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The Best Show Reporting
Coverage of CES 2000 from Las Vegas, NV --
Jan. 6-9, 2000
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| SoundStage!
LIVE Product Coverage - January 13 |
Reference 3A, distributed in North America by
Divergent Technologies, gets a nomination for the biggest price reduction. The Reference
3A Royal Master loudspeakers used to retail for $5000 per pair. Divergent
Technologies is now moving manufacturing to North America and the new retail price is
$2200 per pair!
Sahuaro Cable's Ron Paquette holds the company's new and much smaller Jetstream AC Power
Cord ($1200 in the standard two-meter length, but the modular construction of the cord
allows for easy shortening or lengthening). Sahuaro uses "air
dielectric" construction in their audio and power cables to achieve performance that
they believe is as good as you can get.
For the second CES in a row, the Shun Mook room had impressive sound, but this year the
system was all analog -- no digital to be found. The Bella Voce Reference speakers
($11,000 per pair) were driven by Lamm ML2 mono amplifiers via Nordost SPM cabling. An ARC
Reference One preamp and Reference Phono phono stage along with an Oracle turntable
rounded out the system, which made leaving the room, blanketed in Shun Mook discs as it
was, tough.
Silver Audio showed the new Hyacinth interconnect ($250 per meter pair) featuring
eight-conductor litz construction.
Slab Technology Limited of New Zealand showed a series of small desktop panel speakers
called, appropriately, Slab. Intended for small systems or personal computers, the Slab
speakers take up little space and are about as thick as three credit cards. Slab will also
sell picture frames with peel-off adhesive for affixing the artwork. You trim your own
artwork to the frame size, peel off the adhesive covering, and apply your own artwork. The
artwork becomes the driver, completely camouflaging the source. In the photo, the painting
in the blue frame was actually making music when the photo was taken. The sound was not of
audiophile quality, but it was certainly equal to or better than low-cost speakers in
moderately priced products. A small gray sub-satellite system sells for $139, while the
top-of-the line panels are $200 per pair.
The Speaker Art Proklaim II ($10,000 per pair) seeks to eliminate internal and external
cabinet resonances and eliminate cabinet diffractions at the same time. The cabinet shell
incorporates a tensioned skin overlaying a lossy core and viscoelastic damping layer.
Closed-cell aircraft foam is used inside as a superior damping material. The crossover is
Speaker Arts' proprietary quasi-fourth-order design refined over two decades. The
crossover is claimed to achieve steep attenuation, smooth power response, and superb phase
and amplitude linearity.
Thiel used their new PowerPoint surface-mount speakers ($1300 each) on the floor, walls
and ceiling to reproduce six-channel SACDs.
Tyler Acoustics’ Taylo Minimonitor ($1500 per pair, displayed finish is additional)
features a Scan-Speak tweeter and woofer, and produces a sound that the company claims is
preferred by many customers over that of even their $5800-per-pair Taylo Reference System.
Von Schweikert Audio’s new VR-7 floorstanding loudspeakers ($15,000 per pair) were
driven by an assortment of Bel Canto electronics, including the DAC1 DAC ($1295) and EVo
200.2 digital amplifier ($2395) via Analysis Plus cables. The sound was very good.
An ASC Tube Trap with the light on top? That's the
Taylor Moffitt Acoustic Carpentry Tube Trap Lite ($200 each, light only; Tube Trap is sold
separately). The Lite is a touch-sensitive fixture designed to make interior decorators
and spouses happier with the presence of Tube Traps in the room. The loudspeaker next to
the Tube Trap is the Paragon Acoustics Jade ($4995 per pair).
The lovely Wavac PR-X1 remote-controlled preamp retails for $6970.
Shown by importer tmh audio, the Wavac MD-811 amp ($3990) features 15Wpc, a volume control
and three line-level inputs.
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