Munich 2019 Official Thread

[chrille]

5 hours ago, DuckToller said:

Short snippets with not much sound ... just for the impression of it

The Gryphon Pendragon was one of the most impressive speakers I have ever auditioned with classical music a few years ago in Singapore.

I wonder how the Martin Logan Neolitic compares to the best Gryphon speakers?

[#Yoda#]

8 hours ago, russellbobby said:

Did you happen to see the Lindemann Source? 

Yes, I did. I know capabilities of the Lindemann Musicbook quite well, because a good friend owns the Musicbook 25 DSD and two Musicbook:55 for bi-amping his Piega Coax speakers. My motivation was to listen to the Lindemann source in combination with the Manger P2 speakers. Unfortunately the spacial conditions were suboptimal, a noisy AC on top of the listening booth disturbed frequently any listening efforts and a correct alignment of the speakers was not given. No place in the auditory space was within the sweet spot, what is very important to really enjoy the advantages of the Manger speakers. 

[#Yoda#]

Isn't it funny, but it seems as most of us are impressed by the "big is beautiful" effect. This oversized and overpriced speakers with nearly no serious buying interest of any audiophile with suitable income and listening room are playing in audio shows like the HighEnd in a much too small "show room" of max. 30 square meters with usually suboptimal room optimisation. 

 

Anyway, we tend to recognize them as impressive speakers, mainly because of the powerful and exaggerated impulse response in the low end, IMO. 

I've listened to many speakers, designed to be suitable for average living- or listening room conditions that sound more "natural" and overall better for this usual user environment than this big flagship speakers. 

[Kal Rubinson]

1 hour ago, #Yoda# said:

Isn't it funny, but it seems as most of us are impressed by the "big is beautiful" effect. This oversized and overpriced speakers with nearly no serious buying interest of any audiophile with suitable income and listening room are playing in audio shows like the HighEnd in a much too small "show room" of max. 30 square meters with usually suboptimal room optimisation. 

I've stopped going to shows for the demos which are becoming increasingly irrelevant for these and other reasons.  I go to discover and see new stuff and to talk with people.

[austinpop]

4 hours ago, chrille said:

Don't miss Berg's Violin Concerto and  Mahler's 5th live, very good material for ear calibration and  absolutely great music.

 

 

I went to both the Julia Fischer/Academy of St. Martin in the Fields and the Berg/Mahler with Kavakos/Harding. Both were excellent. I really like the sonics of the Philharmonie Gasteig, from previous visits to Munich.

 

As for "calibrating my ears," I seem to remember an article on that a while back.  

 

 

 

[DuckToller]

1 hour ago, #Yoda# said:

Isn't it funny, but it seems as most of us are impressed by the "big is beautiful" effect. This oversized and overpriced speakers with nearly no serious buying interest of any audiophile with suitable income and listening room are playing in audio shows like the HighEnd in a much too small "show room" of max. 30 square meters with usually suboptimal room optimisation. 

 

Anyway, we tend to recognize them as impressive speakers, mainly because of the powerful and exaggerated impulse response in the low end, IMO. 

I've listened to many speakers, designed to be suitable for average living- or listening room conditions that sound more "natural" and overall better for this usual user environment than this big flagship speakers. 

Maître Yoda,

it is quite hard for the average enthusiast to get close to that kind of overpriced equipment apart from these shows. Most of us have grown up with some media guidance that manifested the opinion that in audio you'll get what you pay for, which concludes into the effect of more expensive should be better. I do not support this opinion, but getting a baseline what such overpriced equipment is capable of, may as well give you some peace of mind with your own "average" 2-10 k system.

And most of the systems sound different, as external factors as environment, set up of room & electronics plus choice of music are kicking in.

OTOH, the manufacturer focusing of sub 2 k equipment seldom have some nice spaces at fairs as their products seldomly leave them the necessary cash flow to create interesting rooms at such events.

After getting the full Monty this year, I doubt that in 2020 I would do such an circuit again.

Funny thing I noticed are the important information provided by sellers of +120k  transducers, that the can easily adjusted to "small" rooms due to adjustable gain or dsp, but seem to forget that a height of 1.8 m or more may have some unsuitable impact as well.

