RMAF 2011 - Who's Going, What's There?

[rjbond3rd]

1. Is anyone attending the RMAF 2011 this weekend in Denver? http://audiofest.net

2. I notice some widebander companies will be there:

Voxativ
Lowther America
Madisound
SEAS (not sure what they'll bring).

Please mention any others!

There also seem to be plenty of other cool companies, e.g., Bottlehead, Tape Project, Linkwitz Lab, Pass Labs, German horns (Acapella, Cessaro), and lots of vinyl-related companies.

[rjbond3rd]

Volti Audio, who renovate and hot-rod Klipsch Heritage speakers, will be showing a brand-new horn. the Vittora, which looks superficially like a souped-up curvy La Scala but is a from-scratch design. http://www.voltiaudio.com/

(Sorry, not wideband but the company started as a DIY outfit.)

[rjbond3rd]

Ouch! I guess nobody from here is going then. I'll (most likely) post a report.

[rjbond3rd]

Madisound displayed their new BLH kit. Alas, the FE126En sounded brand new (no break-in) but showed promise. (On top is what looks like a fullranger but I believe it's a SEAS coax).

[rjbond3rd]

Teresonic displayed this fine-sounding TL featuring the Lowther DX4. This confirms yet again that I really prefer the alnico Lowthers but let's not split hairs.

[rjbond3rd]

Voxativ showed their fine BLH (which recently graced the cover of Stereophile magazine).

I wanted to love these. And I did love some aspects. First off, I have AER's at home and these drivers sounded almost exactly like the AER's (no surprise as this company split off from AER). And like my AER's, you want to be about 15 degrees off-axis (also no surprise).

The cab does have a lot of guts in the bass but for some reason, it didn't win me over (probably just the lack of novelty in the sound compared to what I have at home).

[rjbond3rd]

Rethm recently developed a custom in-house replacement for Lowthers. The room was dark and so is the picture. They sounded good except I did not love the active bass (it sounded too much like a sub to me). Blame the room, or maybe the listener. Otherwise good.

[rjbond3rd]

A Swedish company named EARO displayed some good BLH's. The smaller ones look like they use the Jordan JX92S but that could be a superficial resemblance. They sounded stellar in terms of clarity and imaging. The big red ones use a custom in-house paper cone driver with active electronics inside -- very convincing.

[rjbond3rd]

It's amazing that DB Keele was just hanging out (as was Siegfried Linkwitz). This curved line array was based on Keele's work (or maybe even designed by him) and sounded fantastic in the Parts Express room. The idea apparently is similar to constant directivity (unless I'm completely wrong).

Clear, open, spacious, beautiful.

[rjbond3rd]

These 1940's Western Electric monitors were by far the best thing I heard, in terms of tone. In the Silbatone room. I would have thought they were junk, from looking at them, but they were unforgettable. Very rolled off on top so "vintage sounding" but they were just flat out superior tone-wise (does anything else matter?)