My very personal, subjective but undogmatic and honest High End Munich 2022 show report

[jazznut]

My report this year (it’s all just an opinion) is a bit different and shorter than the last two. Compared to what I’m used to meanwhile, I was even less impressed soundwise in terms of a possible combination of air around instruments and air all over a shimmering 3D soundstage, enveloping, holographic singers and instruments, natural, organic timbre and energetic, lively dynamics than at the last shows also by most of the biggest and best setups. Several big setups for sure had certain better technically effective audio characteristics due to size, concept or effort taken (e.g. macro dynamics), but the vast majority missed to transform the whole into a realistic illusion… although preconditions were much better this time…

Due to a much less crowded situation on the non-public day, I had the chance to get the middle sweet spot seat where I wanted, to listen for quite some time and to also play recordings I knew well. Many rooms were very well acoustically treated this year with often a quite large speaker to front wall distance, which enabled a quite good listening experience if one was ready to ignore the usually less optimal bass tightness in those rooms.

I’ll post a few sections now.
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The interesting, nice, fancy, crazy stuff (no listening):
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Beautiful (Audio Research):

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Crazy (8k, I even heard those, better no word about it):

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Boulder with always impressing design:

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Gryphon‘s new small speakers:

And the beasts, which are even bigger than they look:
(The normal Gryphon class A amps so far had and have two of those heat sinks in a row, the prototype I once had, had 3 and the Apex now is 4 heat sinks long). Regarding the rough interior design, the concept seems to never have changed since 30 years, but details will be very different for sure.

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Always crazy…Metaxas:

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The best vinyl playback one can get…Acoustical Systems (fully fletched, bigger than the Axiom, fully titan, all fine adjustments arm 58k, upcoming turntable 75k)

[kerosene]

What were your observations regarding the presence or discussions of MQA? Did they have a dedicated room or booth of some sort? Just curious.

Related, was Atmos (for music) being discussed at all?

Those Gryphon prototype speakers look cool.

[jazznut]

I”m sorry, MQA and Atmos was of no interest for me, I didn’t recognize anything about it.

[Baldy]

Very nice. Thanks for the report!

[vkennedy61]

It may be just me, but I feel like I see fewer mid to high DAC’s with MQA. Perhaps it’s because with streaming bandwidth at relatively reasonable prices, MQA isn’t really that necessary.

I could be way off here with my observations.

[jazznut]

The disappointing sounding section (examples):
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Many say, it makes no sense to judge sound at shows. That’s more or less right, but boring. And preconditions are the same for everyone, room treatments and placements this time were really good, so why not? If it wasn’t possible to compare, all would sound as bad…which they did not.
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This was not good at all, especially considering the financial effort.

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I already heard the big Avantgarde good sounding, not this time. They were supported by the Wadax player, which I heard in 3-4 different setups there and was nearly always disappointed. At least it didn’t save the sound in those setups. By the way the music played there (e.g. Oscar Peterson We get requests LP) was such a badly mastered pressing, that any 5k setup using a good reissue or the original would have beaten this one by far. A clear matter of no clue what to play.

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Looked great but played very disappointing this time:

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Also here not too good but a lot of effort:

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If one combines two anemic sounding types of components, we know what happens…

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This theoretical allstar combination never convinces without a matching room and more care. Better just show and not play it then.

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I still have to hear any Magico and/or CH Precision setup really convincing. Still nothing desirable there for me (I know they they constantly get rave reviews). But I’m sure there is a way to hear them great.

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…to be continued tomorrow…

[vkennedy61]

It really makes no sense to me. Between a lack of dialing the systems in and poor material, it makes me wonder if they just don’t care or they think the customer doesn’t know better.

At the shows I have attended I have often noticed a lack of power conditioning and a lot of gear that’s not broken in, including cables.

A dealer friend once told me to attend the last show of the season because by then the gear has had time to settle in.

[scotte1]

A lot of Samolians spent on this set up.

Nice eye candy…

[kerosene]

I assume that’s a power conditioner and/or a regenerator in the left corner. What manufacturer?

[scotte1]

Stromtank

[allan.thunes]

Paraphrasing Paul in one of his recent videos, at some point the cost of what goes into gear becomes less about sound quality and more about aesthetics. At that point does the house look become as or more important than the house sound?

[aangen]

In my opinion, Gryphon gear escapes this area of thought. It is just so oh-my-God badass that I just buy the gear and giggle every time I use it. But Gryphon gear, while expensive, is not boofoo expensive. The Boulder gear though, hmmmmm.

I hate that the big Wilsons were wasted. I still have a thing for Wilson.

Excellent and very enjoyable posts @jazznut !!!

[jazznut]

The Wilson’s definitely can sing, but it needs the right amps and care for the matching room and placement.

But I think most visitors do not know how good Hifi can sound…honestly.

[kzk]

Was there much buzz about Stromtank? Have heard it’s the best one can do if cost no object

[jazznut]

They were at the show in 2018 already. Their focus is on cases where complete supply shutdowns can happen. I don’t think this is the most cost efficient concept otherwise.

[kzk]

Wadax is fugly. Looks like it could be a toy I’d buy for my 5 year old nephew at Toys R Us
(Yes I know it’s massive and probably the most expensive dac out there currently and well regarded sonically but jeez, trying way too hard on aesthetics- swing and a miss)

[kzk]

@allan.thunes

At that point does the house look become as or more important than the house sound?

Only to posers.

Sonics 100x more important than looks, but that said it shouldn’t look cheap or hideous. Doesn’t have to look the best, but not cheap or hideous (unless it absolutely destroys everything else sonically, then ok).

[Rudolf_Appel]

High res in general is too cumbersome. I am very happy with Apples uncompressed format, CD’s and vinyl.

Speakers and amps make the biggest difference from there.

[Rudolf_Appel]

Nice report. Beautiful pictures.

I think crowded hotel rooms and exhibition booths are not ideal for listening. What I would enjoy is talking to people who share the hobby, having a chance to talk to the people what have a big share in manufacturing that beautiful equipment is the exciting part of exhibitions.

A quite day at a dealer with a limited but interesting choice of equipment is the much better condition for listening.

In exhibitions there is so much going on that there is simply no piece of mind that allows for good listening sessions.

Nevertheless I was not in Munich and appreciate you sharing this with us.

[jazznut]

If you look at the Chord or the Wilson Benesh room, the speakers stand far in the room, often extensive room treatments were applied…good preconditions (better than in many listening rooms) for great soundstage experiences and even some flexibility in tonality tweaking with positioning. And it was not crowded on dealer day when I was there. Not sure what should be so bad. This time all my listening could be done in the sweet spots…didn’t help too often unfortunately.