TP-028, Nat Adderley's Work Song is now available

Author Topic: CES reports  (Read 15804 times)

Offline ironbut

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CES reports
« on: January 09, 2009, 06:40:15 PM »
Here's a thread that out members who are there and couch potatos like myself can post thoughts, impressions and links to show reports we've found interesting.
Here's one from the Stereophile where John Atkinson seems pretty stoked on the sound from EAR room;
http://blog.stereophile.com/ces2009/ scroll about half way down.
steve koto
 Sony scd 777es(R. Kern mods)> Vpi Aires>Dynavector XX-2mkll>Bent mu>CAT ultimate>CJ premeir 140>Magnepan 1.6qr(Jensen xover)Headphone Eddie Current Zana Deux>AT ad2000,HD800 ,Metric Halo ULN-2 (battery powered),
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Offline Ben

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Re: CES reports
« Reply #1 on: January 09, 2009, 09:31:08 PM »
With the prices the salesman are throwing around for audio equipment
what does the middle class buy? Still no $1k cables, a good sign I hope.
Too bad, one could not demo a few R2R machines for sale.
« Last Edit: January 09, 2009, 09:35:20 PM by Ben »
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Offline joeljoel1947

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Re: CES reports
« Reply #2 on: January 12, 2009, 08:11:39 PM »
Well I am back from CES and semi-recovering from a red eye flight.  It was a great show overall, lots of enthusiasm.  Even though attendence was down, it was much more fun this year then last.  We got to talk more to the manufacturers and get better seating in the rooms for demos!

I got to spend some time in both the EAR and TAD rooms, which were both proudly playing the TP tapes.  The sound in both rooms was excellent!  Matter of fact, I was sitting right next to David Chesky on the last day in the TAD room and overheard him say he thought it was the best sounding room in the whole place! 

I got to bother DocB a bit at the TAD room and met "The Pauls".  Great bunch of guys.  I'm really glad that they are now modding the Otaris (I got to see the smashed modded one at least) because I think its a great deck with lots of potential (I'm biased though as I have 5 of them).  They are also hoping to offer kits for these mods down the road.

Finally, in the EAR room I was able to hear some cuts from the new series and also a cut from Waltz for Debbi, which is one I haven't received yet.  Oh my God!  The Waltz is unbelievable!!

Anyhow, just wanted to share some quick thoughts.  I'm sure glowing reviews for the TP stuff from CES is just days and weeks ahead.

Joel
Regards,
Joel Kozlowski

Offline docb

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Re: CES reports
« Reply #3 on: January 12, 2009, 08:51:19 PM »
Thanks for the kind words, Joel. It was great to meet you. Yeah, David was just raving about the TAD compact monitors to Paul and I too. I agree, they were sounding awesome, my faves of the show along with the Magico M5s. I made myself crazy going back and forth listening to both of them on Saturday. Each a little different and each fabulous in its own way. I could live with either one for a long time.
Dan "Doc B." Schmalle
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Managing Director - retired, The Tape Project

Offline joeljoel1947

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Re: CES reports
« Reply #4 on: January 12, 2009, 09:14:07 PM »
Hi Doc,
Great to have met you too!  I really wanted to make it to the Mirage for that party Thursday but we got so stuck in traffic at the Venetian we just decided to stay there for a few more hours.  Thats what we get for parking on the 9th floor.

The Magico room was great, you are right about that.  I doubt you made it over to THE Show, but the Magnepan "mystery demo" was out of this world.  It turned out to be my favorite overall.  If your curious, you can read a post I made earlier today on Audio Asylum:
http://www.audioasylum.com/forums/MUG/messages/13/137124.html

Anyhow, thanks again for being so hospitable at the show!

Joel

Regards,
Joel Kozlowski

Offline Ki Choi

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Re: CES reports
« Reply #5 on: January 16, 2009, 02:46:16 PM »
Hi Joel:

Thanks for the link.

Although I did not go to CES this year, the best sound I heard last year was the Evolution Acoustic's MM3 speakers at the Alexis Park near where I was working the April Music room.

