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Bristol Show 2019 Feb 22-24.

Hi!

Sure: he demo'd a couple of tracks (from a slightly noisy pressing!) with different levels of 'upgrades' to a 'standard' Rega tt.

With the supplied felt mat .v. Funk mat (the demo that persuaded me to buy one last year!), with and without the Bo!ing tt decoupling feet (which made me think long enough about the change brought about that I ordered a set specific to Technics tt's last night!!); then, I think, he went on to demo before and after upgrades to a Rega arm but I left before he got to that.
 
As a happy 3010S2D owner I would echo the disappointment of the Exposure room, I found the sound far to sibilant, in contrast I thought the Brigadier speakers in the Leema room which were completely unknown to me were superb (at 5K so they should be). I too also enjoyed the Creek room, the simple modest set ups were generally the nicest sounding.
 
I think it was, the crossover was completely wrong, which is a shame. I heard them with, what was supposed to be, a production-ready Naim active x-over and they sounded ace. Apparently Naim’s owners, Focal, went batshit over Naim’s willingness to work with another speaker manufacturer and it got canned.
 
Darmok said:
Lols.

The last time I attended TBS, in one of the demo rooms I persuaded the guy who was loading and demoing a CD system to play Opeths "Still Life."

220px-Opeth_stilllife.jpg


If you know this band and CD, it starts with an intro of a beautiful acoustic guitar solo, it progresses into a cresendo assault of drum pummeling, dual guitars raging and finally a roar of a cookie monster vocal as the song really gets going.

The room cleared in 30 seconds, the CD spinner was dumb struck and darmok, his eyes wet, grinning. :D

That btw was just over 12 years ago.

What fun.
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I was dragged to the Fyne Audio room by their PR chap, who is a good mate, to check out their speakers before the show opened on the Saturday. We played a few noodly hi-fi show tracks and then he unleashed some Slayer - we had it cranked up so much that the sign above the door outside in the corridor fell off!

Frankly, I can feel a 'hi-fi show compilation CD' coming on. I shall have to practice my poker face when handing it over, though.
 
ThELiZ said:
Would love to hear me some Slayer cranked out at a HiFi show.
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Or any other half-decent rock. Anything other than the usual plinky-plonky cr@p! Just once, many years ago, Naim played “Sweet Child in Time” through a full-fat 500 + F’ugly Grand Utopias - by ‘eck, it were grand!
 
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Well my visit to the Bristol HiFi Show bought an unexpected surprise. Suzywong is so right, for me if the music on demo has something that attracts me, excites me or gets my foot tapping then I will naturally notice more about the system on demo. If the music is typical HIFi demo music which shows off the system but is dull,boring and even pointless, then even if the system is super high end there is nothing of interest for me, that is with most HiFi systems, ... but I have discovered one brand which simply highlights the music and makes the recording, the music so interesting and enjoyable and that is ATC. I heard the ATC SCM40 with their new integrated amp and cd player. For me that speaker was the 'star' which will make you rediscover your music collection and suddenly realise the beauty of your recodings! After that experience I did not feel the need to hear other speaker brands (I already heard JBl2, the new Dynaudio speakers, Fyne Audio speakers, Focal Sopra2, Falcon Studio Standmounts, Proac,Monitor Audio, Scansonic, Enormous Spendour speakers all very fine speakers giving various presentations) because I know they will not match the ATC speakers in the areas which ATC do so well.
 
Continuing from what Romulus said, I don’t know why demonstrators are seemingly afraid of “music con cojones”.

Perhaps their “mega systems” just cannot cope with decent rock music....

...or for that matter, full blown orchestras!
 
Unlike others I didn't have a problem with most of the music I heard being played. Spendor were playing some electro music which was certainly testing the bass output of their classic speakers which they were handling with aplomb (they just might be my go to speakers if I ever win the lottery). Harbeth were playing some complex orchestral music through their P3s which once again demonstrated how good they are. I heard some Stevie Ray Vaughn in 2 different rooms & while I was in the Leema room they played some Depeche Mode & Inxs. I think some of the attendees might be to blame for the plinkerty plonk "HiFi" music, when I got to the Fyne Audio room they were playing some great Indie rock music when one of the listeners handed the sales guy a CD of piano music which he explained to no one in particular would test the dynamic range of the speakers.
 
Lucky you, no SRV for me....not even the Dynaudio folks who are usually good for “Tin Pan Alley” :)
 
suzywong said:
Lucky you, no SRV for me....not even the Dynaudio folks who are usually good for “Tin Pan Alley” :)
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It was Tin pan alley I heard being played, once in the Focal/Naim room through the NDX2 streamer & Focal Kanta standmounts (too sibilant) & once being played on a TT I didn't recognise (It had a Hana cart, the only rep in the room was a Japanese guy, I assume the Hana rep, whose English wasn't very good) through some Graham Audio floorstanders which sounded very nice if a bit too bassy for my liking (maybe the room?).
 
Anybody else listen to the top of the range Sony stuff in the big room on the ground floor?
I was most impressed by their top of the range headphone. Sounded better than the top of the range Focals to my ears.
 
sunbeamgls said:
You'll find a bunch of ramblings and lots of photos from the show at the musings blog:

http://audiophilemusings.blogspot.com/2019/02/the-bristol-show-2019-report-and-photos.html

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Wow definitely ramblings.......

"The JBL K2 S9900 is a bit "legendary" in Japan. Linn even have Exakt filters for it. Its a £20k speaker (each) but didn't sound anything like that kind of price today. Poorly controlled bass and fizz and tizz from this system. Not for me."

Shows how subjective it all is. That system was incredible. I sat down to listen to Bob Dylan's " Man in the long black coat' with a fellow member of the music industry and we both said at the same time that it was like listening in a studio control room. Boom. I would have left with that system in a heart beat....... oh and the Falcons and also the Dynaudio were fab as well.
 
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