Acoustica HiFi Show 2017

Just back from the annual Acoustica bash, first time I've visited.

The showpiece Statement / 500 system, with the Focal speakers left me rather unmoved, possibly, as Mayor West suggests, because of the music being played, but, the Focals, for me, are quite underwhelming insofar as they play all the notes in the right order, but don't seem to be that musical.

On the other hand, the active 250 /272 setup with the Kudos Titan 707 definitely floated my boat ......... hugely impressed.

A big thanks to both Geoff and Pete, and all the exhibitors, for staging a very relaxed and illuminating show.

First time to Acoustica show as well.

Overall impression very good. Not too crowded, opportunity to vary the music played and informative demonstrators.

NDS/Statement pre/500/Sopra3 system was impressive in scale and detail but a bit too overblown for me. For example a Bo Diddly track (I think) sounded like it was being played in an arena whereas it was probably recorded in a small studio. This may be a factor of the room, the distance between the speakers and the volume. In different circumstances with careful set-up the system certainly has potential to sound amazing.

The Kudos 707 system was more musical and the bass is certainly a big improvement over the 808s which I've heard previously. However, it still sounded a bit thin so it was more a case of "this sounds OK" rather than "this sounds amazing."

I was more impressed by the big Dynaudio speakers which I think were attached to a NDS/252/300- couldn't say for sure as the equipment was in a separate partitioned off room.

Highlight for me was the new Chord Sarum T cable which is a significant step-up from the Sarum TA and knocking on the door of the Chord Music. 

Chord cable were using a 272/300(?) into the latest stand mount DYnaudios. The Sarum T made the sound more natural and inviting and less hifi. I rated this system highest for musical connection.

Jonn posted:

 

I was more impressed by the big Dynaudio speakers which I think were attached to a NDS/252/300- couldn't say for sure as the equipment was in a separate partitioned off room.

It sounded that good that I had to have a peak round to see what was behind and it was indeed NDS/252/300

Enjoyed day at Acoustica show. Found the Sopra 3's underwhelming not helped by to many people chatting in the room. Very impressed with the Kudos Spendor and big Dynaudio speakers, pity about the Dynaudio being used by Chord Company as the right speaker wasn't installed very well, every time the guy walked passed it, it wobbled for fun.

I think the telling thing here is no one has said anything about the room with the Uniti's in it... Suggests they sounded either completely underwhelming or just crap.

I wonder why some of the exhibitors bother. They don't engage with the visitors at all - no explanation of the hardware, no information on the music being played, apparently more interested in watching the clock count down to closing time. Chord were again a notable exception to this. As at Bristol they gave a very impressive demo and talked with great enthusiasm and knowledge about their products and the music. As others have said the 'big' Naim system with the Statement pre was distinctly underwhelming and certainly failed to impress. The music was dire.  I heard considerably better today from systems costing less than 10% of the big Naim system. 

Hm, I thought the big Naim system was impressive given the environment and I'd love to hear it in a proper room well set up.  My wife has virtually no interest in hifi but was impressed and keen to hear it with some 'proper' music with a few drinks!  Whilst we were in there they were playing Hallelujah by Jeff Buckley followed by a Kate Bush track of the 50 words for snow album.   I know the former very well and could hear things I've never heard before and the harmonics were amazing, treble was a little harsh at times perhaps but it was impressive.  I don't like the 50 words for snow album but it sounded really interesting through the system and I may well give it another try as a result.  I did listen to the Uniti demo and though it sounded very nice to be honest. I;d agree that there wasn't much effort from some of the exhibitors to engage even when I wondered over to look at some of the hardware.

Agree that the Chord people were engaging but they were demonstrating the effects of moving through their cable hierarchy whereas the others were just demonstrating a single system. Nevertheless I found them forthcoming with information when I asked and also willing to change the music or handover the iPad to select music when asked.

