2011 CES Show Report V

Simaudio

Simaudio had a reserved display, with quite a number of static units, but playing the new Moon 750D DAC/Transport ($12,000), 750P Preamplifier ($25,000), and 880M Mono Power Amplifiers ($38,000/pr). Accompanying these were the Vienna Acoustics The Kiss speaker system ($15,000 incl. stands). As Jeff Rowland has at times used his equipment as background music, so also the Simaudio rig seemed to be playing at very moderate levels. The atmosphere was wonderful, but I did not get a demo to comment on the system’s capacity.

Lotus Group

The Lotus Group displayed the well regarded Granada Loudspeaker with active crossover and Feastrex Type II Field Coil Driver ($125,000/pr), Hanns T-60 Turntable ($5,000) with Origin Live Illustrious Tonearm ($9,000) and Dynavector DRT XV-1t Cartridge ($1,895), the Hanns PA-60 two chassis Tube Phono Stage ($2,750), Musical Fidelity AMSCD CD Player ($8,999), SMc VRE-1B Preamplifier by Steve Mccormack ($15,950), and Musical Fidelity AMS50 Class A Stereo Amplifiers ($13,999 each).

The Lotus room has always been intriguing to me as it shows a system comprised of relatively affordable components with some very costly components, for instance cabling from PranaWire and power treatment from Acoustic Revive totaled more than $100K! This puts the cabling and power treatment at approximately one third the value of the $311,685 system price tag! If I had not assembled similarly unusual systems myself with cabling costs skewed to the high side as much as 30% I would be tempted to ridicule such efforts. But I have built extremely fine sounding rigs with similar unusual combinations of gear. The Gradada speaker system has never failed to impress and this rig was no exception.

Fono Acustica

For several years I have been enamoured of the sound of the Kaiser Kawero speaker ($66,000/pr) with a variety of gear. This time the attending system included the Denon DP-3000 Turntable with modified tonearm and Shelter MC Cartridge, Concert Fidelity SPA-4C Phonostage ($14,000), Esoteric X-01D2 SACD/CD Player ($19,500) as transport to the Concert Fidelity DAC-040 D/A Converter ($10,000), Concert Fidelity CF-080LSX Linestage Preamplifier ($20,000), Fono Acustica Armonico Interconnects (approx. $6,790/meter/pr) and Speaker Cables (approx. $18,300/meter/pr), and Silicon Arts Design ZL-200 Monoblock Power Amplifiers ($40,000/pr).

The Silicon Arts and Concert Fidelity solid state electronics have sounded very good at the past two or three shows, and once again they had a smooth, refined way with the Kawero speakers. I once again heard surprised show goers comment about this system as the size of the speakers is unassuming, but is far more powerful than it appears and has a high degree of openness like a planar speaker with its ribbon module.