Conference hips::uk_audioo

    I have exact dates at home in the August HFN/RR, I'll tap them in
    next week unless someone beats me to it. If my memory serves me,
    it's around the back end of September.
    
    Dave

    From about 1400 on 14th. September, all day 15th. and 16th. September,
    are the "public" times. Before that is trade only. Apparently they
    have a special car park, visitors are asked to follow the signs
    to this and not drive to the Penta hotel. I believe there are courtesy
    buses laid on for those arriving by train/tube.

    Dave

    hi,
    
    Do you know till what time in the evening it is open?
    Also, do you know if they charge for admission?
    From past experience do you know if this is the sort of place to get
    good demonstrations without the feeling that there's a compulsion
    to buy? I assume you can buy at these shows? 
    
    Malcolm
    

    You can usually buy only accessories, audiophile recordings, etc. at
    shows, nothing else. You couldn't make an informed buying decision
    based on a demo in a hotel room crammed with people, but you can
    use it to draw up a short-list by talking to the manufacturers or
    distributors, if you can past the brochure-collectors!
    
    Dave

    I enjoy them, I couldn't think of a better way of listening to such a
    wide range of equipment, other than inviting all the HiFi Manufacturers
    to set up their equipment for demonstration in your home.
    
    I'm game for Sunday, anyone want to share the journey from Basingstoke
    ??
    
    Mark.

    re.-1
    
    If the dates posted earlier were correct I think you'll find
    the last day is Saturday! 
    
    Anyone know what time the show closes?
    
    Malcolm

    should've read 15/16/17th. I'll keep taking the tablets....
    
    Dave

    
    It's that time of year again. I know the show is on this weekend. Does
    anyone know the times ?
    
    Trevor

Sat and Sun, 10am to 6pm I believe.  Think I'll trot down there myself.  Wonder
what the car park cost is?   I heard it was some extortionate rate last year.

Nick

    
    I went to the show on Sunday morning, and here are a couple of
    impressions.
    
    It's definitely good to get there early. I was there before it opened
    at 10.00, and several stands were already open by then. It was pretty
    empty to start off with, but by about 11.30-12, it was really a bit of
    a crush in all the small rooms (the majority).
    
    I spent most of my time wandering round the major loudspeaker company
    stands (as I've decided I'm in the market for some new ones). I didn't
    really see anything particularly worthy of documenting on these stands. 
    
    An awful lot of companies (who don't make their own) were using Arcam
    CD players and amplifiers. Most of these were also using the Black Box
    D/A converter. Speaker cables the diameter of garden hosepipe were also
    much in evidence.
    
    I heard a couple of systems that I'll note. One was in the Cornflake
    Shop's room, which was a Xerxes t/table (I think), with Onix pre/power
    amps and Monitor Audio Monitor Seven speakers. The Monitor Sevens are
    *tiny*, but the system was making really quite an impressive noise.
    
    I also went to one of the ticketed demos from Absolute Sounds. This was
    of an ultra-high end system, with the (at least) the following parts:
    
    - Goldmund t/table  (can't remember the name, but it's about 4-5K to
    buy), with Koetsu Red Signature cartridge.
    
    - Krell MD1 "CD turntable" with 64x oversampling D/A .
    
    - Krell Line pre-amp and separate Phono pre-amp.
    
    - Krell KSA250 power amp (one only). You'd really have thought they'd have
    used dual monos, wouldn't you ?
    
    - Wilson WAT/PUPPY speakers. The WAT is a small pyramidal monitor, and
    the Puppy is an optional LF unit that fits underneath it. There is also
    a subwoofer available, apparently.
    
    At a conservative estimate, this was about 40,000 pounds worth of gear.
    It sounded quite amazing - *very* detailed, but also very involving. AS
    were demonstrating two other systems in different rooms, but I didn't
    get a chance to listen to those.
    
    All in all, I found it a worthwhile and interesting visit.
    
    Trevor

I also went.  In fact I went on both days, because I didn't get to see the
Absolute Sounds demo on the Saturday...  I've never been to one of these shows
before and found it highly enjoyable:  I'll certainly be attending more.


