Atma-Sphere MA-2 Mk II.3 monoblock tube amps
($33,000/pair) and Gilmore Audio Model 2 planar speakers ($19,500). (Unless otherwise
noted, all prices are in US dollars, and all speaker prices are per pair.) Few systems
could have done justice to Laboriel's snapping, popping, plucking, and sliding, but the
rig in Glacier's room did him proud -- and it sounded pretty darn good on prerecorded
music, too.
There were lots of good-sounding rooms at HE2004 East, but
I'll just focus on my top five. These all had that extra something that made me want to
camp out in the sweet spot, spin yarns, listen to good music, and bask in that indefinable
essence de audiophile you get only in the presence of true believers.
Room 731
Nowhere at HE2004E did I find more of that essence than in
Room 731, where Robyatt Audio, Tektron, Omega, Wilson Benesch, Audio Zone, and Gingko
Audio managed to jam about eight quarts of essence into a pint jar. I’d heard that
Gingko's Vinh Vu had a compelling real-time computer analysis of his Cloud 10
vibration-control platform, so I made a mental note to find him before the end of the
show. Imagine my surprise when I discovered his demo was across the hall from my hotel
room!
Using a pair of identical CD players (one mounted on a
Cloud 10, one not) and two tape accelerometers, Vu displayed the difference in measured
resonance between the two. It wasn't subtle. I'm arranging to try some of these affordable
platforms in order to see how audible the differences are. I'm betting the answer is plenty.
No sooner had Vu finished (well, maybe a little
sooner) than Robin Wyatt, a whirling dervish of audio enthusiasm, went into full demo
mode, showing off his nifty little Tektron TK2A3/50S-I integrated amp ($1779 plus tubes),
which accommodates a wide range of output tubes. Here's the wild part: Wyatt was plugging
and unplugging tubes in mid-demo without switching the TK2A3/50S-I on and off. Don't like
the way the amp sounds? Just change the tubes, from 2A3s to 45s to 50s or 300Bs -- no
muss, no fuss, no waiting.
Wyatt was playing the Tektron through a pair of Omega
Grande 8 speakers ($999), which use the paper-cone Fostex driver. The Grande 8s sounded
mighty good, considering they were being driven by all of a watt and a half.
Also on display in Room 731 was the Audio Zone AMP-1
($1995), unabashedly based on 47 Lab’s GainCard. It was silent while I was in the
room, so I can't report on how it sounded, but it sure was pretty.
The best thing about Room 731 wasn't the sound, though that
was pretty good. It was the excitement. Messrs. Vu and Wyatt & Co. were almost
levitating with their love of hi-fi. Wyatt jumped from demo disc to demo disc with such
enthusiasm that I expected to be knee-deep in discards before he was through. It seemed
strangely familiar, until I recognized that it reminded me of me -- only more fun.
Portal Audio
Portal Audio's room, on the sixth floor, was a lot calmer,
but it had a heaping helping of that music-loving attitude, thanks to Portal's Joe Abrams
and Penaudio's Sami Pinttila, who were rocking the house with Portal's new Paladin
monoblocks ($3500/pair) and Sami's Charisma/Chara speaker system ($5545).
 The Chara subwoofer now sports a new laminated plywood veneer, laser-cut from
huge blocks of birch ply constructed from laminated sheets -- devilishly complex to do
with this level of fit'n'finish. I think it's bee-you-ti-ful -- and it's nice that the
Chara now matches the Charisma.
The fully balanced Paladin puts out 200W of high-bias
class-A/AB power. That's at 8 ohms -- the output doubles into 4 ohms. The amp takes both
single-ended and balanced inputs and boasts selectable input impedance, so it will match
tube and solid-state preamps. Other highlights include 16 high-speed, high-current bipolar
output transistors per chassis, an 800VAC toroidal power supply, and 96,000µF of filter
capacitance. Abrams says the Paladin is the brainchild of a very reputable audio designer,
but he wasn't naming names.
I dropped by Portal's room at least once each day -- it was
my substitute for the MIA concerts. There was always something tasty playing on the
system, but my favorite was the day Abrams played "Telephone Road," from Rodney
Crowell's The Houston Kid [Sugar Hill SHD1065 CD]. It thumped along like a
centipede doing wind sprints -- full of relentless drive and breakneck momentum. It gave
me the strength to brave the crowds and audiophile-approved demo discs in the other rooms.
