My Axpona 2022 Impressions

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Mr Peabody

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I did make it, rode with a friend and a friend of his, I realize this morning I have been hanging out with Al Rainbow, who is acool guy but don't tell him I said that. I saw a lot of good rooms and heard some surprises, I'm sure I will forget something.

I just can't pick a single best of show but I will start wih the system I most wish I could bring home. It was Nagra with Stenheim speakers. I found it totally effortless, open and transparent, quick with nice frequency balance. My friends liked other stuff better, there were certainly larger mor expensive but I found I really enjoyed what that system was doing.

MBL, never disappoints.

VAC driving Acora knocked my socks off. Those Acora speakers ar incredible and by comparison a bargain at $37k. The JW Acoustics analog rig so impressive. The new Lampi DAC was in this room, it sounded great but I found myself preferring the JWA set up more than any other source in the room. Someone told me the VAC monoblocks were $150k, the Acora were right at home with that.

I love the ARC/Wilson combo, that was another high ranking room for me.

One of my surprises, Marten speakers had one of there small sets there, Parker, something. Driven by Ayre this was a very pleasing system. I had heard a large set of Marten before and came away with a not so good impression. Shows if hearing something once at a show and it doesn't sound right, don't just write them off.

As another example, a excellent room was YG driven by AudioNet, the Humboldt I believe. My first time hearing anything AudioNet and I thought it was very good and further boasted my opinion of YG, great synergy with this pairing. While talking YG their powered speaker called Live I liked a lot, excellent bass response with good detail and control.

I heard the new Confidence 60's which are now the Dyn Flagship at $50k according to the rep there. Driven by Octave Audio made a good sounding system.

I had an interesting encounter with Modwright who I have never heard before. A room had Modwright's hybrid integrated amp driving a set of Revel 328b. I have heard this speaker a few times with some good electronics but they have never sounded as impressive as driven by that Modwright. So then I wander into another room later and the same Modwright integrated is driving a set of the new KEFRef 3 Meta, that Meta version is certainly an improvement over the former version that already sounded good.

I also finally got to hear Luxman who was driving the Magico M6. You guys know I'm a Magico fan, this just didn't sound like a good combo to me, not bad just maybe not so good of a match.

Another Magico room was A5's driven by Constellation who I have been also really wanting to hear. Constellation was the Taurus power amp. The sound of this system was good but I found I didn't enjoy the sound as much as I was hoping.

Boulder was paired with Sonus Faber, I'm not a big SF fan but the Boulder had them sounding better than I've previously heard them sound.

Krell was showing a new amp, a KSA something but still using the XD technology, nothing like the Prior KSA amps although they are trying to remind people who the company was . One of those moments where you are listening to the sound wile someone describe's it and you ask yourself, is he talking about the same thing I'm hearing. Don't get me wrong, the amp is good, doubles down to 2 ohms and fully stable into 1 ohm is what we are told. The sound is Krell, just not like former KSA, which some may feel a good thing.

Most rooms were spinning vinyl, analog was out in force. Of course, most had some form of streaming as an alternative for anyone asking.

Bending Wave had the Wadax streaming system and Gobel speakers and I'm pretty sure CHP electronics. This is an incredible system, I did feel it suffered some gymnasium effects from the large room. Like being at a live concert.

Saturdayaround 6 an the show was closing, I began to hear Volbeat playing at a loud volume, so naturally I gravitate that way, listen to the rest of the song and most of a song by Ghost. This room was rocking out using Paradigm Founder128 speakers driven by Anthem separates. It did play loud, thunderous bass, I do think the amp may have been straining or it may have just been way to loud for that size room. I think the latter though as most of the higher end systemskept better composure at high volumes but I don't remember any others reaching quite that high of SPL.
 
I like that Axpona provides evening concerts. I wanted to see both but it wasn't in the cards for Friday. I did see Lori Leberman Saturday, hope I spelled her name correctly. I wasn't familiar with her but it was a nice show.
 
