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2019 CAS Report by Richard Austen, Part 2

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So comes to an end CAS 2019.  I enjoyed a number of rooms as well as meeting up with some of my fellow writers.  The folks behind the scenes that make these shows happen and meeting a number of wonderful show goers.  I was pleased to see a large number of people under the age of 30 in attendance and enjoying many of the rooms.

This section is dedicated to my two favorite normal sized listening rooms.  Acapella was my favorite large room loudspeaker systems but for more of us the price and room requirements put such systems into the land of the top 1%.

 

Room 5220 Old Forge Audio – Pure Sound (Amplification) / Soundkaos (Speakers) / Wand (Turntable)

This is another one of those – “how do you get all of that sound out of such a tiny speaker” scenarios.  Here’s the thing – I am not generally a fan of small speakers that strive for a lot of bass.  They usually wind up sounding boom and sizzly to me and while I walk away impressed with the bass that is usually the only thing that impresses me.  Not this time.  These tiny speakers are four ways.  They run $6,750 a pair (including dedicated stands) and I am told by Dave Cope that they will have an upgraded version coming.

I enjoyed the music here.  Piano and acoustic instruments felt real and present and even though there was a mishap and the correct stands didn’t make it to the show – I felt this is what a small loudspeaker that promises big sound should be.  There was feeling depth to the piano on Jackson Browne’s “The Pretender” as well as Sarah McLachlan’s “Angel.”

Vinyl was outstanding played via the Wand Turntable and tonearm ($5,600 combined).  This fed into Pure Audio Vinyl phono stage ($4,500) to the Pure Audio ONE integrated amplifier($10,000).  I was highly impressed with this solid state amplifier and I have requested a review sample.  For my regular readers, you know I am not a fan of most solid state amplifiers.  No the system wasn’t perfect – you could always ask for more bass or more air but this was a music delight.

 

Room 5226 – Audio Note UK / True Sound

By Sunday the Audio Note room separated itself from the pack as I spoke to a few musicians in attendance (two pianists) who were really rather taken with the rooms ability to recreate instruments  with such realism. Like great theater one needs the suspension of disbelief. The Audio Note room was often packed and people, including myself, chuckling that so much sound could be attained from a 9 watt amplifier and a 300B no less.

Audio Note was showing their new version of their 300B Meishu called the Meishu Tonemeister.  The previous Meishu has been in production for around 25 years and the new version makes upgrades utilizing the power supply design of the 211 Ongaku. At first I was a little worried that the sound would be too analytical or punchy losing the beauty and gentility associated with 300B tube amplifiers. This will always be a matter of taste as I was not a huge fan of the previous Meishu because I had felt it was too soft and gentle. But this new Meishu Tonmeister is just something else – it lives up to the name – it’s a tonemeister. I can understand why they sold one during the show. It has seemingly endless power reserves and bass and body throughout.

The new TT3 turntable with PSU 2 power supply) there are three versions (levels of quality) of the power supply to control each of three motors. What was amazing about the sound of this front end was that it all came out of the IQ3 – a mere moving magnet cartridge. The showrunners this year played a wide variety of music from the standard classical and jazz to the body crunching dub-step techno music.  All rendered beautifully.

 

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