Thread: Just returned from the S.H.O.W.

I went to the show in LA. We stopped at Shelley's audio on the way and I ended up purchasing a Woo WA22 as my end game headphone amp! The two guys from our audio club and I stayed up late last night having a great time BSing and listening to my Abyss headphones through the amp in my room.

The show, while pretty small, was a lot of fun. Of course Sunny's Components had an over the top system there featuring CH Precision and some newly released over the top Swiss speakers. However, we all agreed that it was not the best room of the show. Alsyvox speakers won best of show in our view!

Anyway, it was a fairly small show but it was a ton of fun.

You lucky bastard . With the external crossover only. Holy shit... they are the best speakers I have ever heard. Totally blown away. I let Ken know that all three of us felt his room was the best of the show, even better than Sunny Components $1.5 million system!

Honestly, congratulations! These are 100% my dream speakers.

Was it small with regards to the # of exhibitors, # of visitors or both ?

I'm still pondering about the feasibility of our Warsaw Show in November, as vaccinated only event.

Congratulations Randy!

That must have been a awesome time.

It was small in that there was a limited number of venders. I don't know the exact count but only three floors were used when several more than that were originally planned two years ago. Attendance seemed decent with masks required at all times, etc.

Although a lot of the big names were not there, some very good ones were present. The bottom line is it was fun to see some good gear and hang with friends for the weekend!

Congrats on the new headphone amp Randy. They make great products.


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Randy enjoy the Wa22, nice unit.

For whatever reason, I didn't care for the Alsyvox at RMAF 2019. I'll have to give them another listen at this year's RMAF, which I am definitely attending.

I am sure it is a personal preference, and I would think a general liking of a panel type speaker would probably be important. I would also assume setup and equipment used would have to be factored in. He was using an amazing top end Kuzma table, etc., with them. However, to me these are about the finniest I've heard and sounded better than Sunny's amazing setup!

I enjoyed the Alsyvox for 30-45 minutes at THE Show. It doesn't sound quite like a magneplanar and the dealer said its more like the old Apogees but efficient. They were played on Vitus front end. It was big, rich and much more real than a 3.7 with a better soundstage. But at $92k for the medium version including the external crossover, it's a tough sell in the US. The frame does seem much more impressive than Maggie types.

Dynamics are much better than Maggies, but still not quite at cone and dome level. with Maggies that always bothered me, these not so much. I wish there was more richness on certain sounds, but likely that was just system related.

other than that, the Wilson Benesch and Spatial rooms had good sound. I'm sure folks will be talking about the bending wave speaker that looks right out of the 50s. To me though, the drivers didn't integrate well with the bass and the timbre was different.

the big $150k Stenheim was impossible to judge as the room was poor and sound bleed occurring regularly from the ATC room next door (only is a room divider, not a wall). it didn't seem to scale as big as it looked from my seat, but the boomy bass was too distracting anyways to learn what it should sound like. unfortunately they only had 30 minute demos with a lot of talking.

Agreed on pretty much all. I also liked the Wilson Benesch although one of my buddies did not. I thought the wave speakers were a joke... didn't like them at all.

The Stenheim sounded wonderful in the mid range and high frequencies but the bass was indeed quite boomy... it almost seemed like the bass was bottoming out the drivers to me.

The CH precession gear is definitely exceptional and the Wadax pieces were simply out of this world!

So great pieces but the over all affect of the room was not the best at the show in my view.

Originally Posted by KeithR

I enjoyed the Alsyvox for 30-45 minutes at THE Show. It doesn't sound quite like a magneplanar and the dealer said its more like the old Apogees but efficient. They were played on Vitus front end. It was big, rich and much more real than a 3.7 with a better soundstage. But at $92k for the medium version including the external crossover, it's a tough sell in the US. The frame does seem much more impressive than Maggie types.

Dynamics are much better than Maggies, but still not quite at cone and dome level. with Maggies that always bothered me, these not so much. I wish there was more richness on certain sounds, but likely that was just system related.

Hey Keith, to my knowledge the Alsyvox dealer in NYC sold 10+ pair of Alsyvox last year, so while expensive (isn't everything these days) they're not out of line with other top tier brands. The "medium" version 'Botticelli' is the most popular model ($92k, optional external crossover $30k). The large multi-panel models only for those with really big rooms. The smaller 'Tintoretto' ($71k) is great for small-ish rooms up to ~500sq ft. Compared to a Maggie, the Botticelli with their steel frame weigh in at 255lbs/channel & are 94db efficient. They were developed using a 30w tube amp. And... they do bass down to 22hz without sub-woofer.

Great to hear y'alls comments. I just received notice my own pair of Botticelli X are ready for pickup in Spain

That is awesome! Your "showroom" is in the bay area, correct? We have been telling one of our buddies about them. He has one of the MBL models... not sure number but I think the same as Mike's . Maybe we can arrange for a few of us to journey your way sometime after you are up and running .

Ah... got ya... so probably a bit far for a day visit for us from the central coast of Cali

Originally Posted by Pearce Harrison

I was there on Sunday and the Alsyvox room was well attended. I found the Vitus gear to be too bright for my liking and the speakers were being pushed too hard. The room was also very dark and so it was pretty much impossible to really see what the speakers were like. One could hear the potential in the speakers, but not a great match up with the Vitus gear.
Like you said, the Stenheims' were quite boomy and they were also being played too loud. The net result was a room interaction that really was unpleasant. The bleed through was also annoying.
I thought the room with the Wilson Benesch's was probably the best sound at the show.

Hi Pearce, thank you for stopping by the Cake Audio room. Regarding the dimly lit room, the hotel lighting had a bad ballast that was making a terrible loud buzzing sound when the lights were turned up. I tried to get engineering to fix it - but there was no time. At the last minute I got ahold of some battery powered spot lights - but they were not strong enough to do much good. I had to decide between good lighting, or good sound. I chose good sound.

A big thank you to everyone who came to the show! To anyone interested, I have the Botticelli X's setup and available for private listening in San Clemente CA.

Ken Boyce
Cake Audio

Hey Ken,

It was an awesome room. Us three from the Central Coast Audio Club absolutely loved it! I felt it was the best room at the show!

Originally Posted by Randy Myers

Hey Ken,

It was an awesome room. Us three from the Central Coast Audio Club absolutely loved it! I felt it was the best room at the show!

Thank you Randy! Hearing this and seeing peoples reaction in the room when they heard the system, makes all the hard work worth it...