Simaudio and DeVore Fidelity
I didn't need any Dutch courage for the fourth-floor room
shared by DeVore Fidelity and Simaudio, however. This was another oasis of musical sanity,
playing real music at sane volumes. Simaudio premiered its Moon P-5 LE preamp ($5200),
Moon W-5 LE power amp ($6000), and Moon Eclipse LE CD player ($7200), while John DeVore
brought along production samples of his handsome fiddlebacked Silverback speaker, in
anigre wood ($14,000). The Silverback employs a pair of opposing, side-firing 8"
woofers and a 0.75" silk-dome tweeter mounted under a custom 6" midrange
driver. The Silverback's secret is a filter DeVore calls the Suspended Vibration Damped
X-over (DeF SVDX), which encapsulates the crossover components in Vibraflex to damp coil,
resistor, and capacitor resonance.
The DeVore-Simaudio room was a big 'un, and those are
always crapshoots at audio shows (not that small rooms are a sure thing). However, the
gamble paid off big-time in this instance -- the system sounded crisp, lifelike, and
emotionally satisfying. Was it the electronics or the speakers?
 Both, obviously. But beyond the
system’s sheer sound, there was a profound truth to its presentation of the
musical message. The DeVore-Simaudio system made me care about the music as a form of
communication, not just as a series of tones. That's what music is about, and what hi-fi
is supposed to be about. It's always nice to be reminded of that.
Tetra
Some people don't need to be reminded of that. Tetra, which
bills itself as "the best of both worlds," seems to be run by guys who hold it
to be self-evident. Adrian Butts, who designs the Tetra speakers, and Wayne Prince, who
builds 'em, went all out when they made the 505LTD ($8000).
The 505LTD is built around an 8" Morel NeoLin woofer
and a 1" Scan-Speak treated-fabric tweeter coupled to a minimalist, hardwired,
12dB/octave crossover incorporating Châteauroux Polypropylene Solen Fast Caps and
Hepta-Litz Air-Cored inductors. The Tetra 505LTD doesn't look like a conventional
loudspeaker, and it sure didn't sound like one.
At first glimpse, the pyramidal 505LTD looks almost goofy
atop its integral stand, but once I’d heard it, all reservations disappeared -- which
was especially impressive when I considered that the Tetra was powered by the 18Wpc
Birdland Audio Pleyel-Ag stereo amp, augmented by the Odéon-Ag 24-bit/192kHz upsampling
DAC (driven by an EAD CD player’s digital output). The system sounded meaty, beaty,
big, and bouncy -- thanks to the 505LTD's 91dB sensitivity. It also sounded immediate and
present -- about as lively and vivid as any of the big-bucks systems I heard at HE2004E.
Heck, better than most of 'em.
You've got to love it when a dreamer makes good -- and I
suspect that's exactly what Tetra and Adrian Butts are going to do. Watch -- no, listen
for 'em.
 Manley Labs and Joseph Audio
As has become tradition, the Manley-Joseph demo was a hoot
and a half. Part of that is due to Jeff Joseph's showmanship -- he always gives great demo
-- but the Joseph-Manley rigs also produce wonderful sound using real music.
This year, Joseph pulled a real Wizard of Oz. After his
demo, he pulled aside the curtains behind his new RM55 speakers ($12,000), which we
thought we’d been listening to, to reveal that the sound was actually coming from his
Insider in-wall model ($1995), driven by EveAnna Manley's nifty little Stingray integrated
amp ($2250).
Now, any true audiophile knows that in-walls can't sound
very good. Most can even cite chapter and verse as to why this is so. But consider this:
The really big problem with most in-walls is that they have to be mounted high on the
wall. Between the poor off-axis response and tweeter/woofer cancellations, they produce
hollow, unfocused sound. The Insider, thanks to its infinite-slope crossover, reduces
driver cancellation and delivers excellent off-axis response, eliminating the biggest
shortcomings of conventional in-walls. The gasps of disbelief when Jeff Joseph revealed
the source of his demo's sound proved how effectively the Insider counters conventional
wisdom.
And that's entertainment.
...Wes Phillips
wes@onhifi.com
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