The president of April Music (had a show room in Venetian), Simon Lee, had said in the AM's user forum that these Mini-Maggies were worth buying even if they cost $100K a pair - loosely translated.  He was certainly floored and planning on writting a dedicated report later on these amazing speakers.

Hopefully it won't cost $100K...

Ki
Ki Choi

Offline ironbut

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Re: CES reports
« Reply #6 on: January 16, 2009, 03:40:39 PM »
Nice write up Joel. I was kinda shocked when I saw how small those things are. Being used to the 1.6 too, the first thing I thought of was "what if I had an array of them" but of course, it might be screwing up the imaging by adding phase problems etc.
Really great to see that their still coming up with new tricks up there in Minn..
steve koto
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Offline Ben

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Re: CES reports
« Reply #7 on: January 16, 2009, 04:22:14 PM »
Specs... I want to see specs ... I don't trust anything with the word mini.
What makes $100,000 pair better than say a $3000 pair?
 
My speaker budget was $2K and I got a good pair of full range speakers 60Hz
to 20Khz. I see room sized music -- needs room sized speakers, no cutting
corners on speaker size. Now all  I need is a good center woofer, but I have
seen any I like yet.

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Offline joeljoel1947

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Re: CES reports
« Reply #8 on: January 16, 2009, 08:53:01 PM »
Ki---do you know John Elison???  He was helping to man the April Music room last year with his PC and Stello DAC!  Glad someone like Simon Lee thought as highly of those mini-maggies as I did.  There have been several quotes I've heard, besides my own, that have really floored me.  Such as in the mini-review on Soundstage.com where an owner of a pair of the 20.1's proclaimed, "I wish mine sounded as good as these mini-maggies!".  Magnepan certainly has a predicament here because although they do SOUND LIKE 10-100k speakers (and believe me at the show those were all there as you know), they certainly can't price them too high where people will laugh or too low where nobody would ever buy the other speakers in their product line!!!!

Steve---you are spot on with your assessment of adding "more" of them in an array.  IMHO, the REASON they sounded so good was BECAUSE they were so small.  Kind of like the long standing theory that "mini-monitors image better then large floorstanders"---thats EXACTLY what was going on there.  You could stand up, sit down, be on axis, off axis, stand on your head, it didn't matter---they imaged like NUTS!  They did not have the "beaming effect" that I hear with so many Maggies and electrostats and this, IMHO, was because they were so small!

Ben---nothing makes a 100k pair better then a 3k pair of speakers.  Magnepan just proved that at CES.  In reality, these will be priced max around 2.5k, and that will include at least 1 "woofer panel".  Wendell said he really didn't want to make them cost more then the 1.6's and those are $1700 right now.  A single woofer panel that is needed with these mini-maggies is $500.  So, max you have $1700 plus $500=$2200.

Well, this 2.2k pair of speakers just beat everything at the show (IMHO), regardless of cost (they sounded waaaay better then the self proclaimed YG Acoustics "Best Loudspeaker in the World".  This Maggie demo proved once again in my mind that in high end audio "you don't always get what you pay for."!

My guess on Specs are that the speakers with at least 1 woofer (preferrably 2) they will go from 40Hz-40kHz.  Remember, they are using the ribbon from the 20.1 and that one goes out that far.  And the woofer panel, according to Wendell Diller, is good to 40Hz as long as it is near a room boundary.  As for filling a room with sound?  The room this demo was in was about 30 feet long and 20 feet wide and 10 feet tall (in other words, BIG).  The room was filled EFFORTLESSLY.  I doubt your room is that big, so you should be fine.

Hope that helps.

Joel

 
Regards,
Joel Kozlowski

Offline Ben

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Re: CES reports
« Reply #9 on: January 16, 2009, 09:35:11 PM »
I would like to know more about the woofer panel.
The problem is I have no idea who makes a sub woofer
that has about 8 ohms impedance. The few drivers I have looked
at all peak on the bottom end at about 32 to 64 ohms impedance.
The other factor is how many watts are needed to drive the speakers.
More and more I see, speaker design is still a black art
and getting amps to work well with them.
 

