Whats your "best of CES 2008"

I thought the Reference YG speakers sounded very good especially in the terrible room. I have never heard anything sound good in the mezzanine rooms. I didn't bother with the MBL, Soundlab, or Hansen rooms. I did not like the fact that the sweet spot was so narrow on the Sander's speaker but did think they were well integrated.

The Reference 3As were in my opinion the best speakers at the CES with the Rockport less expensive speakers getting quite close on Thursday.

So you didn't think the YG's lacked a solid center image due to their super wide spacing?

All I heard were two seperate speakers playing in the ends of the room. As messed up as that positioning was, I still felt the sound was OK but not as good as it could of been. But they were most likely thinking that since seating was 6 across, they wanted to spread the speakers out.

The Scanspeaks they are using are excellent and I use one of their current mids in my own design. They have the right idea IMHO, passive sat and active subs are the only way to go to get a speaker to integrate properly into any given room.

Joel, I heard both sets of speakers and actually liked the small ones a bit better. Maybe that was due to too wide of spacing.
At the show I wasn't really looking for imaging as much as the tonal quality of the product. Typically a few degrees off of placement can destroy a decent image and I'm sure the manuf. were trying to cater to larger audiences. I could be wrong too...
One thing I can't get out of my head is the Gallo Ref 5's. They were probably our faves.

MBL had incredible sound (even though the guy running the system on Wed. was a schmuck).

The MBL set-up was freakish and when brought to hi levels seemed to get grainny and not at all lifelike in the mid range. I thought the Totem room more pleasing to listen to. (And you could buy a nice condo in Vegas with the price dif)
Pass Labs SR1 was a very engaging speaker that made it hard to leave the room.

Davore Silverbacks were stunnng

Usher "Tiny Dancer" was disappointing, lacking depth and realism - could have been any number of things though but they didn't sound very good. Bad luck being next to Totem also, which always does a great job with settng up.

Escalante Freemonts powered by Electrocomaniet is magical

For HT i thought the Definetive Mythos STS was nice for the price.

Mac TT was unique

All things Wadia were leading edge tech. By far the most impressive product line. Those guys do things right.

Clarity Cables digital remastering does an incredible job.