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Vandersteen Seminar at Audio Connection (NJ)

Audio Connection hosted a fantastic seminar this past Saturday with Richard Vandersteen.  Richard spent a few hours answering questions and telling us about what's going on at Vandersteen.  One of the more interesting tidbits (IMHO) was Richard's focus (obsession?) on the non-pistonic behavior of cones, found in even in "hi end" drivers (but not his carbon/balsa ones).  Richard seemed to view non-pistonic behavior as causing significant losses in information, and simultaneously responsible for the heightened sensitivity of a lot of drivers (i.e., that some of those dBs of sensitivity are distortion).  He mentioned that a major objective is to bring pistonic behavior into the lower-cost designs, leading me to hope that upgrade packages might because available for the 3A Sigs.  :)    

After the chat, Johnny R had a demo running of the 7s set up with the new Vandy subs ("System 9" is what he was calling it), Vandy amps, AR Reference preamp, and Aesthetix phono-pre.  (Sorry, I missed the specifics of the pre and the analog rig; I did notice that it was a Benz LP cartridge.)  They were playing the MoFi one-step pressing of Fagen's The Nightly--it was probably the best sound I've ever heard in my 25+ years in this hobby.  The midrange and high frequency clarity was just unreal.  After "New Frontier" played, the whole room had to pick their collective jaw up from the ground.

Kudos to RV, Johnny R and the whole Audio Connection for putting on such a fantastic event, and for setting up the demo system so well.
cedargrover
cedargrover OP
302 posts
 
Your point is well-taken, tomic601.  As a (mediocre) drummer, I hone in on percussion because I know what cymbals and drums sound like in real life.  Same for piano from having grown up with it.  It takes a short while to ease into what the 7s are doing, but when you start to really think about what you are hearing and apply your references, there's no escaping that what the 7 is doing is right (IMHO).

audionoobie, I'm not sure if Johnny has an RP1 on display, but happy to bring mine in so you can hear it. I live 2 miles from there.
audionoobie's avatar
audionoobie
367 posts
 
@cedargrover I appreciate the offer. Maybe after the new year I'll take you up on it. Lucky guy living so close to AC!
audionoobie's avatar
audionoobie
367 posts
 

As an aside, I am a drummer as well, although I like to think of myself as "slightly" better than mediocre. When I’m not I.T.’ing things during the week, I play in two Top 40 club/wedding bands on the weekends.

Cheers,
Joe

joey54
434 posts
 
I also attended the event. I thought the 7's powered by the Vandersteen amps sounded the best I have heard them. They truly disappear in the room.

Nick played some great music and I lust after that AMG turntable. At around $18K-$20K it's way out of my budget. I do have a fairly good TT, Clearaudio Performance DC with an AMG Teatro cartridge and although I have a good digital setup, Ayre Codex & Aurender N100H, my listening is 90% vinyl. I highly recommend adding a TT to every system.

I thought the system with the 5A Carbon's and an all Ayre stack sounded great as well. Richard is always entertaining when he is there and it's a real pleasure to speak with him.

The Audio Connection crew deserves a lot of credit for setting up this annual event. And John wearing a suit, unbelievable!
gdnrbob
4,457 posts
 
Nuts, I didn't even know about it. I always wanted to meet Mr. V.
B.
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