I was surprised by the dreadful sounds from some stands.  The Dali room, for
example, had large Danish panel-type speakers driven by the most enormous
amplifier you'd ever want to see - maybe 1ftx2ftx4ft, coloured gold to look as
obtrusive as possible, and resting on what looked like a couple of railway
sleepers - which were producing a horribly screechy sound most of the time. 
The Hafler room, with Carver Amazing panel speakers, was much the same but
perhaps more restrained.  In comparison the Carver room with the same speakers
was almost pleasant.  Jamo and Cerwin-Vega also come to mind as pretty bad, but
I guess that's to be expected.


I saw two speakers that impressed me.  First, a thing called the NEAT Petite, a
new speaker built by North Eastern Audio Traders, who are primarily second-hand
hi-fi dealers.  This miniature brought a smile to my face because it is so tiny
and works so well:  to some extent it reminds me of my beloved Celestion
SL600s, except that it's a little smoother and more forgiving.  It's ported and
the bass is pretty good:  initially I thought the stand was an active part of
the speaker but it isn't.  A common mistake I was told.  This beast costs about
�525 per pair, and if you're looking for a little speaker in that range do try
to listen to it.  I think the guy said the Cornflake Shop would be stocking it.

The other speaker is from a Canadian company called Museatex, and it's called
the Melior One.  This is a panel design, with a single trapezoidal membrane
driven by a single motor somewhere in the middle.  It's a moving-coil, there's
no crossover or equalization, and it's sensitive and a kind load so you don't
need a Krell.  It doesn't seem to be particularly fussy about location, or need
a large room; it sounded very, very fine in a grotty hotel room with no
acoustic treatment and a window a short way behind it.  To my mind this was
producing the best sound there, and I'll be interested to try it at home... 
Apparently it's a development of the Sumo Aria:  they claim they built the Aria
for Sumo but do so no longer.  It isn't available in the UK yet, but they
expect distribution to be set up in the next couple of months, with price set
at about �1900.  If anyone knows anything more about this speaker, or the
company, or the Sumo Aria, I'd be interested to hear about it.


Speaking of acoustic treatment, I found the Deltec room amusing.  To show off
their amplifiers (let's face it, amplifiers are boring) and D/A converter they
were using big hybrid speakers, maybe Acoustats, lots of tube traps, and sound
deadening panels behind the curtains.  That was one dead room!  It had the
interesting effect of building a fairly flat image several feet off the floor -
as though there was a 3ft or 4ft stage in front of you.


I too was impressed by the Absolute Sounds Goldmund/Krell/Wilson WATT demo. 
The sound was good, but not �40000 good!  I thought the Krell CD was
particularly pleasant, given what most CDs seem to sound like, and can't wait
for this kind of quality to cost sensible money.  Shouldn't be long.  If anyone
else went, and saw the other AS demos, could they confirm that the panel in the
end room, with the Class� amps, was an Apogee Stage?  I meant to check but
didn't get back there.  I didn't like it, whatever it was.

There were indeed a lot of Arcam CDs and Black Boxes, including a Bitstream
BBIII in the Arcam room.  Never heard of that one.  (Arcam didn't do themselves
any favours by basing their display around a video system whose sounds weren't
too good and which distracted attention from quite decent sound elsewhere.)  I
noticed Celestion were using two Finestra preamps - as well as using half the
staff of Reading Hi-Fi by the look of it - and said RH-F staff said there were
quite a few other stands using Finestras, though I didn't notice.  It's nice to
see them getting more attention, as IMHO they deserve it.


Went to the Townshend room to get another fix of the Rock Reference (I'm still
waiting for mine).  This was being played through a new speaker by the name of
Sir Galahad, and I thought the sound was unattractive to say the least.  Sir
Galahad is maybe 6ft tall, with seven woofers one above the other, nine leaf
tweeters beside them, and a port down below.  Pity he wasn't just (just?) using
the Glastonburys, but he was clearly proud of these monsters.  Apparently his
'woofer' (used on all his speakers) goes up to 14kHz, with only the very top
end handled by the leaf.  If I've got this right, it's an odd design.  Instead
of the surround and spider providing restoring force for the (aluminium) cone,
there's a rod running backwards from the dustcap through the centre of the
magnet, with a spring at the back.  Weird.


Anyway, I'm glad to say that when I got home on Sunday evening and put on some
records, I found myself thinking "Ah!  That's better!  What a nice sound!" -
and getting drawn into the music.  So it hasn't brought on a fit of the
upgrades.  Unless those Museatex jobs really are as good as they seemed.

Nick

    Anyone going to Penta this year?
    