Brian, I heard the Burmister briefly, as a system it struck me as very neutral, along the lines of Krell and the like. Didn't get a feel of just the speakers.

RDS, the Stenheim were 3's and the Nagra power amp was the Classic, not sure what else. Not being able to see the system I rely on who I'm with or ask questions from the person running the rooms, some are helpful and some just give a short answer. That system was my taste in sound though.
 
Mr Peabody said:
...Most rooms were spinning vinyl, analog was out in force. Of course, most had some form of streaming as an alternative for anyone asking...
Click to expand...

An interesting observation. Here are excerpts from a couple of posts on another forum (the poster is also a member here)

"I did notice that the number of turntables decreased from 2019 by a good amount. Rooms are much more dependent on digital streaming than ever before."

"On the other hand, rooms which used even modest turntables had a much better chance of producing pleasing sound. Others may disagree but a $1000 turntable is likely going to sound better than a laptop-based digital music server with a $2000 DAC. That’s been my experience at shows and has also been my experience in my own personal journey."
 
Maybe others who went can give their opinion but the majority of rooms I visited were playing vinyl. Most had the option of doing both but I got no impression analog was less prominent. Qobuz was around promoting their service. As I stated a couple rooms even played R2R while I was present, this has never happened for me before. Maybe that person is selling an agenda but I disagree, not my experience.


rbbert said:
An interesting observation. Here are excerpts from a couple of posts on another forum (the poster is also a member here)

"I did notice that the number of turntables decreased from 2019 by a good amount. Rooms are much more dependent on digital streaming than ever before."

"On the other hand, rooms which used even modest turntables had a much better chance of producing pleasing sound. Others may disagree but a $1000 turntable is likely going to sound better than a laptop-based digital music server with a $2000 DAC. That’s been my experience

at shows and has also been my experience in my own personal journey."
Click to expand...
 
Mr Peabody said:
Maybe others who went can give their opinion but the majority of rooms I visited were playing vinyl. Most had the option of doing both but I got no impression analog was less prominent. Qobuz was around promoting their service. As I stated a couple rooms even played R2R while I was present, this has never happened for me before. Maybe that person is selling an agenda but I disagree, not my experience.
Click to expand...

That was my quote on another board and I can assure you that I am not selling any agenda.

I have attended that the last 6 Axponas with the same person and we both commented to each other that the number of rooms playing LPs was way down. We didn’t do a tally but that was our impression. Most of the big rooms on 1 and 2 had turntables but they always do. The smaller rooms on floor 3 and above seemed to be much more dependent on streaming digital.

Regarding reel to reel, I have brought a mix tape for the past 4 Axponas and was able to play it (again) in 2 different rooms.

Not trying to argue here; just providing my experience.
 
Mr Peabody said:
Maybe others who went can give their opinion but the majority of rooms I visited were playing vinyl. Most had the option of doing both but I got no impression analog was less prominent. Qobuz was around promoting their service. As I stated a couple rooms even played R2R while I was present, this has never happened for me before. Maybe that person is selling an agenda but I disagree, not my experience.
Click to expand...

I said out loud as I was wrapping up the show that my observation was that digital (mostly Qobuz I believe) totally dominated. The friend I was attending with agreed. We certainly did hear vinyl and tape during the course of our two days, but I would estimate that 80% of what we heard was digital.
 
MPW said:
I said out loud as I was wrapping up the show that my observation was that digital (mostly Qobuz I believe) totally dominated. The friend I was attending with agreed. We certainly did hear vinyl and tape during the course of our two days, but I would estimate that 80% of what we heard was digital.
Click to expand...

I’d say this was true at Florida Expo also.
 
One of my favorite things about shows like AXPONA is the chance to meet the designers/owners/principals/dealers who are in the rooms with their products. Folks like Jeff Joseph of Joseph Audio, the Margules family, Bruce Jacobs, the designer of the Bayz speakers and many others. To me, the people behind the products influence my buying decisions as much as the products themselves, and its good to get to meet and know them.