Penart Blue. I had a brief listen to one of the Uniti range (Atom?) attached to a pair of small Focal speakers and underwhelming is about right. Don't know what part was responsible but although detailed, there was a complete lack of body/substance to the sound.

Jonn posted:

Agree that the Chord people were engaging but they were demonstrating the effects of moving through their cable hierarchy whereas the others were just demonstrating a single system. Nevertheless I found them forthcoming with information when I asked and also willing to change the music or handover the iPad to select music when asked.

Penart Blue. I had a brief listen to one of the Uniti range (Atom?) attached to a pair of small Focal speakers and underwhelming is about right. Don't know what part was responsible but although detailed, there was a complete lack of body/substance to the sound.

Cheers for the reply Jonn. The 906's are a nice sounding speaker but have no bass really, which is perhaps why they lacked substance. I'd have thought they'd have used a sub with this setup but perhaps just wanted to show what the lowest cost system might sound like

Penarth Blues posted:

I think the telling thing here is no one has said anything about the room with the Uniti's in it... Suggests they sounded either completely underwhelming or just crap.

The Atom with the Dynaudio Emit M20 was a very nice little system.

sunbeamgls posted:

Penarth Blues posted:

I think the telling thing here is no one has said anything about the room with the Uniti's in it... Suggests they sounded either completely underwhelming or just crap.

The Atom with the Dynaudio Emit M20 was a very nice little system.

It was indeed. Although there were better sounding systems I would say that this would probably the stand out value for money performer for me. 

My mistake then, I didn't look closely and assumed they were Focal because of the Naim/Focal tie-in. Still think the sound needed filling out properly engage.

Enjoyed the show yesterday, spending most of the day there. I met up with an old friend and it was great to experience his totally unbiased reaction to the systems on demo. Apologies for the length of the ramble, just wanted to bash out my thoughts while fresh.

Statement room: Initially impressive, and very detailed, but after a few tracks I felt the presentation was fatiguing due to the high frequency presentation of the Sopra3's. Also very cool to finally see the Statement (albeit just one third) in the metal - what an amazing piece of industrial design! When I told my buddy the approximate overall system cost I had to break out the smelling salts for him.

Chord Company: Alan Gibb (I think it was) did a very accessible and methodical presentation of the benefits of of using a decent screened ethernet cable in a high end system, increasing in cost from simple patch cable to the insanely priced Chordmusic at 4K! I went into the dem a sceptic and left a convert. I will certainly be investigating a dedicated streaming cable.

Kudos Titan 707: Very impressive indeed. I preferred this room to the Statement room and genuinely enjoyed this system. A little forward, but nothing abrasive or off putting - I'm sure the balance could be tweaked with the x-over. Great to see Naim entering the x-over game once more.

Naim Atom (and Nova): A tricky one to asses as they are perhaps still works in progress. In the Naim room I think they were limited a touch by the Focal Aria 906’s, certainly lacking body as some commented. In contrast, in the Dynaudio room the Atom parred beautifully with the Emit’s. Absolutely love the new industrial styling (filter it down to the classic series please!) - a real step forward. I look forward to auditioning a production Atom alongside my Qute2.

Naim NDX/282/250DR/Sopra1: As with Sopra3, I just could not get along with the presentation of the Sopra1 here. I know the Sopra’s can sound good, as I’ve heard them at a dealer open day (1&2) sounding good, so not sure what was amiss. My mate didn’t like the sound in this room either, commenting it just made his ears feel like they were being pummelled. 

Dynaudio: Both rooms very impressive. I thought the Dynaudio Emit 20’s and Atom (plus Core) presented the best sound per pound at the show. A thoroughly entertaining musical presentation, deep soundstage, sweet treble and powerful bass (for their box size). Certainly there are flaws being budget boxes, but overall, refreshingly strong for their price point. My buddy was so impressed that said he will be looking into this system further. The big Dynaudio Countour 30's (I think?) were just superb. Perhaps a little lean for my taste, but there was no denying their abilities - Nils Lofgren was in the room playing live This was the room I had to be dragged out by my ankles, finger nails cloying at the carpet! On balance both my favourite rooms of the show, irrespective of price (just pipping Kudos).

