Rocky Mountain Audio Fest 2014

This is just over a week away. I plan on attending. Anyone else going?

 

I'll be there as well.

 

haven't missed one. lots of fun meeting up with friends and hanging out

 

I'll be there

 

Me too

 

I will be there.

 

Had such a good time last year that I'm coming back for all 3 days this year.

 

I'm going for two days, and I'm really looking forward to it.

 

I will be back for my 5th time. I have been to the RMAF site and looked at the amount of vendors coming this year. I guess after last years reduction in attendees that several vendors that have been coming over the past few years are not attending this year? Only looks like two of the floors to be fully booked with vendors. The rest of the floors are only partially booked. But CanJam has been growing every year from the first time I went and there were only 10 vendors. I hope Jude from Head-fi and Tyll from Inner Fidelity have enticed more vendors to show up for CanJam. I guess another reason for less vendors showing up in Denver is due to the increase of other audio shows the past couple of years. The New York show was just this past weekend. There seems to be about one show a month anymore.

 

Anyone going to the show to check out something in particular? Do you have an upgrade in mind?

I just purchased new speakers a few weeks ago, so I won't be making any other audio gear purchases this year. But I do plan to eventually replace my current stereo amp, and I'd like to add a stereo preamp to the system also. Consequently, this RMAF is a fact finding mission for me.

Brands to which I'll be paying special attention include Hegel, Merrill Audio, Esoteric, Music Audio First, Mola Mola and Boulder.

I may also pick up a few more of the Synergistic Research HFT units for my listening room.

I'm looking forward to some Mexican food at the local restaurant (Garcia's ?) that's very close to the venue. I also just discovered that there's an Old Fashioned Pancake House within walking distance, so I foresee a prodigious breakfast or two during my stay in Denver.

 

I like the Mexican place...the margaritas can be deadly.

 

DPM, I saw your mention of Music First Audio, for a preamp I presume. Since I am the only dealer in the western USA for Music First, I can tell you that we will not be there this time. If I can loan a preamp to you, for home audition, please contact me. You can find my contact info at my webpage, www.MusicFirstAudio.com/california/

By the way, I am also a big fan of both Garcia's restaurant and Synergistic's HFT units. In fact, Gracia's margeritas and the HFTs seem to have a very similar intoxicating effects upon me. Too many can be too much. --Warren

 

Day one of RMAF 2014 starts soon. I'll be hitting the music vendor room first. I'm hoping the new Steely Dan and UK SHM SACDs are available. If they are on sale I'll probably pick up UK's debut and Pretzel Logic.

I'll then start hitting the audio gear displays--paying particular attention to the power amps. As my Proceed HPA 2 has taken a downturn recently the writing is on the wall. The Parasound Halo mono blocks have me intrigued. I'll definitely be looking out for them.

 

Rocky Mountain Audio Fest 2014 is history.

My thoughts.

1) Attendance seemed down overall to me. Saturday was easily the busiest day, but it wasn't so busy that getting an elevator ride was a hassle. I also overheard one of the music vendors saying that the attendance numbers for last year were a bit flat after a strong growing trend each of the years before. I wonder if the plethora of audio shows is starting to eat away at RMAF. Hmmm.

2) Computer-based audio is here to stay. No surprise there, but the majority of the rooms were running some sort of hard-drive derived setup. Vinyl was strong too.

3) Rooms/companies that stood out in a good way to these ears were…

- Hegel room with Magico S3 speakers (I think my next amp is going to be a Hegel.)
- Constellation/Raidho room (Raidho introduced their new excellent X1 stand mount.)
- Acoustic Sounds room with Sony speakers, J-FET power amps, SME turntable and Pass Labs electronics.
- Esoteric/Cabasse room
- German Physiks/BDR Sound Enhancement
- Salk Sound/Audio by Van Alstine
- Kimber Cable room with Meitner electronics and Sony speakers (surround setup)
- Audio Limits room with Polymer Audio/FM Acoustics/Thrax Audio

I was going to include photos, but now this site won't display photos posted using Photobucket. This link worked before.

 

I would like to read some comments about the Infinity IRS Beta speakers in the PS Audio room. I absolutely loved those speakers (with vinyl LPs and Audio Research 100% tube, no digital or ARC hybrid yet, at the time) many years ago at CES in Las Vegas. How do these ancient speakers sound now, compared to the latest-and-greatest?

I wonder if the hyper-resolution of current PS Audio digital/transistor equipment might make for a bit of an anachronism, compared to what I heard when the IRS Beta speakers were the cutting edge. In other words, I suspect the romance and emotional involvement of real music might be cleaned out-of-existance with this combination.

Or, are great speakers from the past still great?

 

Agree on all except Esoteric probably due to Cabasse speakers. Also good were:

Wavelength with Vaughan speakers. My Best of Show.
I've never heard dynamics like that. German Physiks was really good though as was Raidho/Constellation.

Ryan Speakers with Aurelic.
Eclipse with Luxman electronics and Synergistic Research "voodoo".
Nola Baby Grand and Audio Research. Spectacular.
Unison Research Triode 25 with VoiceBo monitors.
All Benchmark Media system.
DeVore Fidelity Orangutans with Ayre electronics.
Wilson Audio Sasha with VTL.
Joseph Audio Perspective.
Mr. Speakers Alpha Dog Prime headphones.
Sony Z7 headphones.
Schiit Yggdrisil flagship DAC.
Hifiman headphone and amp.
Vinnie Rossi Lio with Hifiman 560.
Noble with Chord Hugo.

P.S. The Audioquest power demo was truly amazing.

 

I had moved to Denver last year and made it. I worked all weekend this year and didn't.

 

What was that?

 

Anyone seen the Schiit Fulla?

 

Did you get to hear the new Cavalli Liquid Crimson with the Alpha Dog headphones?
I think I might kinda want that amp. Even though I just got a Liquid Fire.

 

Yes I did and it sounded great!

 

Yeah, so I looked at your profile and saw Magicos! Nice!

 

Which FM Acoustics units did they have?

 

are you serious?

 

Yep it looked interesting. Jason showed it to me but I did not listen to it. Like Geek Out but more raw metal looking with a round volume knob.