The overall attitude in all of the rooms was positive and everyone was putting out a great effort.

Some of the rooms (not yet mentioned) that impressed me, and of course YEMV (Your Ears May Vary):

- Scaena speakers fed by DCS electronics and custom amps
- TAD Evolution 2 speakers fed by T+A HV amp and digital pre-amp with Wolf server
- Valorem speakers fed by Jadis electronics. A small standmount speaker handmade to order in Addison, Illinois. $8500. The owner/designer was great to talk with.
- Vimberg Mino speakers fed by Karan electronics, Taiko Extreme and Crystal Connect cables
- Muraudio speakers fed by a Hegel receiver
- The Borreson rooms (with the 02 floorstanders and the 01 standmounts)
- Cube Audio speakers driven by a custom, one-off Nelson Pass amp
- Bayz Courant speakers driven by Pilium and Esoteric
- Heretic speakers driven by Lab12 electronics. These unique speakers (they look like the monitors a band has at the front of the stage) had a sound that grew on you. Designer from Montreal was a nice guy.
- Atohm speakers driven by Atoll electronics
- From a budget perspective, a lot has been said about the Polk/Denon combo. From my standpoint, the orange-grilled JBL bookshelf speakers provided big sound for reasonable dollars

So, it's your final day, last couple hours. You've seen all the rooms. What to do? I revisited those rooms where I just wanted to sit back, relax and dig the music. I guess those are my Top 3:
- Marten Parker speakers powered by Ayre Electronics. I sat behind Ken Micallef, who writes for Absolute Sound, earlier in the day and listened to Marvin Gaye's "What's Going On" and was transported (a word I don't use easily). He wrote about it in his online post of the room on their website. I had to go back and listen to more.
- Joseph Audio Pearl Graphene speakers powered by Doshi Electronics with J. Sikori turntable. Jeff Joseph was in the room to discuss his speakers. A record producer was in the room to discuss the music from his record label that he produced and which was playing. A great experience, and the sound was solid and engaging.
- Vivid Audio Giya speakers powered by JMF and Ideon electronics. I only left this room because I knew I wanted to see my other top 3 before the show ended. Probably my top pick.

All told, a fun show. A good crowd, but not too crowded. Looking forward to next year.
 
ptman said:
One of my favorite things about shows like AXPONA is the chance to meet the designers/owners/principals/dealers who are in the rooms with their products. Folks like Jeff Joseph of Joseph Audio, the Margules family, Bruce Jacobs, the designer of the Bayz speakers and many others. To me, the people behind the products influence my buying decisions as much as the products themselves, and its good to get to meet and know them.

> I agree, I've met several there I wouldn't have other wise, Beno from Gamuet who was interesting to visit with, Richard Schram, Sutherland, Jeff Rowland, to drop a few names, LOL

The overall attitude in all of the rooms was positive and everyone was putting out a great effort.

Some of the rooms (not yet mentioned) that impressed me, and of course YEMV (Your Ears May Vary):

- Scaena speakers fed by DCS electronics and custom amps

> I did hear this room. They ar usually there. I liked them best with thePS Audio gear, BHK, I think that's the initials. Prior show.
- TAD Evolution 2 speakers fed by T+A HV amp and digital pre-amp with Wolf server
- Valorem speakers fed by Jadis electronics. A small standmount speaker handmade to order in Addison, Illinois. $8500. The owner/designer was great to talk with.