Russell K: I thought the 120’s were very good indeed. But, as with all of the RK speakers I've heard, they mercilessly reveal a bad recording and can be perceived as being forward. Illustrated by a quick spin of two Van Morrison tracks - on the first, the sound presentation could be used to cut glass. The second Morrison track sounded utterly sublime and balanced in every way. Good, but if I was in the market for these floor standers I’d rather buy the ‘full fat’ 150’s. 

Spendor: Very warm and accessible sound from the Spendors, which I liked but somehow did not love.

A very good show, and thanks to Geoff, Phil and all of the company bods for putting it together and giving up their weekend. Personally I found all of the reps approachable and accommodating… The Atom & Statement swapped and demonstrated on request, the Dynaudio Emit’s repositioned to try them near the back wall, a long chat with Russell K about their future products etc…

@Phil Harris. Great to meet you and put a name to the forum persona. Thanks for the chat and insight into the Nova & Atom too. You were right, that Atom is a peach of a thing!

Yetizone posted: 

Great to see Naim entering the x-over game once more.

It'll be interesting to see if this does take off for Naim as you can easily activate 4 models (inc 707) in the Kudos range. I'm surprised that this avenue hasn't been pursued with the Focal range of speakers but perhaps interest is low in the market for this sort of solution ?

Yetizone posted:

<<SNIP>>

@Phil Harris. Great to meet you and put a name to the forum persona. Thanks for the chat and insight into the Nova & Atom too. You were right, that Atom is a peach of a thing!

It is soooooo weird - people will come up and ask me if I know where Phil is and it is really great meeting you all but I can still rarely relate who is who back to here.

It was a great weekend and some really good conversations were had - we try to demo music that shows kit sounding at its best and when I have the 'staff of power' I also try to give people the ability to play things that they want to listen to too however no matter how good a system is it can't make a badly recorded piece of music sound good and I had to chuckle at one young lad who wanted to listen to a Coldplay track and then said that he'd expected much more from it.

Big thanks to Geoff and Pete for all their effort in arranging the event and see you all at the next one all being well...

Phil

Hi All -- First post, so please be gentle.

I spent a thoroughly enjoyable morning at the show yesterday, focussing especially on speakers as I may be in the market for some, later this year.  I found the Statement/Sopra 3 room very impressive.  When I entered, a solo cello was playing (a Bach suite, I think).  Very commanding but far too loud.  Certainly way louder than a real cellist sitting between the speakers would be.  (Why do they do this?)  Then a few tracks of typical "hifi show stuff" I'd never listen to at home, followed by a much more enjoyable jazz piece, but still too loud to be realistic.  Very imposing, but as I don't have £120k lying around waiting to be spent, I moved to the Kudos 707 room.  Here my impressions seem to have been different from others: I managed three tracks before I had to escape.  Perhaps the music was to blame, but I found it far too aggressive (and too loud) for my taste.  And far too much treble dominance -- I could not have put up with that amount of sibilance on voices in a much cheaper system.  With all the plaudits they receive here and elsewhere, I have tried to like the Kudos sound; I even owned a pair of C20s for a couple of years, but eventually decided I couldn't live with the over-bright treble and rather loose bass.

