Rupert Neve mixing desk Socks swag. Got one of his little HP amps as well. Would like one of his summing mixers, but they’re $8k.
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Yes. The new P12 replaces the P5, the new P15 replaces the P10.
They are symmetrical. I sat sat dead center and intentionally checked that. My wife says I’m anal, but she doesn’t know any other audiophiles!
The view from the 3rd floor
It’s either an espresso machine from Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow, or it must be a Western Electric 91C:
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Thanks for posting the pictures!
amsco - no problem. I have a few more. Met Jeffstar today, which was great, saw JA in the PS rooms, and yet more PS folks. It was fun.
One nice bit was that the Renaissance seems to be built of sterner stuff than the Westin - that is, ALL the rooms seemed to resonate less. So overall better sound.
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He’s right. In this room, and in this case I went for dead-on symmetrical.
I posted this over in What are you Spinning now but want to spread the apology.
BTW, those visiting my home city for Axpona, I want to apologize for the horrendous weather. Do note, it’s not that unusual. I’ve been going to White Sox “spring” baseball games for the majority of my adult life. It almost always sucks in the spring. Snowed on a May 6th game once. Stick around for another two months, it’ll get ridiculously hot and humid soon!
Hey! It was gorgeous on Wednesday and Thursday! 
A couple of good sounding rooms: SME/Chord/Raidho
ALL Bryston, including the speakers - the Mini T, which they call “active”. And by that they mean, “powered and crossed over externally”. Go figure. They come with internal crossovers, and so work like a regular speaker, but you can upgrade to their external Xover which bypasses the internals. Driven by a 6 Ch. amp (2x300W and 4x100). Imaged like mad and was perfectly sized for the room.
The Synergistic room had a fab system with a Constellation amp the size of a VW powering Magico S5 Mk.II speakers. Independent of whether you heard all of the effects of the devices Ted was ‘leading’ the audience to hear, it was a great sounding room. Very large with very high ceiling. Sorry - forgot to go back and get a snap.
I visited the Synergistic Room and was impressed with the sound. While I might have heard a change with his gizmos, the science behind some of them seems, uh, questionable. If the tweaks were a little more affordable it might be worth a shot, but his prices just seem unjustified to me. I know others will disagree with me, but that’s why they call it an opinion. Haven’t listened to other two rooms you listed, but will get there today. I’m skipping a lot of rooms, some were crowded others just didn’t click when I saw what was on display.
I really liked the Vandersteen room on the 6th floor, the Quatro’s sounded wonderful for the small room (I’m a Vandersteen fan). The Elac room with the B5 or B6 replacement (the speakers were $300) plus the Elac integrated ($700) was amazing for the price. Andrew Jones knows his stuff. I also heard the big Elac monitors ($2500?) on the first day, but was unimpressed. Something was going on with the equipment so I’ll go back. I also saw that Peter Madnick was wearing an Elac badge, didn’t know he worked for them. Heard several other good rooms, but not coming to mind at the moment.
I will say the big rooms here are BIG and the hotel rooms seem a little small, but that may be a relative thing. Not too many suites which is surprising for this sort of hotel.
Here are a few more photos of the PS Audio room showing the new line of regenerators. Of note is there will be a Stellar regenerator, about 300 watts of power and around $2K. Perfect for source components.
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Here’s a view you don’t see too often in show reports …
That’s from the VAC/Von Schweikert room. They had a huge equipment rack and very large power cables and interconnects. I don’t even want to know how much this set up cost.
The cables were behind the rack on the left.
Right back at you. I went with an audiophile friend and his wife. We missed a lot of rooms, and I was seldom in a decent seat to judge the overall sound. It was easier to judge the bad sounding, rather than the good.
My local shop “Ultra Fidelis” which did sound very good, even though I could only stand in the back had a new pair of Vandersteen amps. While the first amps were designed to work with the 7s and used tubes, these were solid state. I didn’t get many details, but are still designed to work with Vandersteen speakers, put out 150 watts at 8 ohms, doubling at 4 ohms. They were running with a pair of Quatras, Audio Research preamps, and AMG turntable. Amps will be priced at around $30k.
I thought Carver"s room with his latest speakers sounded good. The rooms upstairs were mostly really small, and the next size up, were still not big enough for large speakers. The MBL room was very good being played at a medium volume. The last time I heard an MBL system they had a large area, and while the sound was impressive, listener fatigue would have been a problem. I did get to hear a pair of the Tekton speakers, a pair of stand mounted. No idea of electronics, but the speakers did live up to the hype at Audiogon. Paragon Audio had I think it was 3, but could have been 4. I was way in the back but the room with the Wilson Sasha had a better match of gear and setup, as I was more impressed than rooms with the bigger Wilsons. I was also impressed with the Sonus Faber Aida, powered by the massive Audio Research tube amps. Those amps will cost more to retube, than Paul’s whole Stellar system.
Not being alone, I couldn’t spend enough time to hear any proper demos, so don’t take my impressions as a reason to not consider any of the speakers mentioned. I will say my vote for the worst sounding room was using the Eminent Technology Lft-8s. The Tekton speakers deserve a listen, Paul’s system I think would make anyone putting together their first system very happy, and for your kid the new Sprout package. On the way home, we were discussing the ridiculous people who think there is no low cost audio gear. That little Sprout, and having never seen one, it is small, is so much better than what was available when I was in my teens. Every teenager should get one for Christmas, it could be the product that helps create a new generation of audiophiles.
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Since Jeff and Dr. Goodears brought them up: MBLs
Thanks for the pics of the Stellar PP!