    Dave

    
    I'm planning to go, probably early on Sunday morning again.

When is it?

    Your Heathrow correspondent was up last night bashing away on his PC to
    bring you this stop press report on this year's show. Anyone else go in
    the end ?
    
    
I went to the Penta show on Sunday morning. I enjoyed it rather more this
year, as I had planned what I really wanted to see beforehand. I got
there before the show opened, and so I was able to see all those exhibits
that were in small rooms before they got ridiculously crowded.

My first stop was in the Epos room, as I wanted to find out a bit more
about my ES11 speakers. The system they had set up consisted of a Naim
CDS, NAC72 and a NAP250, with ES11s (i.e., ~5,000 pounds of front end
driving 330 quid speakers), and I thought it sounded really good. The
only other person there at the time was Robin Marshall, so I managed to
have quite a long chat with him. He said that his next project would
probably be to update the ES14, which is getting a bit long in the tooth.
He also said that Epos didn't have any ambition to produce a complete
99-999 pound range of speakers, as he felt that it was a waste of time
because at least some of the models probably wouldn't be much good.
That's an interesting point of view from a member of the same group of
companies as Tannoy and Mordaunt-Short...

Next, I went to one of the Absolute Sounds ticket-only demonstrations.
This was of the following:

        Krell CD transport & DAC
        Krell KSL line stage
        Krell MDA300 power amp
        Martin Logan Quest speakers

This was a really stunning system. It produced an enormous and believable
soundstage, the Quests contributing real bass in addition to their very
transparent midrange and treble. It was real "musicians in the room with
you" stuff.

I then wandered around for a while looking at various different exhibits.

Roksan were showing a new CD player and DAC [not actually working
though], plus a new turntable based on the Radius. The CD player is
styled in an extension of the form taken by their amplifiers; a real 1930s
science fiction film prop.

The Pentachord speakers were quite interesting; they are really tiny,
and sounded pretty good. The weakest point was the integration between
the satellites and the subwoofer.

I also have to admit that I went into the Cerwin-Vega! room. They had
been placed at the geographically furthest point in the hotel from
anywhere else. If anyone's looking for some speakers with which to
bang head and seriously damage the hearing, look no further.

Systems that I was unimpressed with included the Monitor Audio Studio 5s,
mated with the Audiolab pre/power combination. I would have to agree with
this month's HFN/RR verdict on the '5. Musical Fidelity had some new MC-4
sized speakers, plus the Odysseus valve amp and their new CD-1. This
sounded rather anaemic when I heard it. 

I managed to hear the new Sonus Faber Extrema, also reviewed in this
month's HFN/RR. On the basis of a very short audition, I can't say that I
was blown away by the sound. They certainly look pretty wacky though.

The most interesting part of the day was a demonstration by Malcolm Hawksford
from the Electronics department at Essex University of their DSP-based
loudspeaker equalisation system. First, they accurately measure the frequency
response of a loudspeaker, and they produce a mathematical model of this. This
allows them to then use digital signal processing in real time to invert the
unpleasant characteristics of the measured response. The DSP software runs in a 
special box inserted between the CD player and DAC.

Hawksford sees this as a way of improving loudspeakers, and not really as
a way of correcting room-induced problems. They have concentrated on
improving the transient response of speakers, and were able to back this
up with some graphs showing the clutter of stored energy after the
un-equalised speaker was hit by an impulse, and the huge improvement when
the equalisation was used.

An amazing demonstration of the power of the technique was performed
using a pair of speakers that consisted of two mid/bass units
and a subwoofer mounted on a pole, with no cabinet whatsoever. Without
the equalisation turned on, it sounded execrable: no bass; horrible
resonances in the midrange; phasey sound etc.  With the equalisation
it actually sounded like a real pair of loudspeakers. The un-equalised
response graphs showed dips and peaks of 6-9db, with a massive dip of
about 30db at 8khz. The equalised graph was flat within 1-2db, with the
exception of a 10db dip  at 8khz.

They also demonstrated the technique on some slightly modified Canon
wide-imaging speakers, and on Wharfedale Diamond IVs. I thought the
demonstration with the Diamonds was more impressive. There was a
noticeable increase in the level of detail recovered, and in the quality
and drive of the bass.

Hawksford predicted that in a short time, we would see commercial
products that incorporated such systems. He showed several places in the
audio chain where you could incorporate the equalisation, using plug-in
ROMs matched to different types of speaker.