Best, Tom

 

[austinpop]

LOL sign near my hotel:

 

Maybe the traditionalists consider it a violation of Reinheitsgebot?

[austinpop]

14 hours ago, #Yoda# said:

- Voxativ with the Voxativ Hagen system, Atrium 4.2 E222

- a little bit more than 10k€ (12.5k€) Manger P2, Atrium 4.2 F211 and at the Lindemann booth H 4 R08/S07

- Elac, A 4.1 F102, A 4.1 F103, A 4.1 F124

- T&A, A 3.1 D102, A 3.1 D103, A 3.1 D105

- Canton, A 3.1 D109, A 3.1 D110

- Boenicke Audio with the W5, Atrium 4.2 F215

 

Yes, the Hagen was very impressive for the price point, although once again I found myself seduced by the >100k€ Mpeggio!

 

I'm a big fan of the Canton's.

 

The Gershman (Canadian) speakers are very nice at a fairly reasonable price point. I'm hedging, because I can't recall the number.

[russellbobby]

11 hours ago, DuckToller said:

@russellbobby

Yes, the source in pics and video, xcuse the quality...  Lindemann chain with Manger speakers ... Actually the better video upload failed 2x.... So I took a smaller snippet.... CD Transport is outsourced, they were using an Apple drive.

Thank you TuckDoller. Looks pretty much the same but now milled from a solid block. Plus price came down but minus the Cd transport but now has the  the addition of Phono. 

[skatbelt]

On my day two I really liked the Raidho room with their new TD 1.2 driven by a complete Chord stack. And for different reasons the Living Voice room. Here I had one of those wow moments of something getting very close to a live performance with certain genres.

 

I also liked the small Einstein system (the smallest of the two they had setup).

 

Heard a lot of potential with TAD, Stenheim/Playback systems, Lindemann/Manger and Vivid Audio/Mola Mola but unfortunately (except for TAD) these systems where setup in those awful smallish booths in the big halls.

[#Yoda#]

Two more tips for really great sounding and living room friendly designed active speaker systems: 

 

Grimm Audio, A 4.2 E216

 

Lyravox, A 4.2 F225

[DuckToller]

11 hours ago, russellbobby said:

Thank you TuckDoller

Welcome, BussellRobby!

Is that the type of humor you like,

like Tuck Frump?

Cheers, Tom 🤔😏

[mcgillroy]

23 hours ago, your momo said:

Under 10k$ souding good speakers, may I add amphion, this simple setup was very lively and visualy attractive.

 

 

Could you say which Amphions and the rest of the chain. Eyeing a pair of LS7 but still on the fence.

[Confused]

Out of interest, did anyone get to hear the new(ish) PMC Fenestria? I thought they looked quite interesting, until I discovered that they are £45,000.....

[skatbelt]

3 hours ago, mcgillroy said:

 

Could you say which Amphions and the rest of the chain. Eyeing a pair of LS7 but still on the fence.

 

The played with their 7LS and the large Krypton’s. With their own amplification and  some pro-audio gear in the front-end of the system. Very neutral but also a bit clinical to my taste. I owned Amphion in the past. 

[mjb]

19 hours ago, austinpop said:

LOL sign near my hotel:

 

Maybe the traditionalists consider it a violation of Reinheitsgebot?

Exactly. Don't underestimate the importance of the Reinheitsgebot.

[matthias]

My vote for the best sound in alphabetical order:

 

Aries Cerat 

Living Voice 

Nagra

Silbatone

 

Aries Cerat was compromised by the quality of the booth. They deserve to get a room in one of the atriums.

The Nagra demo at Saturday conducted by Marco Cicogna was excellent. The best Nagra demo in Munich so far.

Silbatone had better speakers than last year.

 

Disappointing were Kaiser, Goebel and Gryphon in relation to the price of the set-up.

 

The prize for loudest undistorted sound gets WolfvonLanga.

 

Matt

 

 

[your momo]

7 hours ago, mcgillroy said:

 

Could you say which Amphions and the rest of the chain. Eyeing a pair of LS7 but still on the fence.

