Shows-Events

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Written by: Doug Schneider

Category: Features

Created: 31 March 2011

When it comes to tradeshow displays, Canada's Totem Acoustic is clearly ahead of its competition, and has been for several years. Whether the company shows their wares in a massive booth on the floor at an event such as CEDIA, or in a large room like at Salon Son & Image 2011, the displays are bright, lively, and thoroughly memorable. Totem Acoustic is also one of the few companies to use people in their ads, which, in our opinion, gives their marketing material better visual appeal and a more personal touch. It's odd that more companies haven't caught on, because it's obviously working well. Saying this year's display is eye-catching is an understatement. Awesome better describes it, and you couldn't help but be drawn into their room.

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Written by: Doug Schneider

Category: Features

Created: 30 March 2011

Our goal with this year's Salon Son & Image coverage is to produce the largest show report ever done at this event, and we also want to get it online quicker than anyone. Fifteen years ago when we first started covering this show, no one else was doing online coverage. Times change, though, and we now have competitors trying to catch up to our on-the-spot coverage. The result is that we have to be better than ever. In order to meet this year's goals, it means getting to Montreal early and starting off our coverage with a BANG! That bang, though, was just supposed to be a figure of speech; it wasn't supposed to involve my car.

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Written by: Doug Schneider

Category: The Best of CES and THE Show 2011

Created: 09 January 2011

If you were at CES and saw a shiny, non-descript integrated amplifier with a sexy remote and simply passed it by because you thought it was too pretty to be a serious audio product, you probably missed one of the most exciting product debuts in Las Vegas this year.

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Written by: Jason Thorpe

Category: The Worst of CES and THE Show 2011

Created: 09 January 2011

I flew into Nevada on a crisp, cloudless night. The air was dry here in the desert. That dry air endows landscapes with a lucid quality that's almost hallucinatory. I'd look out a hotel-room window and there in front of me would be a rugged, austere, almost lunar landscape that was totally at odds with the madcap ring-ring-ring casino frenzy.

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Written by: Jason Thorpe

Category: The Best of CES and THE Show 2011

Created: 09 January 2011

While strolling through one extremely high-end exhibit after another, you can easily lose touch with reality. $125,000-per-pair speakers? I'll take them. $30,000 amp? Four please -- I'll biamp.

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Written by: Doug Schneider

Category: The Worst of CES and THE Show 2011

Created: 09 January 2011

One hundred and ninety-nine thousand dollars isn't quite enough to buy a detached home in my city any longer, but it is enough to buy a decent condo or a townhouse, and it's way more than enough to buy one of the most amazing sports cars you can imagine and be envied by almost every guy in the city. It’s also enough to buy one of the worst loudspeakers I’ve heard in years: the Venture Xtreme, priced at exactly what I just said for a pair.

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Written by: Roger Kanno

Category: The Worst of CES and THE Show 2011

Created: 09 January 2011

Mirage's original M1 loudspeaker was released in about 1987 and is considered by many to be a legend. Back then, the Mirage brand was owned by Canada's Audio Products International (API), and the M1 looked like the Monolith from 2001. All that's changed.

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Written by: Roger Kanno

Category: The Best of CES and THE Show 2011

Created: 09 January 2011

Polk Audio has significantly redesigned their top-of-the-line LSi series of loudspeakers and dubbed them LSiM. Even with all of the new upgrades, the price of a pair of bookshelf speakers starts at only $1500 and goes up to $4000 for a pair of their largest floorstanders.

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Written by: Roger Kanno

Category: Features

Created: 09 January 2011

You would think that someone would have figured out a way to future-proof surround processors and receivers. Most surround-sound components become obsolete as soon as a new type of audio or video processing is introduced, requiring the consumer to upgrade by purchasing a new unit if they want to remain at the leading edge of technology.

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Written by: Administrator

Category: Photos

Created: 09 January 2011

Companies featured in gallery below: Simaudio Moon, Differential Technology, Copland, Audience, Clearaudio, Musical Fidelity, GutWire, Peachtree Audio, Roksan, Audio Technica, Sennheiser, Sonus Faber, Sony, Totem Acoustic

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Written by: Doug Schneider

Category: The Worst of CES and THE Show 2011

Created: 09 January 2011

For $15,000, consumers should expect to get a pair of loudspeakers that are extremely well built, beautiful looking, and incredible sounding. All told, a speaker that costs this much should be amazing and, perhaps, even approach the state of the art. Case in point: Vivid Audio's B1, which won our 2010 Pioneering Design Achievement award.

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Written by: Jason Thorpe

Category: The Best of CES and THE Show 2011

Created: 09 January 2011

Vegas is a place where almost nothing is free and few things are cheap. The exception to this rule is Wi-Fi, at least at the Venetian.

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Written by: Doug Schneider

Category: Features

Created: 09 January 2011

There's a well-known saying: What happens in Vegas stays in Vegas. We now have another one: What you buy in Vegas will be many times as expensive in Vegas.

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Written by: Jeff Fritz

Category: Super-Speakers Special Feature

Created: 09 January 2011

Let's get down to brass tacks and talk results. Here is what I heard from the Super Speakers of CES 2011.

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Written by: Jason Thorpe

Category: Features

Created: 08 January 2011

There's a fine balance between humility, genius, and arrogance. High-end audio is full of people who profess to genius, who make their careers by claiming to have special insight into electronics or speaker design.

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Written by: Jason Thorpe

Category: The Best of CES and THE Show 2011

Created: 08 January 2011

Back in 2008 I reviewed the Crystal Cable Arabesque all-glass speaker and found it to be the most thrilling product that I've ever covered. It sounded fantastic, and just look at the thing -- it’s drop-dead sexy and absolutely unique!

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Written by: Jeff Fritz

Category: Super-Speakers Special Feature

Created: 08 January 2011

You have to admire aspiration and vision. The renderings for Verity Audio's new Monsalvat loudspeaker ($325,000 per pair) show truly inspired thinking. It's simply beautiful. Not beautiful as in a really good-looking loudspeaker, but beautiful as art in and of itself.

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Written by: Administrator

Category: Photos

Created: 08 January 2011

Companies featured in gallery below: Crystal Cable, Anthony Gallo Acoustics, Focus Audio, Vitus Audio, Esoteric, Bel Canto Design, Zanden Audio, Eximus, Convergent Audio Technology, dCS, Constellation Audio, M2Tech

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Written by: Administrator

Category: Photos

Created: 08 January 2011

Companies featured in gallery below: Alpha Design Labs, Furutech, DH Labs, Essential Sound Products, Genesis Advanced Technologies, Estelon, MSB Technology, Venture, Volent, Beyerdynammic, Sherbourn, Cambridge Audio, Audio Aero, Avalon Acoustics, Boulder Amplifiers, Hi-Fi Tuning, EgglestonWorks

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Written by: Doug Schneider

Category: The Best of CES and THE Show 2011

Created: 08 January 2011

We'd just finished presenting the crew from Ayre Acoustics with the 2010 Product of the Year award in the electronics category for the MX-R mono amplifiers and KX-R preamplifier when we noticed the new VX-R stereo amplifier, which is sure to be a hit with audiophiles worldwide.

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