At the end of every show report there are always more pictures left, sometimes of gear that just looks fantastic like the Care Orchestra Celestial Crossway mains conditioner (above), which wins our best product name of the show award, and often stuff that plain looks interesting but somehow got left to the end. Either way, feast your eyes on the best of the rest of Europe's top audio delights.
Astell & Kern AK 500N atop the new AK 500A amplifier and AK500P power supply, the forthcoming T1 all-in-one is on the right.
Apparently not Constellation Audio for less, Peter Maddick's Audio Alchemy lives again with this DDP-1 preamp/DAC ($1,995) and PS-5 power supply ($595 )combo.
Aavik U300 by Raidho, great styling on this Danish integrated with DAC and phono stage, class D, 300 Watts, €30,000.
Brinkmann and Vandersteen with the new M7-HPA monoblocks that look like mini speakers and cost $50,000 a pair. Sounded superb with classical vinyl.
The cute Bryston BOT-1 is a dedicated ripper for the Bryston BDP-1 streamer, about $799.
The Ypsilon CDT-100 transport and DAC-100 (€16,000/€18,000) proved that there's a lot of life left in silver discs courtesy of Perfect 8 open baffle speakers.
Townshend Audio found a novel way to show what it's speaker suspension system does. The speaker on the left is spiked, the one or the right sits on Seismic Isolation Bars, the displays show vibration in three planes produced by sound played elsewhere in the hall. Both are sitting on a concrete floor.
Pre production sample of a new Tannoy supertweeter, dig the steampunk styling.
It wouldn't be the High End without a pair of vintage Western Electric horns, this is their owner Mr Chang, the man behind Silbatone valve amps who's engineers built a 0.8 Watt single ended amp called RP-6900 to drive this speaker.
Mytek Manhattan (€4,500) DAC and preamplifier now available in black.
The biggest Astell & Kern portable yet, the AK380 ($3,500) has dual differential DACs and a base with balanced outputs, you can also add ripper and amp modules.
Sven Boenicke knows that damped spring suspension is the way forward and incorporates it in his W8 speakers and the gorgeous support system behind them.
The shutter speed was too high to capture the movement in the bass driver of the Devialet Silver Phantom (€1990) but it was pretty lively.
Cary Audio's DMC 600 (€6,500) is a CD/SACD player with disc ripping and streaming capabilities, DSD compatibility and a tube output – everything, all the time.
Micromega's M One is amp, DAC, streamer, Bluetooth receiver, phono stage and room equaliser. This is a custom finish, the real thing will be available in October.
If you'd prefer something that's here, now and affordable Cambridge Audio's 851 streamer goes faster and does more than most for a sensible £1,200.
JBL Everest DD 67000, now available in white and still a lot of fun.
 |
 |
The British school were out in force, Derek Hughes (left) designs speakers for Graham Audio who's Royal Opera House system is to become a domestic speaker soon. Harbeth (above right) launched the Monitor 40.2 with a 200mm bass diver, 200mm Radial 2 midrange and 25mm ferrofluid cooled tweeter for £12,000.
Micromega has put a MyAmp into the MySpeaker to produce the MyAmp Inside active Bluetooth model, MyWord!
TAD CE1 with custom side panels including urushi on the left and sculpted aluminium on the right.