AXPONA 2011 Atlanta reports/thoughts?

Anyone hear the little Napa Acoustics system (CDP, integrated, small bookshelf speakers)? I meant to check it out but ran out of time.

I guess that I missed the Carnegie room. What model were they showing? Agree about the Soundsmith stuff - pretty sweet sounding.

I'm with Audioguy on the attitude thing. Lots of good kit out there, and easy to avoid jerks. Last year at RMAF, someone high up -- very high up -- in Van Alstine abruptly and rudely took my music off in the middle of a song, after one of the people there had agreed to let me play a couple of tracks. (My selections were well recorded, and got complements all day.) Needless to say, I'd not buy anything from AVA, even for pennies on the dollar. Unfortunately, the behavior there also meant I could not properly audition Jim Salk's speakers, in which I was very interested.

In contrast, owner-designers at places like Zu, Fritzspeakers, Selah, Daedalus, and Spectron were courteous and nice, and I'll continue to consider and recommend them.

John

+2 for Soundsmith. Biggest sounding small speakers I've ever heard, real sweet sound too.

Rockadanny,

The Napa room was very good. I liked the approach which was " Turn any 100 sq foot space into an acoustic oasis ". The aesthetics were a bit on the over modern ( the lines and curves, not the tubes) for my taste but the sound was very open and coherent. A tough act for a 4 way speaker IMHO. I went back to inquire about a show deal on some of the sound treatment panels but they had already sold the whole rig. the 5K rig made real bass in the small end of the room and the overall presentation was very easy on the ears.

Audioguy3107- Not sure of the price tag but I must say the DH rig ala M. Levinson was very forward and seemed to add extra snap to leading edge transients. The rep. was very pleased with the "detail" and "speed" and kept mentioning that he was using a "$400 laptop" as the source. Into a 50K DAC perhaps? Dunno, just not my cup o' music.