Nordost's new $6100 Valhalla speaker cable was the talk of the show. Valhalla interconnects are priced at $3300 for a one-meter pair. Once again Lars Kristensen was performing his cable-comparison demo, this time showing the improvement of the Valhalla over Nordost's older reference, the popular SPM.

Joule Electra, well-known maker of OTL power amplifiers, unveiled their $5000-per-pair Stargate mono amplifiers. SoundStage! will be getting a pair for review soon.

Blue Circle's new BC25 remote-controlled preamp will sell for around $3000. It is fully balanced and has all-tube circuitry.

Wilson Audio showed its new Watch Dog powered subwoofer ($9995), whose amplifier is "very conservatively rated" at 400W. Augmenting a pair of CUB II monitors, the Watch Dog produced some of the deepest, fastest, weightiest bass we've heard. And for those wondering, the Watch Dog is about the size of a large dorm refrigerator and weighs 283 pounds.

Designer Andrew Welker stands beside the new Mirage OM-1 loudspeaker. The main panel has front- and rear-firing 1" titanium-dome tweeters, 2" aluminum-and-titanium-dome midranges, and 6.5" carbon-fiber midbass drivers. This statement-level bipolar speaker boasts four 10" bass drivers in the back cabinet, each in isolated enclosures, that deliver bass down to 16Hz. Regular production has not yet commenced, but the price is expected to be in the $25,000-$30,000 range.

Sharp showed the SM-SX200 one-bit digital integrated amplifier (top), which operates at 5.6MHz -- double the speed of Sharp's SX-AV100 amplifier. The unit's price is yet to be determined.