> I wish I caught this, I'm a Jadis fan.
- Vimberg Mino speakers fed by Karan electronics, Taiko Extreme and Crystal Connect cables

> caught this one, good sound
- Muraudio speakers fed by a Hegel receiver
- The Borreson rooms (with the 02 floorstanders and the 01 standmounts)
- Cube Audio speakers driven by a custom, one-off Nelson Pass amp
> this amp had 1,024 JFET's per channel
- Bayz Courant speakers driven by Pilium and Esoteric
- Heretic speakers driven by Lab12 electronics. These unique speakers (they look like the monitors a band has at the front of the stage) had a sound that grew on you. Designer from Montreal was a nice guy.
- Atohm speakers driven by Atoll electronics
- From a budget perspective, a lot has been said about the Polk/Denon combo. From my standpoint, the orange-grilled JBL bookshelf speakers provided big sound for reasonable dollars

So, it's your final day, last couple hours. You've seen all the rooms. What to do? I revisited those rooms where I just wanted to sit back, relax and dig the music. I guess those are my Top 3:
- Marten Parker speakers powered by Ayre Electronics. I sat behind Ken Micallef, who writes for Absolute Sound, earlier in the day and listened to Marvin Gaye's "What's Going On" and was transported (a word I don't use easily). He wrote about it in his online post of the room on their website. I had to go back and listen to more.
- Joseph Audio Pearl Graphene speakers powered by Doshi Electronics with J. Sikori turntable. Jeff Joseph was in the room to discuss his speakers. A record producer was in the room to discuss the music from his record label that he produced and which was playing. A great experience, and the sound was solid and engaging.
- Vivid Audio Giya speakers powered by JMF and Ideon electronics. I only left this room because I knew I wanted to see my other top 3 before the show ended. Probably my top pick.

All told, a fun show. A good crowd, but not too crowded. Looking forward to next year.
Click to expand...

Hope you don't mind me commenting.
 
A couple of the brands that had rooms in prior shows. I always looked forward to their rooms:

- Tidal speakers and electronics
- Bricasti electronics (I saw one Bricasti DAC in the Stillpoints room)
- Absolare amplifiers

Would have also liked to have seen someone have the Graceline cables.
 
dminches said:
That was my quote on another board and I can assure you that I am not selling any agenda.

I have attended that the last 6 Axponas with the same person and we both commented to each other that the number of rooms playing LPs was way down. We didn’t do a tally but that was our impression. Most of the big rooms on 1 and 2 had turntables but they always do. The smaller rooms on floor 3 and above seemed to be much more dependent on streaming digital.

Regarding reel to reel, I have brought a mix tape for the past 4 Axponas and was able to play it (again) in 2 different rooms.

Not trying to argue here; just providing my experience.
Click to expand...

I agree with totally. Playing LPs was way down. More baffling were room advertising turntables on the door that seemed perfectly content to sit on their chair to play digital. DCPs. WTF?
 
Myles B. Astor said:
I agree with totally. Playing LPs was way down. More baffling were room advertising turntables on the door that seemed perfectly content to sit on their chair to play digital. DCPs. WTF?
Click to expand...

A photo in another thread here showed you appearing to moderate a panel discussion: what was the topic?
 
Myles B. Astor said:
I agree with totally. Playing LPs was way down. More baffling were room advertising turntables on the door that seemed perfectly content to sit on their chair to play digital. DCPs. WTF?
Click to expand...

Makes sense to me. Vinyl is enough of a hassle in a home environment. There is far too much down time diddling with LP's to meet the demands at an audio show. No one wants to sit in a demo with continuous periods of silence as tracks are found and played.
 
still-one said:
Makes sense to me. Vinyl is enough of a hassle in a home environment. There is far too much down time diddling with LP's to meet the demands at an audio show. No one wants to sit in a demo with continuous periods of silence as tracks are found and played.
Click to expand...

My counter to that was that many of the rooms with only digital sources had poorer sound since the digital setups were rudimentary. One room had really nice speakers and electronics but had a laptop and a DAC as its only source. As a result, the sound suffered. Conversely, one room had a not-too-expensive speaker setup but was play LPs and the sound was much better.

I am generalizing but we did find that often not enough thought or expense was put into making the digital source sound good.
 
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