Montreal 2001 Show Goodies!
by Rick
Becker
Blueroom loudspeakers, the speaker that first appeared several years ago in a static B&W display, was playing loud and clear. This plastic speaker that looks like a snowman on tripod legs, comes in white, silver, blue, cobalt blue transparent, and black for $699 CD. It is also wall mountable for surround applications. With its unique shape and bright color, this ported two-way speaker is destined for stardom in a TV series, if not the hi-fi hall of fame.
www.media-and-beyond.com.
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Lots of good music was heard from Totem loudspeakers in several venues at the show. The disappointing news here comes from the same banquet room on the ground floor of the Delta that has proved so problematic in past years. Totem's new flagship (?), the Wind is a four driver
three-way speaker with canted irregular surfaces standing almost 45" tall. Powered by a big rig of conrad-johnson equipment, the unusual music being played at the time of my visit gave me no point of reference to relate to the speaker.
The specification sheet calls for maximum SPL's of 114db peaks in an average room of 12' x 20'. However, the system was being played in a room I would guess as 30' x 30' x 12' high. Nonetheless, if you get a chance to hear this speaker in a more friendly room, carpe diem!
A new Totem, the Hawk, powered by Totem's 120 wpc. integrated amplifier being fed by a Rega Jupiter CD player, was making excellent music. The sound was typically Totem--larger than you would expect from a 36" high speaker. Physically and acoustically, it was beautiful, looking like the Staff, Arro and Forest floor standing models that pre-date it. In another room I heard the Arro driven Rega electronics and the Staff driven by the
$6,500 CD Totem integrated amp, which goes to prove that you can get great music from these speakers without spending long green on electronics. Proper room selection and proper placement, along with a little top loading with Totem beaks or a small rock can go a long way, even with modest electronics. Once again, Vince Brusezze held court in one of the rooms, captivating his audience with both word and music. That he can do this with an open door policy is testimony to both his speakers and his own showmanship.
Tannoy is a speaker line that spans both the music/industrial side of the street and the consumer side. I heard the $14,000 TD 12 speaker, which is the top of their Dimension series. Taking the dual concentric driver technology for which they are known, they have added beautiful cabinetry and mounted a super tweeter in a metal housing to the top of the speaker. Very modern looking with its polished alloy trim, it sports an unusual array of terminals in back--four per speaker for bi-wiring, and an additional jack to ground each speaker, if necessary in your particular environment. The speaker sounded good with an Arcam 7 CD player feeding a Bryston preamp and 4B-ST power amp.
Monitor Audio provided a rare opportunity for me to hear the Musical Fidelity NuVista integrated amplifier. I learned there are (or were) only 50 of these amps available for all of Canada. In the US, they are (or were) available through only a single mail order outlet. The rich looking design of this amp is not given justice by the mail order catalogs I have seen. The speaker was the
$5,000 CD Gold Reference 20, and the system had a detailed sound that I probably did not fully appreciate, being unfamiliar with the music being played.
One of the exciting elements of the Montreal show is the exposition of unusual design, particularly speaker design. The Reps R-1 System, a tall, horn loaded system using the Reps R-1 full range driver is only one example. At 65" tall, with its sweeping curved front, it boasts 99.8 db sensitivity. $14,000 US.
Fab audio's HTM-1 ($8499 CD) boasts 95 db efficiency in a stunning gloss black speaker that looks like a stand mounted monitor, but actually incorporated the cavity of the stand as part of the bass cavity. A rear-facing woofer acts as a subwoofer. The system included the Canadian NOS Audio Mu2
CD player feeding a Paravincini V-12 integrated tube amp. Very nice sound here.
Tetra was back with their Model Space that I favorably commented on last year, or before. These
$4,950 CD tetrahedron two-ways sit atop a triangular pedestal that is designed not only as support, but also as an aesthetic component of this contemporary design that falls on the "art" end of the spectrum.
Tetra also showed a more conventional mini-monitor called the Bullit. It features a slant front, and is a sealed cabinet with a 3 1/2" mid-woofer and a Seas silk dome. The Z-shaped stands were also by Tetra. In standard black oak, it goes for $1750 CD, or in gloss black, for $1950. Powered by modest electronics, they had a very full, smooth sound that belied their size. Someone should review these.
While I've been a fan of Proac's Response series over the years, a visit to a video set up this year leaves me questioning the value for this application. The Response CC2, at $3000 CD each, can be used either vertically for the corners, or horizontally for the center. The system was augmented by their $3000 CD subwoofer which featured a 10" downward firing Scanspeak woofer and a built in 150 watt amp that operated in Class AB. For surround sound music videos (where the mainstream will probably end up in a few years) and films, I'm not sure I want to be invested this heavily, yet.
A room with the new Quad speakers was a disappointment for me. I've heard the smaller of the two new models sound much better in a much larger room at a visit to HiFi Farm using other electronics. Room placement is critical to these speakers, and I suspect the room was too small, and probably too full of moving bodies when I stopped in. Give these speakers a listen if you ever get a chance.
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