So on to the other half of the show, where I was keen to hear the new Uniti models.  Interestingly, I found the Nova driving the small Focal speakers disappointing and weedy, but the Atom with Dynaudio Emit 20s sounded excellent and great VFM.  If I was after a second system for a small room this would definitely be on my list -- the Atom is a great little box.  Then Spendor, where they were using exactly the same electronics as I have with a pair of D7s and producing a sound I think I could live with, and the Russell K room where they were demonstrating the 120s which did the job, but I'm not convinced they're voiced for the sort of music I listen to.  Somehow, I couldn't imagine them conveying the heft of a Mahler symphony, for example.  Finally, the Dynaudio Contour 30s which, for me, were the standout speakers and even (just) within my budget.  The design looked a bit odd, with the tweeters well above head height, but they conveyed music in such a realistic way, dynamic with excellent speed, but well balanced over the frequency spectrum and offered a sound I believe I could listen to for hours.  At the end, I decided to allow myself a second helping and concluded that the Dynaudio rooms were the only two I felt I had to return to, so I fear another costly visit to Geoff and Pete's tempting emporium may be in the offing later in the year.

Finally, returning home, I had to play some music on my system while memories of the sounds of the show were still fresh.  So were my PMC Fact 3's disgraced?  Well, they don't do bass like the Sopra 3s and may be a bit dry for some tastes (not mine), but what they do superbly is disappear, with the musicians hanging in the air behind them and playing in a convincing acoustic.  Any replacements will have to manage that trick just as well if they are to gain house room.

Roger

Roger, I wouldn't apologise for it being your first post: it's far more considered than most on here, including mine.... and may I commend you on your excellent choice of electronics.

Phil Harris posted:

Yetizone posted:

<<SNIP>>

@Phil Harris. Great to meet you and put a name to the forum persona. Thanks for the chat and insight into the Nova & Atom too. You were right, that Atom is a peach of a thing!

It is soooooo weird - people will come up and ask me if I know where Phil is and it is really great meeting you all but I can still rarely relate who is who back to here.

It was a great weekend and some really good conversations were had - we try to demo music that shows kit sounding at its best and when I have the 'staff of power' I also try to give people the ability to play things that they want to listen to too however no matter how good a system is it can't make a badly recorded piece of music sound good and I had to chuckle at one young lad who wanted to listen to a Coldplay track and then said that he'd expected much more from it.

Big thanks to Geoff and Pete for all their effort in arranging the event and see you all at the next one all being well...

Phil

The best system in the world couldn't make Coldplay sound good. 

Peakman posted:

Hi All -- First post, so please be gentle.

I spent a thoroughly enjoyable morning at the show yesterday, focussing especially on speakers as I may be in the market for some, later this year.  I found the Statement/Sopra 3 room very impressive.  When I entered, a solo cello was playing (a Bach suite, I think).  Very commanding but far too loud.  Certainly way louder than a real cellist sitting between the speakers would be.  (Why do they do this?)  Then a few tracks of typical "hifi show stuff" I'd never listen to at home, followed by a much more enjoyable jazz piece, but still too loud to be realistic.  Very imposing, but as I don't have £120k lying around waiting to be spent, I moved to the Kudos 707 room.  Here my impressions seem to have been different from others: I managed three tracks before I had to escape.  Perhaps the music was to blame, but I found it far too aggressive (and too loud) for my taste.  And far too much treble dominance -- I could not have put up with that amount of sibilance on voices in a much cheaper system.  With all the plaudits they receive here and elsewhere, I have tried to like the Kudos sound; I even owned a pair of C20s for a couple of years, but eventually decided I couldn't live with the over-bright treble and rather loose bass.

So on to the other half of the show, where I was keen to hear the new Uniti models.  Interestingly, I found the Nova driving the small Focal speakers disappointing and weedy, but the Atom with Dynaudio Emit 20s sounded excellent and great VFM.  If I was after a second system for a small room this would definitely be on my list -- the Atom is a great little box.  Then Spendor, where they were using exactly the same electronics as I have with a pair of D7s and producing a sound I think I could live with, and the Russell K room where they were demonstrating the 120s which did the job, but I'm not convinced they're voiced for the sort of music I listen to.  Somehow, I couldn't imagine them conveying the heft of a Mahler symphony, for example.  Finally, the Dynaudio Contour 30s which, for me, were the standout speakers and even (just) within my budget.  The design looked a bit odd, with the tweeters well above head height, but they conveyed music in such a realistic way, dynamic with excellent speed, but well balanced over the frequency spectrum and offered a sound I believe I could listen to for hours.  At the end, I decided to allow myself a second helping and concluded that the Dynaudio rooms were the only two I felt I had to return to, so I fear another costly visit to Geoff and Pete's tempting emporium may be in the offing later in the year.

