I have attended the Bristol Hi-Fi Show for more than 30 years, and it remains one of my favorite weekends of the audio calendar. Other shows have their merits, but there’s a real energy to the Bristol Hi-Fi Show, with its crowded rooms and corridors and the expansive bar where the public rub shoulders with manufacturers over a steady stream of ale. At the close of play on the Friday night, it seems that every single exhibitor, customer rep, journalist, and PR person who’s ever worked in hi-fi descends on the bar, creating a glorious cacophony of conversation that rises like the instrumental crescendo in “A Day in the Life.”
The busiest hi-fi show in Britain opens with crowds queuing around the block
Day one began, as it usually does, with a succession of press conferences. This year’s show featured several new-product premieres from a plethora of leading brands.
The stampede begins . . .
Michell Engineering
First up to bat was Michell Engineering with its stunning new Apollo phono stage and accompanying Muse power supply. Each piece of this beautifully designed, two-box solution is tastefully machined from a solid billet of aluminum and finished in black with gold accents. The clamshell cases of both units are designed to operate as Faraday cages, isolating the delicate amplification stages from the transformer and other sources of electromagnetic interference. Great care has been taken over component selection, including ceramic (not glass) fuses and a high-grade transformer. The main gain stage is class A.
The styling of the Michell Apollo two-box phono stage perfectly echoes that of the GyroDec
The design bears the hallmarks of Graham Fowler, legendary audio designer at Trichord Research, with whom Michell has a longstanding relationship. I still use his Dino Mk3 phono stage. One of its most striking characteristics is its supreme quietness, even with the lowest-output MC cartridges, such as my Lyra Kleos SL. An extremely low noise floor is a key priority for the new design too.
Shades of Trichord in the Apollo’s design
An array of dip switches on the bottom plate enables selection of cartridge-loading settings, for both MM and MC types. The Apollo–Muse combination sells for £3500, with availability scheduled for March. I have already requested a review sample.
I’m looking forward to getting my hands on this new phono stage for review
The Professional Monitor Company (PMC)
PMC, which is famous for its transmission-line loudspeakers, distributes Michell Engineering products in the UK. In addition to the Apollo, PMC showcased an entirely new five-model range of loudspeakers, Prophecy, at Bristol. The series launched in December. Prices start at £2875 per pair for the two-way Prophecy1 bookshelf model and extend to £8975 per pair for the Prophecy9 three-way floorstander. For home-cinema enthusiasts, there’s also a particularly attractive dedicated center-channel model. The stated design objective was to achieve a bigger sound from a compact cabinet and to deliver a slender and modern aesthetic. In my view, PMC has amply succeeded. There are no screws evident and everything is flush-fitting. Prophecy speakers are available in three matte-veneer finishes: Medium Oak, Natural Oak, and Blackened Walnut.
PMC’s new Prophecy line
PMC’s Laminair port has been redesigned for the new series. The Laminair X port is deeper, extending to the depth of the cabinet. This increased depth is intended to reduce turbulence at the port exit and to enable higher outputs with no port noise. In addition, PMC’s new tweeter waveguide is intended to improve off-axis imaging.
The matte-veneer finishes give PMC’s Prophecy speakers a contemporary look
Chord Company / English Electric
The legendary British cable firm always arrives at Bristol with a plethora of new products and innovations. This year was no different. First up was the brand-new PhonoARAY, which certainly excited this vinyl lover. Patrick Mitchell of Chord explained how the large amount of metal in most turntables and the extremely low output levels of most cartridges make any vinyl front end susceptible to behaving like a radio antenna.
Chord’s new PhonoARAY
The PhonoARAY is a compact aluminum cylinder with earth-connector terminals at each end. Its purpose is to target and dissipate noise from the ground. Audio signals do not pass through it; hence, its only connection is from the tonearm earth wire. The tonearm earth is connected to one end while another Chord-supplied highly shielded cable runs from the PhonoARAY to the earth terminal then on the phono stage or preamplifier. The unit has very lightweight feet that should be loosened slightly before use to provide extra isolation from ground vibrations.
Chord claims a significantly reduced noise floor and better resolution of fine details with the £999 PhonoARAY in circuit.
English Electric EE1 Plus—has there ever been a cooler name for a hi-fi company?
Also launched at the Bristol show was the new English Electric EE1 Plus network-noise isolator, which is intended to be inserted into an ethernet connection, say between a router and streamer. The EE1 Plus features galvanic isolation to eliminate low-frequency noise often generated by household devices. It’s a passive device that works by converting electrical noise into heat. The body is milled from a single billet of aluminum. Priced at £600, it became available in late February.
