CES 2008 and the parallel show run from January 7-10th, with a special press day on the 6th (Day Zero, we call it). Click to visit each of UHF's live reports. The report will appear early the next day, if not before.
Day 0 (Jan.6th)
Day 1 (Jan.7th)
Day 2 (Jan.8th)
Day 3 (Jan.9th)
Day 4 (Jan.10th)
As every year, the exhibits in this huge show are scattered across a number of venues, not all next to each other. And that's not even taking into consideration the existence of the second show, which we'll cover on Day 2.
We got through perhaps half the rooms in this first day, and for a good reason. The exhibitors who had picked the large rooms last year got burned, because no one could find them (and didn't care to stay if they did). They've piled into the towers this time.
Did we ever mention we like unusual speakers? We do, whether they're good (as these are) or merely weird. These tall glass speakers are from Perfection Audio, and yes that's real glass, not acrylic. It needs to be thick, because there is clearly(!) no fibreglass or other damping material. Each pai requires some 200 hours of assembly time, not to mention shipping costs and insurance against breakage, all of which explains the price: some $275 thousand. The green tint is real, and other tints are available on request. We made the usual jokes about "transparent sound," but it really was transparent. We hard Jennifer Warnes' Lights of Lousianne, which was gorgeous.Less tall but only a little was the newest addition to Focus Audio's Signature series, the FS 988. This $12 thousand three-way speaker has impressive transients, and smoothness of Stéphane Grappelli's violin on the Duets album was pleasant indeed.
Focus speakers are mostly expensive, though the newest series is not. Th FS7 is a floorstanding speaker with a $2500 price, and it too sounded smooth and anything but shrill.
While we're on the subject of unusual speakers...
Remember Gradient? Yes, the company that once made a subwoofer for the Quad ESL-63 electrostatic speaker. Its other speakers seemed relatively conventional, but not this one. We don't know a lot about it, beyond the fact that the woofer, at bottom, is open-backed. Not baffling a woofer seems insane by conventional standards, but you'd be surprised how many "name" designers have told us off the record that they have experimented with exactl that.Oh...how did it sound? Not bad at all. We heard the opening of Jazz at the Pawnshop, and admired the depth and image of this famous live recording.
We have in the past reviewed two of the moderately-priced Genius speakers from ASW, but now this Germany company has made a leap into the upper reaches of high end, or at least the financial upper reaches. The ASW Magadis (no, we don't know either) costs some $30K. It's of three-way design, with a ceramic midrange from Thiel (the European driver maker, not Jim Thiel's eponymous company), and a ribon tweeter. We listened to Bruckner's Ninth on Reference Recordings, and admired the brash but by no means shrill brass. We don't know whether the price tag will necessitate a different dealer network.
Speaking of Thiel (the Amrican company this time), it was presen with a product you might not expect: a digital speaker system for home installation. That[s one of the speakers at right, sitting atop the digital processor. In the very good demo we heard (which included one of Thiel's superlative subwoofers), the system was hooked together by Ethernet, though the antennas at the rear make wireless operation an option (with a small performance hit, we are told).If you have attended any audio shows recently, you won't be shocked if we tell you that turntables were everywhere. Analog, if it was ever gone, is making a comeback.
For instance, Creek, known for amplifies and CD players (and speakers through its Epos division, now has its own tuntable, the Wyndsor. Yes, with a "Y". With arm, it's $4500 (the US and Canadian versions may have slightly different arms). It was playing with a Goldring Elite cartridge, the economy version of our own Excel. A similarly-priced turntable was the reborn Revolver, though the tabe itself is unrelated to the late lamented Revolver table (so named because, yes, it revolved).And then there was the Clearaudio room. The new Clearaudio Performance, moderately-priced (at $2500 with arm), sounding very good with a small Pathos tube amplifier and the inexpensive (below $1000) Vandersteen 1c speakers.
The acrylic used in several Clearaudio tables, can be made in any color you like. The proof?
And then there's the Statement. It wasn't playing, but you don't expect these things to. Don't expect mass production.We hunted around for possible successor for our superb but aging Moon Attraction surround sound processor. Bryston told us it expected to have one in a few months, capable of handling uncompressed Dolby or dts sound via HDMI 1.3 connections. So did Simaudio, which has a mockup, shown here. Likely price tag: well into five digits, but then we expected no less.
Note, by the way, that the "cheek" of the as-yet unnamed unit opens to reveal control buttons. That's a clever styling cue, and we hope it doesn't get designed out.Our congratulations to Wadiya, which has introduced what we have long clamored for: a device that can pull a digital (not analog) signal from an unmodified iPod. The iTransport will cost $350, and if it works as claimed it is a breakthrough (the people at Bel Canto may want to take note).
The evening ended with an off-site show called Showstoppers. More on it in our print issue, but one item which caught our eye was the Blu-Ray drive from LiteOn. No it's not meant for humongous storage, but for playing actual movies on a computer. Finally! The internal version will be a surprisingly-low $200, with the external one, shown here, just a little more.And now for some badly-needed rest. Tomorrow, the rebel outfit, namely the T.H.E.Show. It's at the St. Tropez, plus the old CES corner of the ocean, Alexis Park. And to continue with the maritime references, some exhibitors have jumped ship!
[ON TO DAY TWO] [TO THE UHF BLOG] [BACK TO THE UHF HOME PAGE]