I'm sure that die-hard analogue freaks would see this as yet more
pointless digital tinkering, but I don't agree. A good analogy is the
F-16 fighter, which won't fly without a computer that keeps its
aerodynamically unstable airframe flying, but which benefits from much higher
performance as a result. There are some things that you can do with
computers that you just can't do with elastic bands and jewellery...

All in all, a few hours well spent !

Unrelated now to the base note, but the equalisation system in .18
does sound interesting.

When I did DSP as a module in my degree, the disappointing thing was that
with digital filters, you get roughly the same problems as analogue filters,
i.e. problems with phase. Obviously you have more flexibility on what you
filter out, but it would be interesting to know how they got round the problems
with phase lag (at least I think that was the problem, the course was 5 years ago!).

The best area for this to go would be in the Loudspeaker, with an active power amp,
after the digital stage, with just a digital input to the speaker!

Mark.

    Re: Roksan CD player.
    
    The player (�1000) and DAC (�500) will be available very shortly.
    Roksan are makeing some very bold clames for this beast ``It sounds
    better than any turntable I've (Roksan ed) ever made'' Well ever ones
    been saying that about their own CD for a while apart from Linn with
    the ``Its as good as a Basik'' line.
    
    What makes this so different is that my pet Hi-Fi Shop Owner (No
    guesses who :-) actually agrees !!!!
    
    His words ``Bl**dy Hell, a CD player that works''.
    
    If this is that case (and he's yet to be proved wrong by my ears) then
    things are getting interesting. After all �1500 is HALF the price of
    a top-of-the-range (LP-12/Roksan/Naim CD) front end ...
    
    	Rik-last-in-the-street-with-a-CD-Watson

    
    It's that time of year again. The Heathrow Penta show is open to the
    public this coming weekend, starting at 10am each day. This year, it
    costs �2.50 to get in, unless you bought last month's HFN/RR.
    
    Trevor

This year's show was potentially quite interesting, with the format war
between DCC and MD on the horizon. In the event, I didn't see any mention
of MD in the whole show - either it wasn't there, or I missed it.

I went on Saturday morning, and the entry conditions to the show were a bit
odd. Before 10am, you could walk into the hotel foyer, but not into the
exhibition area. A queue formed for the main show entrance, where you had
to either pay �2.50, or hand in your coupon from HFN/RR. However, once the
show was open, it was perfectly possible to walk in through the main hotel
entrance, and into the show, without paying.  Perhaps worth bearing in mind
for next year...

I didn't have many things on my list to see this year, so I wandered around
fairly aimlessly, as a result of which I may have missed some interesting
stuff.

The system I most enjoyed listening to in the main exhibition area was in
Neat's room. They had the Neat Petite speakers being driven by a heavy-duty
Roksan system (top Xerxes etc., pre-amp, dual mono power amps). This was a
terrifically enjoyable system, involving and rhythmic, which threw a huge
soundstage. The speakers go very low for such tiny boxes (6.5 litres), and
they didn't seem to be particularly fatiguing, which surprised me. I sat in
and listened to three tracks from the album they were playing, and
temporarily forgot about the rest of the show.

Also worth honourable mentions were KEF, where there was a pair of K120s,
again being driven by a big system, and sounding good. Meridian had a D6000
system which I would have enjoyed more had they not been playing such
execrable music on it. Well, I know next to nothing about Jazz, and as for
Jason Donovan doing that song out of Joseph ???? 

Infinity had a large system with expensive US front ends, four *enormous*
Jeff Rowland power amps, and some metre-high slim floorstanding speakers.
Very expensive, and completely uninvolving as well. Tannoy had a pair of
their more expensive "Sixes" range being driven by Naim CDS/52/135s. I
didn't care for this very much, which I think was down to the speakers.
Tannoys always sound a bit harsh and shouty to me, but maybe that's just
the connotations of the name...

On the general exhibit front, Musical Fidelity had lots of new things: a
"valve CD player"; Tempest/Typhoon amps; MC-3 and Reference 3 speakers;
MA65 monoblocks; and a couple of other things I've forgotten. The MA65s now
have a rather garish chrome front panel, rather than the original black of
the A1, MA50 etc. I'm not sure whether there's any method behind their
product development, or whether they just keep on banging them out. In a
similar vein, Monitor Audio had some new speakers in the MAxxx Gold range.
I defy *anyone* to make sense of their product line, even after reading the
literature !

