Inside CAF 2025 Luxury Hi-Fi Show Part 1 — Capital Audiofest's Top Floors With 84 Rooms
New trends you need to know about, the latest audio gear, and not to be missed rooms!
Capital Audiofest 2025 Show Report By Rick Becker

Popori Acoustics
A pair monoblocks powered the slender Popori loudspeakers from Hungary.

Jaguar Audio
The Jaguar Audio room shattered my opinion of the Estelon entry-level YB speaker, or maybe this being the Estelon YB Mk II is the reason it sounds better. Or maybe it was the black absorption boxes next to the speakers that were helping.

Or maybe it was the vinyl source playing back on the new Klaudio turntable that was making the difference. This was the less expensive version of the table without the peripheral clamping mechanism, which will save you thousands compared to the $68k flagship model.

The tonearm is the same as we saw earlier in the Klaudio room 825 with Steven Norber's Prana Fidelity speakers and electronics. It features tangential tracking with the pivoting twin arms, but also slides on bearings to keep the cartridge perfectly straight in the groove.

The green laser allows you to check the perpendicular alignment of the tonearm.

Deep down lies the magnetic bearing and drive. It is so obvious that I had to double back while writing to mention here that this is a world-class turntable and arm.

The incredible-sounding Vitus Audio integrated amp is my favorite solid-state amp and has been for years. The music was just so right in this room, I had to force myself to leave.

A quick scan of the room list told me this was likely a bit over $200k, and it easily sounded worth that much.

Next Level HiFi
Next Level HiFi made the trek to Capital Audiofest 2025 with a high-quality rig from Audio Group Denmark, which sounded very consistent with their house sound. There was a noticeable difference coming from the previous room with a world class analog front end into this room with digital streaming.

Still, it was very high resolution with a black background and plenty of dynamics with a surprisingly tight, deep bass from the stand mounted monitor.

The speakers were the Borresen T-1 SSE ($57,500) and were obviously gorgeous. The digital front end was the Aavik SD-588, the Class D integrated amp was the Aavik I-588, and the cables were a loom of Ansuz D3.

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