2010 RMAF Analog Reports + Meet and Greet

My favorite rooms this year were the Avalon room with the Rowland 625 driving the new Transcendent speaker, the Gamut room and the Playback Designs/DarTZeel room. The VTL/Wilson room was also very good, with the Wilson Sophias sounding as good as I've heard any Wilson sound. Soundsmith always has wonderful analog sound.

All these rooms were very musical and I could be very happy living long-term with any of these systems. However, the Avalon/Rowland combination was my absolute favorite.

Oh, off-site, Soundings had a great Boulder/Vienna Acoustic room.

This was my fifth RMAF and, by far, my favorite. The key to my enjoyment was leaving the rooms that sucked immediately. There's no need to be nice, because all you're doing when you stay a second longer than needed is literally injuring your ears. The truly bad set ups (it's often due to the room, but that's not my problem)can be heard in seconds. Sitting in there for five-minutes just to be nice and just because the people seem nice only hurts your ears. It not a sacrifice worth making.

The best times to go to the best rooms is early Saturday and Sunday, before the crowds really mount. Early you can often have the room to yourself, with the AC off and no one talking or the door constantly opening and closing. I used Friday to scout a bunch of rooms overall and decide where I wanted to spend more "quality time".

Hi Thom_mackris, so any input in relation to the arms you guys were going to compare?

Hi Pcosta, so any input in relation to the Raven 10.5 and the Thales arm you were going to look at.

Anything else interesting in relation to vinyl you care to share.

You being an exsperienced AC owner for a while now so you are use to it's over all sound what are your thoughts in relation to the sonic differences compared to the Black Knight.

HI Dev

The Thales arm is out of my league as far as pricing goes so no interest in owning one. Wonderful idea though.

The Raven 10.5 is wonderful sounding arm, always in control, smooth high's with nice clean upper extension. Bass was deap and tight, nothing to complain about as far as usability. Build quality is second to none! It will accomidate many different cartridges according to TW.

We listened to the 10.5 with Miyabi/47 on the TW Raven AC3, and the Ortofon Cadenza Black on the 10.5 and the TW Black Night.

High Water Sound had two setups at opposite sides of the room, so different presentations from the two setups. Both very good.

I will let Jeff from High Water Sound know I will be buying a 10.5 in the future.

I have full rez pictures of both setups, I will post them on my systems page.

I went to the shoot out later adnd it was still in full swing at 10PM and they were still going at it when I left. Full house BTW.

Steve Dobbins was down the hall playing music in his room too, so I spent some time in there. The attmosphere was a lot more relaxed from my tastes.

Agree that the Raven/Thoress room was great fun and great sounding. TW is also a very nice unpretentious guy with a great sense of humor. I also enjoyed Steve Dobbins room with the Beat direct-drive turntable and "small" MBL speakers. The Beat cum Reed tonearm is a winner for sure. All the vinyl gurus I met: Thomas, Steve, Thom Mackris, Schroeder, etc, are unusually nice guys with a penchant for sharing their enthusiasms with others.

I walked out of the tonearm comparison (not to say "shoot-out") at what must have been around 10 PM. I was stuck at the back of the room and could not hear any important differences between Talea and Schroeder, except to say that the differences I did hear could well have been due to the differences between the cartridges. Others with better seats had more definitive impressions. What the experience proved to me is that choosing among the tonearms and turntables we agree are among the best is largely a matter of personal taste and the availability of disposable income. There are so many excellent well thought out products; we are very fortunate.

I am glad I attended finally.