advertisement


London Audio Show - Heathrow

I bought a weekend ticket, thankfully at a very reduced price weeks ago. I got round the lot this morning. Didn't even stay for lunch. Not many individual manufacturers as such. Mainly dealer or distributor rooms highlighting brands. Some stuff was just awful to hear, others good. The highlight for me was the Technics Premier room. If you walked in, initially you would have been thinking you were listening to the speakers on display. First impressions, fairly decent sound. Then it transpired that what you were hearing was coming from the all in one unit on a stand. SC C70 MK2. Gobsmacked. Built in speakers and subwoofer. Has Cd, streaming, Bluetooth, wifi, usb and airplay and costs £899. At that price, it put some of the other manufacturers to shame for some of the prices they were asking for their kit.
 
some pics here but not many yet

London Audio Show, Heathrow 20/21 April

Thought I'd stick this up for general interest... London Audio Show Radisson Red Hotel, Heathrow 20th/21st April 2024 Earlybird single day or both day tickets at £7.50 and £10 respectively are only available until the 31st January, after that the on the day prices increase...
www.maverick-hifi.com www.maverick-hifi.com
 
I went. There was a surprisingly small number of rooms. How can a London based show have such a low turnout of exhibitors? The Whittlebury show was substantially bigger than this. Most rooms sounded average to me. OK so I was there early so maybe some kit needed to warm up a bit but a return to many rooms left me underwhelmed. One of the reasons I made the journey was to hear some Gershman speakers. In this case their Monitor Studio standmounts. I was hoping that they might have the relaxed presentation of their Avant Guarde model that I owned for a few years and really enjoyed but no. I suppose ‘Studio’ says it all. Still pretty good just not what I was hoping for.

1000008523

They did have a very nice looking Zavfino turntable in the system.

1000008524

The Winters Audio room was impressive. The system was being driven by a Gryphon Essence 120 integrated paired with Giya loudspeakers and centre stage a direct drive turntable with a milled aluminium plinth from a new UK company called Onkk. Very nice if you like the curvacious look. Fitted with a Tri-Planer arm and a Murasakino Sumile cartridge. It all sounded really good.

1000008529


1000008538

1000008539
Audio Note delivers again. I walked in to Rage Against the Machine being played. A nice change from the usual meh. Those small pair of Ax2 standmounts were amazing. Rage was followed up with some Gorillaz which again sounded great. A very impressive system at the low end of their product range.

1000008540
The other room I really liked was the Russell K room which was running a pair of the RED 50se standmounts with Rega amplification. Lovely sounding speakers.

1000008527
Quite disappointing overall. £3 for a half filled cup of tea and ULEZ charges don’t help either. I doubt I'll bother next year.
Whittlebury was way better IMO.
 
I went and enjoyed most of the stuff there, I believe it will be better next year with more exhibitors but like tricky1 said, got round in the morning fairly quickly, I liked the Russell K room and the OIKK room, just nice to have a show in London, didn't take any photos though, just forgot. Anyhow have to make my donation now.
 
I bought a weekend ticket, thankfully at a very reduced price weeks ago. I got round the lot this morning. Didn't even stay for lunch. Not many individual manufacturers as such. Mainly dealer or distributor rooms highlighting brands. Some stuff was just awful to hear, others good. The highlight for me was the Technics Premier room. If you walked in, initially you would have been thinking you were listening to the speakers on display. First impressions, fairly decent sound. Then it transpired that what you were hearing was coming from the all in one unit on a stand. SC C70 MK2. Gobsmacked. Built in speakers and subwoofer. Has Cd, streaming, Bluetooth, wifi, usb and airplay and costs £899. At that price, it put some of the other manufacturers to shame for some of the prices they were asking for their kit

.
i genuinely thought it was coming from the speakers, I kept wondering why they weren’t playing the TT in the room.

Superb sound for an all in one. I can’t believe I didn’t realise 😅😅

I was a bit underwhelmed by the whole show, my first.

I liked The Tannoy Sterling’s with the Sugden amp and stage.

Also enjoyed the audio note room, the AN-X is a cracking speaker for the money.

My favourite room, which I can’t remember the name was the room that had Malvern Audio Research and Hana banners in.Valve monos and pre and a TT with a Hana Unami Red cart. Unfortunately I can’t remember the name of the amps or speakers but the sound was very much up my street, best of the show for me.

The small Russel K speakers where also excellent.
 
I'm here. Arrived about 1pm due to some home troubles with a bathroom leak (hope it hasn't started leaking again).
Enjoying it immensely as I was the competition winner 😀 currently doing evening lunch on justin bird!
 
I remember going to the HiFi show at Heathrow in the early 70’s as a teenager with my father, it was rammed and being short I didn’t see much, but I enjoyed the experience including the novelty of being shuttled between the Penta hotel and another high rise hotel were the show had been split across two locations
 
I went in 1983 or 84 to check out Pink Triangle before making a buying decision. I remember being mesmerised by a Mark Levinson system more expensive than my parents house (well, it probably was).
 
There was so little there I couldn't even justify the petrol cost despite the very generous PFM member making a free ticket offer.

Nothing like the Penta shows of years gone by!
 
I used to go to the Penta show decades ago. Cut to a couple of years ago my wife and I watched The Sweeney as I had never seen it. There was an episode where they had to go to a hotel near Heathrow and they walked into a hotel lobby and I thought 'that looks familiar' - yes The Penta with the same decor from the 70s kept through the 80s.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.


advertisement


Back
Top