UK Audio Show, Daventry 2023 The UK Audio show followed hot on the heels of the event at Ascot and the contrast could not have been bigger. Far from the glitz of the country’s most fashionable racecourse the Staverton Park Hotel proved a far more accessible and relaxed event. There was a real sense that […]
UK Hi-fi Show Live, Ascot 2023 For the first time since 2019 the grandstand at Royal Ascot rang with the sounds of high end systems on the last weekend of September for Hi-Fi Show Live. Spread around its six floors and Escher-esque stairways were the cream of manufacturers and distributors occupying rooms with fabulous views […]
EI Live 2023 custom install show We don’t often visit the EI Live custom install shows at the Ear but once in a while it can be interesting to see how things are progressing in that field. Having speakers in walls and ceilings is no longer the preserve of the super rich nor is it […]
High End 2023 pt4 The Thorens Reference wins our largest turntable of High End 2023 award. Priced at €220.000 including arms it has to be one of the most expensive too. The arms are a 12inch version of the classic TP 160 alongside a rebadged Thiele TA01 which attempts to combine the benefits of a […]
High End always comes good with extreme gear and 2023 was no exception. The Marco Serri Design Gladiator above was actually at the off site show Hi-Fi Deluxe and weighs in at 250kg per channel. It has 420mm bass drivers, external crossover, open baffle mid and tweeter and comes from Modena. I didn’t dare ask […]
The Wand gets thicker Simon Brown makes the Wand tonearms and turntable in New Zealand, for High End 2023 he brought along the new Dark-Light arm (c.£5-7,000) which is a very distinctive design with a tapered carbon fibre beam with a massive 40mm diameter at the counterweight end. A nominal 10 inch design it has […]
High End show, Munich 2023 The madness of High End 2023 never disappoints. This year Germany’s busiest audio event brought forth a shedload of fabulous new gear, what follows is just the gear that caught our eye to begin with. There will be a lot more lovely equipment from Europe’s ultimate high end show. PMC […]
Audio Show Deluxe, Whittlebury The first Audio Show Deluxe took place on March 25th and 26th at Whittlebury Hall, home of several other shows in the past. It’s not the most exotic of locations unless you are into motor racing, the roar of vehicles on the nearby Silverstone track could be heard from the car […]
Oslo Hi-Fi Show 2023 pt.2 Aavik, Ansuz and Børresen get us dancing Filling larger show rooms with good quality sound can be even more of a challenge than mastering the acoustics of the smaller bedrooms. But the best syndicate room by far, to my mind, was that of Audio Group Denmark. With a system costing […]
Oslo Hi-Fi Show 2023 pt.1 When a country needs a decent audio show there’s probably nobody better equipped to create it than the major importers working together with the top magazine. So it is that Oslo now has an audiophile show to be proud of although one city centre retailer did their best to scupper […]
The Bristol Hi-Fi Show 2023 pt.2 PMC Distribution took the opportunity to demonstrate the new Martin Logan Motion series of loudspeakers. These have a black folded motion tweeter in black (rather than yellow of yore) and new woofers, the Motion models have woven fibre cones while the more tasty Motion XTs use Kevlar. The floorstanders […]
The Bristol Hi-Fi Show 2023 pt.1 The Bristol Hi-Fi Show 23 is the first of its kind since the pandemic. Run by retail chain Audio-T it has been running for as long as I’ve been involved in the industry, with my first visit back in 1989 when the hotel was a Holiday Inn and I […]