Pacific Audio Fest

A friend and I went yesterday and spent a few hours there.

A few highlights for me...

- Meeting Anne Bisson and buying an autographed copy of Blue Mind.

-Modwright.  Meeting Dan in person was nice, he's been very helpful and kind.  The sound in the room was very good.  Small room, but it was set up really well for such a small space.

-Acoustic Fields "room".  Sound was really nice and demonstrated the importance of room treatment.

-Joseph Audio.  They had the Pulsar Graphene speakers playing.  Amazing sound for their size.  It was a large room and besides the clarity, imaging, and soundstage, the bass was quite impressive.  A friend has these in a well set up room and they are incredible.

-Daedalus Audio.  Really nice sounding speakers and beautifully made.

-Salk Sound.  I don't recall which model they had set up (I think they were the Be Pure 2), but they were really dynamic and had great imaging.  

-Spatial Audio Lab.  That was my first time hearing open baffle speakers.  Very nice.

-Linkwitz Audio.  Weird looking speakers, but in a good way.  Impressive bass for their form factor.

We didn't have a chance to see everything.  Hopefully the show returns next year and I can plan better and spend more time there.  Much appreciation for Lou Hinkley and Gary Gill and their team for pulling this together.  It was a nice event.

I attended Friday and Saturday.

3 rooms were of note.

Von Schweikert Room. Big room and Huge soundstage. I found it hard to leave the room.

Linkwist room. Very tight and tuned sound. Not too crazy about the looks, but a very good sound.

The Pillium/Alsyvox Room. BEST OF SHOW! Incredible tonal balance, relaxed sound, clear soundstage and unbelievably toned, well defined bass. Never boomy (which I heard in many rooms as they are not the best rooms for demos). Several times, people looked around for "the subwoofer". No subwoofer.

 Another thing I noticed- there were no room treatments! These are my dream speakers. The Pillium amp would be nice, too.

This speaker called Linkwitz looks funny but it sounds clear and holographic.

I only had one day, and couldn’t hit all the rooms. I thought these rooms were excellent:

1. ACORA SRC-2 speakers with VAC mono blocks and preamp - Big room, and they presented an amazing soundstage and lifelike sound.
2. Linear Tube Audio preamp and mono blocks with Daedalus speakers: Gorgeous sound and speakers (just beautiful wood and joinery). I am thinking of getting an LTA preamp. The speakers are very efficient, and a great pairing with the LTA 20-40W amps and integrated.
3. LINKWITZ speakers - A total surprise. I know the name and a bit of the founder (RIP) but these speakers really surprised me. Amazing omnidirectional presentation, and a huge deep soundstage. The speakers really disappeared. They are odd looking, almost a homemade look but the sound! They come paired with 5 channel monoblocks (class D) so that each driver has its own channel. (The MBL Radialstrahler (120?) is a fancier omni that would have to be considered too.)
4. Acapella Campanile horn hybrid - Lovely sound. I have little experience with horns, but was pleasantly surprised.
5. MAGICO A5’s, Constellation Argo integrated, Berkeley DAC, Aurender streamer: Excellent overall. If I had $25-30k for speakers, these would be in the running.
6. JOSEPH AUDIO Perspective (or Pulsar?) Graphene2 - Very pleasantly surprised. Gorgeous and lovely sounding. I didn’t get to hear their stand mount monitors which have gotten excellent reviews, darn it. Mr. Joseph is a charming fellow, in my brief chat with him.
   
   I wish I could have gone back on Sunday to hear some of the rooms mentioned here. Next time I will spend 2 days. The hotel has a very odd layout which made navigating a bit of a pain.

This system sound very musical.

The most notable thing is the cost of amplifiers is modest compared with that of speaker.

Raidaho speaker cost 70k$ while Margules power amp and pre amp cost 10k$ and 7k$ only.

I got the feeling that Margules pre is good.

Thus I bought it at show discount price of 6k$.

After installing in my system, I am happy with it.

It use 4 12AU7(ECC82) and one 6922(6jd8) tubes.

Thus lot of room for tube rolling.

I replaced the stock Elextro harmonic tubes with NOS Amperex.

It really sound gracious.