Photos from AKFest 2010

I stopped in that room briefly and was surprised. The vendor was asking guys how they liked the system and they flat out told him they wouldn't buy it. He said he could take it, but when they told him they weren't impressed he seemed to go over and pout, so perhaps I missed out on something earlier. I wasn't impressed either and FWIW, those are the fugliest things I saw all weekend. :puke: Even if they sounded good they are so visually obnoxious I wouldn't buy them.

They are UGLY!
 
I stopped in that room briefly and was surprised. The vendor was asking guys how they liked the system and they flat out told him they wouldn't buy it. He said he could take it, but when they told him they weren't impressed he seemed to go over and pout, so perhaps I missed out on something earlier. I wasn't impressed either and FWIW, those are the fugliest things I saw all weekend. Even if they sounded good they are so visually obnoxious I wouldn't buy them.

Interesting. Clearly, beauty is in the eye of the beholder, cuz I thought they looked awesome. From what I've read about those speakers and what that guy was saying, the form follows function. The way he described it (and, again, this corroborated what I've read), those speakers license the nautilus technology from B&W, so they need room for the tubes to come off the backs of the drivers, and that's what gets you that unorthodox appearance.

It just so happened that they were in the first room I visited, and I was really impressed by how awesome they sounded. The attack, bloom, and decay of piano notes was like listening to a concert grand in the same room. The impact of a kick drum was right on as were high hats and triangles (I'm just citing a few examples). Boxy wasn't anywhere near my mind as I was listening to them.

Granted, the guy doing the demo needs to work on his people skills and, as someone else suggested, drop the attitude. Of course this guy has attitude: he said that the speaker wires he had hooked up to those babies cost $13,500 a pair. Now, we've got a zillion threads on the relative merits of expensive cables (I happen to view it as snake oil to a large extent), so I don't want to go there, but if I had $80K or whatever to drop on speakers like those (or whatever it was - it was way outside of my price range), I might spring for a little more than zip cord.

Still, they sounded the most like live music to me of all the speakers I listened to on Saturday. But, at that price, they darn well better. There were some other close runners up (those Welsh speakers... Tom Evans??? I can't find my notes ... that didn't have any solder in the signal path and didn't have any crossovers in them... were pretty amazing - and at only $9K a pair, they're a steal!!! Yeah, right).
 
The 'Guy' in the Rega/Dali room was playing some very interesting and unusual music for us towards the end of the show Sunday. ( IE ~ The Dark Side of the Moon by The Flaming Lips!!)

I had to go back for a second visit with pen in hand because some of the stuff I heard was haunting me.

He told me that he was really enjoying this show as there was a real interest in the music and so many folks had eclectic tastes!

The Rega 2 box system and both the Dali speakers were very impressive too.

The music that was being played was off of the Bop - Clear Your Mind album, which I brought to test out some of the speakers at the show. Got haunting melodies but also fast, dynamic almost glitchy beats and deep basslines.
Ended up buying those Dali Menuets, which are burning in as I write. Amazing little buggers that were some of my favs from the show.
 
Ended up buying those Dali Menuets, which are burning in as I write. Amazing little buggers that were some of my favs from the show.

Those were one of my favorites at the show as well. If I had the scratch for it I would have bought them myself. :yes:
 
'Sounded pretty dynamic from the hallway . . . In-room they sounded boxy, but this was (to some extent) due to spkr placement - they were a low-directivity design, and placed way too close to the sidewalls -- 'Pretty hard to have a fair audition of the spkr itself under those conditions.

Aside: the seller(s) were NOT living-up to the AK pledge of "No Attitude". After a demo, they asked if anyone had questions about the speaker, so I asked a good question . . . The gent who replied was outright dissmissive and rude -- rolling his eyes and saying that it was an "irrelevant question". It seems (and I'm being gentle here) that he couldn't understand the question and/or had limited knowledge of audio.
I don't expect everyone to be an engineer, but it was a basic question. If multiple salesmen are hovering about the room just to sell a single product that costs more than my car, I expect more. In the end, it was simply a big speaker with traditional components in a curvy box. Nothing innovative about it.

If the folks referenced read this (I'd be shocked) I would welcome a PM to discuss.

Sorry for the rant . . .

-- Tubamark

What was the question?
 
What was the question?

This...

Did anyone have any thoughts on these speakers?

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Sorry, I think you misunderstood, I quoted tubamark's response because I was curious about his question.
 
Aside: the seller(s) were NOT living-up to the AK pledge of "No Attitude". After a demo, they asked if anyone had questions about the speaker, so I asked a good question . . . The gent who replied was outright dissmissive and rude -- rolling his eyes and saying that it was an "irrelevant question". It seems (and I'm being gentle here) that he couldn't understand the question and/or had limited knowledge of audio.
So, what was the question?
 
Aside: the seller(s) were NOT living-up to the AK pledge of "No Attitude". After a demo, they asked if anyone had questions about the speaker, so I asked a good question . . . The gent who replied was outright dissmissive and rude -- rolling his eyes and saying that it was an "irrelevant question".

-- Tubamark

It seems like he asked them a question and I would like to judge it's relevance. :)
 
The music that was being played was off of the Bop - Clear Your Mind album, which I brought to test out some of the speakers at the show. Got haunting melodies but also fast, dynamic almost glitchy beats and deep basslines.

I was in there for awhile when you were playing that disc... I liked it a lot, very minimalist. Outstanding on the little Menuetts... I couldn't believe how detailed, open and fast those speakers are while still being able to do a credible job on the bass and midrange. No, they are not going to rattle windows, but I didn't feel like they were giving up a whole lot. If I had a smallish room and some money burning a hole in my pocket... :thmbsp:
 
"The lowly SMAC room still sounded great"

I'm not sure what this means. The pictured equipment retails for around $7500, excluding Bob's DIY speakers and all the cabling we had.

I do agree that it sounded great though just not that it sounded great in spite of something else.

Jeff
 
Wonderful pics & assortments of awesome gear. Kudos to all involved in making this a nice event. Hope to join one some day.

Rome
 
Anybody hit Retrostereo's room? Looks like he may himself some new speakers.

I listened to his speakers quite a bit, and the big brothers to those in the Tyler room. Those things are just so fantastic sounding. I told Retro that if he didn't have room to get them home I had plenty. I would say out of all the vendors there, the Tyler speakers were by far the ones that most impressed me sound wise..
 
Did anyone have any thoughts on these speakers?

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Also...it seems like most of the speakers specialists were using tube gear...

I got a special test drive on these speakers.. and WOW was a first thought, and hhhhmm.. OK was the secodn thought...

I walked into their room Saturday right before 6pm. THey were getting ready to wind down, but he asked if we would like to hear something on them. WELL HELL YES!!!

So he pulls out Led Zep, and plays Dazed and Confused on them at a really great volume... ... WOW... the bass was super clean and super tight.. The imaging was way over the top, and the cymbols were ultra clean and really crisp. The vocals I would have called OK though. Nothing outstanding about them.

The other thing about them was at points, it sounded like there might have been a freq range that wasn't quite there, but then again, this is a hotel room we are listening to them in. I would love to hear them in a room tuned for them. I also know that Zep was never the greatest mastered band, so that could be why they seemed a little thin in places to me too. My wife agreed on all these points. We were really impressed by the sound though.

They were running these speakers on a huge CAT tube amp. Talk about tube.. 16 of those beasts in there, and I have a feeling that pure class A had a lot to do with how great the speakers sonded on it..
 
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