Finally, returning home, I had to play some music on my system while memories of the sounds of the show were still fresh.  So were my PMC Fact 3's disgraced?  Well, they don't do bass like the Sopra 3s and may be a bit dry for some tastes (not mine), but what they do superbly is disappear, with the musicians hanging in the air behind them and playing in a convincing acoustic.  Any replacements will have to manage that trick just as well if they are to gain house room.

Roger

Roger,glad to hear you like the Dynaudio's...I have owned the focus 160's,C1mk11's,and currently own the excite12's and xd 600's.Today they released a firmware update to the xd 's,as they are active,I am blown away with how much better they are now,Right now I am feeding them from the digital out of my 272,and this is really something special,the xd's have 600 watts per speaker,and now I hear all of it,and they even seemed to improve detail,separation etc.The Dynaudio rep that frequents the Dyn AVS site,said they are very close to the new Contour 30 now,and even better in some area's.My system took a giant leap forward today,thanks to a free firmware update,good job Dyn.

What was the system driving the 707's, by the way?

252 / supercap DR and 2x 250dr active.

Not sure what source. NDS?

expensive Chord Sarum cables.

KUDOS T-707 WITH NAIM SNAXO ACTIVE SYSTEM

Kudos have been the best room at this show for the past 3 years (even when launching their most modest floorstanders they've made a great sound here) so, with the T-707 just launched at the Bristol show about 3 weeks ago, anticpation was high, opportunity to disappoint therefore equally high, I suppose.

A bit of background - Kudos are big fans of making their speakers capable of working with active options from manufacturers such as Linn and Devialet.  Their current range leading T-808 has been played with passive electronics from Naim, Exakt active from Linn and active with Devialet at shows I've been to, in addition to active with Naim electronics being fed by an active Behringer crossover (which was good but not in the same league as Linn and Devialet, presumably let down somewhat by the crossover).  The best of these was Devialet at Indulgence, although I understand the Exakt crossovers have been heavily modified since I heard them at the National Audio Show back in 2015.
The T-808 range topper comes in at £23k and is quite a large two-box cabinet.  So out of the range of most.  Kudos are now happy with the concept they used in the T-808 (e.g. the cabinet shaping, isobaric bass loading, complex flared porting, ability to easily run passive or active etc.) to roll-out the same concepts down the range into more accessible (!) pricing and suited to smaller (let's say, more UK sized) rooms.  So the T-707 scales down the 8" drivers to 7", uses one less of them, uses a single box cabinet and takes up less room in the room.  The 7" is a mid-bass that has another identical driver hidden in the cabinet, configured in isobaric mode.  For active use, 2 pairs of terminals are presented on the back panel so only 2 amp channels are needed per speaker.
A little more background - Kudos have been hoping to persuade Naim to provide a SNAXO active crossover for some time.  The design is now done (by Kudos with help from Naim) so hopefully it will just be a matter of time before it becomes available.  Naim really should do this - as we'll see below.

Today the system was Melco, NDS / 555, 252 / Supercap, SNAXO active crossover with Hi-Cap PS and 2x 250DR power amps.  Cables were, in the main, standard Naim fare (not hi-line) with the exception of the streamer to pre connection which was courtesy of Chord Sarum-T.  Sarum-T also provided connection between power amps and speakers, with the length of cables in use today just exceeding the price of the speakers themselves - at around the £13.5k mark.  Gulp.  The T-707 at Chester were finished in Tineo wood veneered sides - black oak, Tineo red and satin white are also available as standard.  Other finishes are options.