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Offline joeljoel1947

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Re: CES reports
« Reply #10 on: January 17, 2009, 06:22:07 AM »
Ben---
Here is some more on the woofer, and a picture too:
http://www.avguide.com/blog/the-maggie-mystery-speaker-part-2

It's 4 ohms and passive (no amp in it), so you will need to have some power.  They used 1800 watts into 4 ohm per channel Bryston monoblocks in the demo, but that was overkill to trick us into thinking there were huge speakers behind the curtains (i.e. all we could see were the amps in front of the curtains).
Regards,
Joel Kozlowski

Offline steveidosound

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Re: CES reports
« Reply #11 on: January 17, 2009, 11:40:49 AM »
Traditionally Magneplanar and low power single ended  filamentary triode tube amps don't play well together. They are (or were) pretty inefficient speakers.
I had a set of the 1st generation Tympani IIIs - 3 panels per side - driven by 200 watts per channel and it was barely adequate.
Steve Williams

you don't want to know what equipment I listen to...

Offline ironbut

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Re: CES reports
« Reply #12 on: January 17, 2009, 11:57:37 AM »
I think that Magnepan has improved quite a bit in the efficiency dept. lately but they are a pretty tough load (dips down to 2 ohms ). I use a 140 W PP amp on mine and plan to biamp them one of these days with another 200W amp on the woofer panels. I think that one of the main considerations with any dipole is placement and room treatment.
steve koto
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Offline Ki Choi

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Re: CES reports
« Reply #13 on: January 17, 2009, 03:08:04 PM »
Ki---do you know John Elison???  He was helping to man the April Music room last year with his PC and Stello DAC!  Glad someone like Simon Lee thought as highly of those mini-maggies as I did.  There have been several quotes I've heard, besides my own, that have really floored me.  Such as in the mini-review on Soundstage.com where an owner of a pair of the 20.1's proclaimed, "I wish mine sounded as good as these mini-maggies!".  Magnepan certainly has a predicament here because although they do SOUND LIKE 10-100k speakers (and believe me at the show those were all there as you know), they certainly can't price them too high where people will laugh or too low where nobody would ever buy the other speakers in their product line!!!!

Joel

 

Hi Joel:

If you visited AM room last year, we may have met.  It was always so busy only John and I manning the room- we barey got to eat lunch. John helps me in marketing AM in US.

One thought on the nice sound at CES for Mini-Maggies is the particular Room a the Alexis Park.  Although our AM room at the Alexis Park last year was not as good as Magnapan room but we used a common pair of B&W Signature 805s on standard stands to demo the stello CDT-100 CD transport /DA100 Signature DAC via I2S connection/HP 100 preamp/ S100 50w/ch power amp and had truly super sound - resulting in positib remarks by TAS and Stereophile reviewers visited our room.  Unfortunately, we were just as successful in promoting the B&W speakers where people always went to the front of the room to check on the speakers after hearing such a tuneful bass, etc.  However, when we brought the same speakers back to normal listening room... We never could repeat the feat using the very same gear...

I look forward to hearing the Mini-Maggies in a normal room.

Ki
Ki Choi

Offline joeljoel1947

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Re: CES reports
« Reply #14 on: January 17, 2009, 09:29:57 PM »
You are spot on Ki which is why I began my review on AA of the mini-maggies at Alexis Park with,

 "Now, I will say right up front that of any room at either the Venetian or Alexis Park, Magnepan had the best actual ROOM to work with (maybe the TAD room was close though at the Venetian). Very large, but not TOO large, optimum seating, optimum setup, normal height ceilings, etc. So they had a significant "advantage" over the other demo rooms in Vegas. I was speaking with them and they have used this same room for a few shows now (they were there last year too) because they like its acoustics a whole bunch. I heard nothing to dismiss their beliefs!"

Good to know you know John E. too!  If you were at Alexis Park, we probably did meet as I was there quite a bit last year compared to the Venetian.  I had a friend representing Opera/Consonance there.

Take care, Joel


 
Regards,
Joel Kozlowski