Chord also demonstrated its upgraded custom-install speaker cable, which incorporates features from their Leyline range. The copper conductors are tinned to reduce oxidation and an XRPE jacket is fitted as a dielectric. At £10 per meter, this should prove ideal for long cable runs and commercial applications.
It’s all in the wires!
Further demonstrations of the Chord range continued with a comparison between an Apple USB cable and the C-Series Chord equivalent. As somebody who previously worked in IT, I’m as cynical as the next geek about anything impacting the transfer of digital data, but even I had to acknowledge that the C-Series cable seemed to reduce some of the glare and harshness of the sound compared to the Apple cable. The jury’s out for me logically on this, but it does seem to be doing something positive to the sound.
Acoustic Transducer Company
ATC—my favorite speaker brand—showed a stunning navy-blue-gloss, limited-edition version of its SCM20ASL active loudspeaker (£10,000 per pair), along with a matching navy-blue, limited-edition C4 Sub Mk2 subwoofer (£7495). Designed to celebrate the firm’s 50th anniversary, the SCM20ASL LE’s front panel is hand-upholstered by Eissmann in royal-blue, full-grain napa leather, while the exterior alloy elements are silver-anodized. Only 150 pairs will be manufactured.
The achingly pretty ATC SCM20ASL LE
Through this stunning-looking 2.1 setup, the Rolling Stones’ “Love in Vain” showed superb timbre and note delineation. I was struck by the excellent integration between the sub and main speakers. There was simply no blurring of note edges, and the effect was to turn the already-excellent SCM20 into a full-bandwidth system capable of all the snap and speed one associates with this revered brand.
The prettiest sub-sat combination in the world
The C4 incorporates a full SL-spec 12″ ATC long-throw bass driver specifically designed for this sub-bass system and driven by a 450W class-G amplifier. The cabinet is made from 25mm thick MDF and heavily braced. The SCM20 employs ATC’s proprietary 6″ Super Linear midrange-woofer and a 1″ S-Spec dual-suspension tweeter. The on-board amplification comprises a 50W amplifier for the tweeter and a 200W amplifier for the midrange–woofer.
This is the definitive sub-sat combination. It’s as achingly cool and pretty as Audrey Hepburn in a cocktail dress. Oh, how I wish I had the shekels . . .
Quad
While we’re talking about legendary British loudspeaker brands, I was delighted to see Quad with an entirely new electrostatic loudspeaker, the ESL-2912X, which will officially launch this summer. Priced at £12,500 per pair, this new iteration of an old classic incorporates a stiffer chassis and frame, complete with ultra-cool illumination of the base and backlit Quad logos at the foot of each driver. The electrostatic panel has been completely redesigned and is now manufactured in a climate-controlled environment for better consistency and performance. The ESL-2912X is an imposing beast, so you’ll want a sizeable room to get the best out of a pair of them. In the large exhibit space at Bristol, the pair created that gloriously open soundstage and life-size sense of scale that makes electrostatics so unforgettable.
Quad ESL-2912X—a legend returns
Fronting the new ESL-2912Xs was Quad’s all-new 33/303 pre-power combination. The firm has done a wonderful job updating the orange and gray retro style of the original, while incorporating niceties like LCD displays and remote control. The preamp offers both fully balanced XLR and single-ended RCA outputs, along with MM/MC phono and line-level inputs.
Quad 33/30: The original 1970s version left, the new 2025 iteration on the right
The new Quad 303 is rated at 50Wpc into 8 ohms and operates in class-AB mode. It, too, is a gorgeous restyle, cleverly matching the footprint and dimensions of the original and updating it for the modern age.
The new Quad 33 pre features a superb retro aesthetic
I was surprised to discover that these are priced at just £1199 each, which for the performance and style on offer seems a bargain! I would love to see Quad still manufacturing in England rather than the Far East, even if it was only for the higher-end models, but I suspect the prices would have to rise accordingly.
Dinner date
And so, the first day at Bristol drew to a close. I had thoroughly enjoyed meeting a new member of the SoundStage! team, Joseph Montezinos, who will be working with me on some exciting special projects. It was Joseph’s first time at the Bristol show, and I think he loved the fact that hi-fi still excites so many people in England.
The author (left) and ace-photographer Joseph Montezinos have some exciting plans for 2025
As usual, the entire industry descended on the bar at 5 p.m. I love catching up with teams from all of my favorite brands over a pint. I didn’t stay long as I had a dinner date with Naim Audio. So I returned to my room at 6 p.m., changed into a new satin shirt, and headed out into the electric wonderland of Friday night in Bristol.
Jonathan Gorse
Senior Contributor, SoundStage!