Let's get the negatives out of the way first.  There are really only 2 for me - the price, and that the room was playing its part a little today.  Boom was not really tolerable in the back row of seats, but the middle and front seats removed most of this, but there was still a touch too much.  It wasn't enough to distract though - just a hint that there's more to be had by a different set up, and other offerings that might help to address room modes.

If I said that I spent over 2 hours in this room, it might give an impression of just how enjoyable this Naim / Kudos active system is.  Music, music, music was what was heard in this room.  Track after track (with the exception of one rather poorly recorded Elvis track requested by a visitor) just flowed rhymically from these speakers.  Occasionally there are some bass details that aren't as well resolved as my Exakt/PMC system, but the overall set of compromises here is a much better mix.  Focal could learn from a big powerful sound that doesn't have to be over-bright, nor does a big speaker mean that instruments have to be over-large in the image.  It was impossible to drag myself away from the room - even for music I don't traditionally like.  As usual, the Kudos team encourage visitors to select music and they shy away from nothing.  This system just got on with playing tunes - there's a sense of joy in these speakers - I think the T-808 goes deeper, but somehow, in comparison with these 707s, they feel a little restrained - holding something back in case they get too excited.  The 707s feel much more like they want to get on with entertaining and being part of the party - but they still manage to be in control.  There's a sense of detail in there too, but its not the sort of detail that says "hey look at me", its just there when you seek it out.

Kicking electronic dance tracks? Hugh Masakela? Folk Rock? Sophisticated pop (think London Grammar)? Dire Straits? Mexican guitar duos? Deep electronica?  Just play whatever you like and enjoy.  For me, even more than the T-808.  I really look forward to hearing these with alternative front ends.  With something to address room modes (perhaps an alternative front end or some room treatment), a couple of Naim 250DRs and the T-707s could be a match made in audio heaven.  Maybe - it would be good to find out.

Top Shelf Stuff: SNAXO for T-707 on the left and its Hi-Cap PS on the right

A superb system.

I spent almost an hour in the Kudos room, and felt it was far and away the most compelling music to be heard.

The problem now is to work out over the next few months whether this was purely the 707's themselves, or more the fact that they were being driven actively.

Hope it's the second one, then I can pursue a demo of my Neat Mf 9's in active mode.

The fun simply never stops. 

It was good to hear the active T 707s, and the Kudos room is an essential chillout zone after the intensity of the nearby Statement/Focal room. I was much more impressed, though, by the passive 552/300/T808 demo a couple of years back. Anyone who says a HiFi show in a hotel room is a bad place to listen to music would eat their words after hearing that.

I, too, was really impressed by the Atom/Dynaudio E20 system. Unfortunately, the two Naim rooms (NDX/282/250 and Nova) failed to impress, and I'm pretty sure this was down to the inevitable Focal speakers again.

The new Russel K 120s were sounding very good. The dem was using CDs in a T + A all in one which I think is about the same price as a Uniti 2, but it drove them well. I did find the bass slightly overbearing, but I suspect these speakers might really shine with some better electronics. 

I also spent a really enjoyable hour in the Kudos room late on Sunday,  their room is always fantastic every year but there was something very 'right' about this system. Superlative sound, tunes (found a great new George Duke track, thanks Richard) and it's always a pleasure to talk to the Kudos guys. It really is an excellent company.

I also briefly heard the 707s at Bristol (in non-active mode) and can confirm that they sounded great in this configuration as well.

Other highlights for me were the Dynaudio rooms (interesting demo of the impressive new Contour floor standers comparing different resolutions of files and the Atom / Emit M20 system sounded astonishing for the price) and effectively having the main Naim system room to myself for 10 mins with Daft Punk playing at very impressive levels. Thanks Phil!