I saw a few weird and wonderful items. There was a company with an
integrated valve amp which had large wooden knobs, and valves poking
through a steeply curved copper "lid". I'm sure there will be a picture of
this in the HFN/RR show report. Absolute Sounds had the Linaeum speakers,
which have a strange exposed ribbon-style tweeter sitting on top of a very
small ported enclosure. They sounded very good.

I went to the Absolute Sounds demo of a Krell/Sonus Faber system. It had
the Krell MD10 CD player, KRC line controller, MDA300 power amps and Sonus
Faber Extremas. They had the Krell KAS power amps there, but couldn't use
them as the mains was not good enough ! It was interesting to hear this
system, and compare it with what I remember of a similar system from last
year, with big Martin Logan electrostatics. The Extremas are obviously
completely different to the Martin Logans. I think the feature that stood
out for me most in this system was the silences between notes. The Extremas
handle transients superbly, and there was a real feeling of blackness in
the silences. They are also incredibly detailed, without sounding harsh, in
this system anyway.

I went to a presentation by Covent Garden Records in the auditorium. This
included a CD vs. DCC challenge (it was impossible to tell the difference,
under those conditions). They also described some of the upcoming
technology, of which a brief summary:

CD-R. They claimed this is a professional format. I don't see why that has
to be the case, certainly it wouldn't be true without DCC.

DCC. We all know about this. Available in 6 weeks they reckon.

Laserdisc. This is starting to be seriously pushed in this country. There
are now multistandard players available that do Laservision, Laserdisc,
CD-V, and also both PAL and NTSC video ! A UK Laservision
trade association has just been formed, and PAL software is supposed to
be finally becoming available in proper quantities. Along with Laserdisc
comes widescreen TV, which is TV, er, with a wide screen.

Photo-CD. Kodak's system for transferring photographs to a CD, which you
then view on your TV. The player is also a standard CD player, and the
Photo CD application lets you zoom in and generally play about with your
photographs. The Kodak Photo-CD player was about �360.

CD-I. This is a technology that allows for interactive A/V applications,
such as games, structured teaching applications and so on. The players can
also play standard CDs, and interestingly, also include Photo-CD. The
initial Philips player will be �600, but will drop to �500 after a few
months, according to a Philips person I overheard. I don't know how much
the CD-I software will be. A pure Photo-CD player thus looks like a
complete waste of time. 

If these new formats take off, the specialist audio CD market could also
take a bit of a hammering. If you can get a player that does everything for
�500, and presumably the prices will fall, why bother with a pure audio
player ? Of course there will still be a few people who want to pay for
the increase in quality, but all the "me too" specialist manufacturers has
better start looking at CD-I pretty soon.

As usual, the show was an enjoyable way to spend a few hours.


Trevor

Hi,

I also went, and took a friend along. My friend is a musician, and is thinking
of upgrading his system. It would be a big step for him, as he has had an Eagle
system for a long time, and none of it can stay really.

Anyway, we wandered around, and the impression I had this year, is that the
expensive systems from most manufacturers don't sound better than the cheapest!

I used to think that this only happened to Japanese manufacturers, but it also
seems to afflict a lot of other companies. My main beef was the music that was
played, and that when we found somewhere playing good music, the record always
finished when we walked in.

Apart from the Phillips DCC stand, no one played Dire Straits! However, they all
seemed to be trying to be as 'cool' as possible, playing some esoteric jazz. I
would have loved to hear some REM or Talk Talk or anything good!

What struck me about most of the systems was how fatiguing they sounded. The
notable exception to this was the Monitor Audio room. They had the baby Monitor
Audio speakers playing with a sub woofer playing. We asked them to try it
without the sub woofer, and preferred that. These speakers are smaller than
my diamonds, and sound much better! I might invest in a pair, before I get
a CD player!

I'm thinking of the Marantz CD-52 (I'm not going to bother auditioning, coz
Which magazine says that all CD players sound the same!! ;-) ), and went into
the Marantz stand. This had the mighty Tannoy Westminster Horn speakers,
playing from Marantz CD and amp, and the system sounded quite nice.

Overall, a good mornings worth, and reassuring for the bank balance that I
don't have to go to stupid expense for Hi Fi.

Mark Jeffery