Loudspeaker where amphion Argon7LS, with MAC pro as server with Crane Solaris DAC and Antelope Satori pre-amp into a small black stereo block (don't know the name) sitting on the floor in between speakers.

Total cost of this system was probably in the 12-14k$ including cabling, sound was really enjoying, fast, lively but nothing aggressive.

 

Other rooms did had this budget for maybe half the cables or just the main supply filter and cabling...

[your momo]

8 hours ago, Confused said:

Out of interest, did anyone get to hear the new(ish) PMC Fenestria? I thought they looked quite interesting, until I discovered that they are £45,000.....

Yes they were running in the PMC room, three of them set as front stage for their 19-20 speakers immersive demo.

Source was, but not only, an Oppo BD player, pre was from PMC + a crazy lot of Bryston amps hidden behind room curtain.

Sound of the immersive recording was amazing and great - but it's no more Hi-Fi, it's Si-Fi ...this setup is nowhere to see in any private home I guess.

They did also run the Fenestria for normal stereo sound, great speaker for sure ...but personally the looks is by far too much for my taste. For same price I would jump on a pair of Magico M2, very refined sound and style.

[#Yoda#]

However, the show is over for this year and I'm sure, most attendees enjoyed the unique variety and quality of the presentation. For the overseas audiophiles, I hope that you've also had the chance to experience a little bit one of the most livable cities on this planet beside the show, even if the weather conditions could have been improvable this year.

 

Welcome back next year!

[your momo]

Munich is nice city to stay, a kind of mix of Florence and Berlin ...and the weather was far from great, so I can imagine it's even nicer when warm - hanging out outside with a fresh beer.

[The Computer Audiophile]

3 minutes ago, #Yoda# said:

For the overseas audiophiles, I hope that you've also had the chance to experience a little bit one of the most livable cities on this planet beside the show

Oh yes. I took an unplanned trip away from the show on Saturday and had a wonderful experience. I met people that were so nice that I want to bring my family back next year. 

 

I’m going to write about this because the trip away from the show was audio related and turned into a fun time with local people. 

[#Yoda#]

6 minutes ago, your momo said:

Munich is nice city to stay, a kind of mix of Florence and Berlin ...and the weather was far from great, so I can imagine it's even nicer when warm - hanging out outside with a fresh beer.

In case of doubt, I would prefer Florence. 😉 Munich is the Italian outpost north of the Alps, unfortunately not always climatic.

[skatbelt]

To complete my contribution: on day three I was impressed by the Crystal Cable/Siltech room with the Arabesque Minissimo diamond driven by a full DCS stack. Best two-way system of the show in my humble opinion. Also very interesting to hear about the philosophy behind the new Siltech Symphony speaker (prototype) with open baffle woofers. Unfortunately a speaker that will be priced for the very, very happy few.

 

I also liked the Marten room with the new Mingus Orchestra speaker, driven by CH Precision. And - for very different reasons - the complete Voxativ Hagen system. Very coherent, almost headphones like with a lot of music. The limitations of the full range driver approach could also easily be heard in dynamic or complex passages or when played louder: breakup.

 

There was a Voxativ implementation that I liked even more and this was the PureAudioProject Quintet10, driven by a lot of tube gear. Here a Voxativ full range driver is accompanied by four 10” woofers in an open baffle construction. Very involving and life like. I had to push myself to leave this room and give-up a perfect chair in the center.

 

I had high expectations of the Grimm Audio room with the LS1be and the new MU1 music player and although convincing is some ways there was something really off in terms of focus and sound staging. No matter in which row I sat, it was a constant feeling of sitting on in stead of in front of the soundstage. May be this was because the speakers were placed relatively far from each other and toed-in a lot. I did not take the time to ask for an explanation. 

[Miska]

T+A system with the new DAC sounded very good (I may be a bit biased though...  ). And they run nice comparison demo as well.

 

Esoteric also sounded good, they seem to have also moved to discrete DSD DACs instead of COTS DAC chips. And quite esoteric PCB layout as well.

 

I also liked sound of Dynaudio + Sim Audio combo, Elac Vela FS 409, Audio Vector as well as Amphion Krypton speakers sounded very good.