AXPONA 2023 TRIP REPORT

Bubo · April 18, 2023

In each area, when I listened, I rated the products as in the top tier or not

So there were As and also rans,

there are too many choices to settle for less.

More price doesn't equate to an A rank.

Neither does reputation or hype.

There are definitely some companies that consistently put out good product, but not all are As

Some McIntosh amps are loved more than others.

For example, an honest headphone bake off needs everything the same except for the headphones.

Same is true for any bake off.

General Impressions

Show was very busy, near parking filled up fast

Lots of exhibitors, maybe more than the previous years

Lots of people fly in to attend the show, shows commitment

The action in audio is in the Headphones, Head gear, and Digital amps

Most of the audio market by volume is the Smart Phone and powered speakers, some foot print at the show, but the focus is on the big ticket iron and lots of exotic designs.

Lots of massive amplifiers with machined aluminum cases producing lots of watts for inefficient speakers.

New speaker concepts still showing up, - Endow Audio.com has new horn I haven't seen before. Chattanooga TN.

The Name Klipsch didn't appear in the show guide, or the show directory and maps in the atrium, maybe decided to attend late.

K-Horns were in the Esoteric room, sounded pretty good. Only heritage on site.

Demos are risky given the rooms and other challenges, like which amp would you rather demo with or source material

I visited floors 6 and above and the ground floor and Mezzanine exhibits, nothing struck me as the product of the year, perhaps I have become jaded.

There is no correlation between price and sound quality at the show, perhaps also true at home as someone convinces themselves it sounds great.

All of the Integrated and pre amp makers must add tape in/out RCA interfaces to their units so Equalizers and other gear can be inserted into the signal path for modification and enhancement.

More Amps are adding Meters, it's nice to see what the thing is doing. Knobs, meters, dials, gauges, buttons, lights, bouncing bar graphs not only make me happy, I can see what the gear is doing.

The standout at the show was little Emo aka Emotiva of Nashville.

-Instead of a demo room they had a standard trade show booth in the exhibit hall, look muscular with all of their product offerings on display. No demos. Their sheet metal cases are good enough IMHO, flat black like old Yamaha. Aesthetics are good, they got prettier.

Almost every demo room, the volume was way too loud, maybe why I like Emo's silent booth so much.

Almost no one inc me brought a pen, the salesmen sure didn't. Weird.

HEAPHONES

They had their own exhibit room, where the action is.

Demos sound like 20 people around you talking, closed cans are slightly better.

Still worth spending some time.

So many great headphones, IMHO declining marginal returns begin setting in around $200 and peak around $350

Lots of head amps, dacs, all kinds of cans, many sound great.

CABLES

14GA and lamp cords unless you are running distance or in the walls, then twisted pairs

Shielded line level and other source cables aka USB, Ethernet etc

Everything else is snake oil IMHO.

HIGH PERFORMANCE POWER CORDS

Sucker born every minute

DACS

$250 is the sweet spot, IMHO

if the unit does more aka pre amp, wifi, blutooth, HQ head amp, bouncing meters etc then maybe more money.

Gallons of snake oil in this segment.

Most are the Delta Sigma designs, there can't be that many DS chip sets on the market

INTERNET SERVERS

No one can explain why I need one at the shows

I couldn't act dumber when asking for an explanation.

Buy a laptop, or use an old one and be done with it, $400

- coupled with a wireless keyboard, fit, form and function are superior

I use my laptop display or 50 inch plasma display when surfing.

The US salesman reping Aurender Korea at the show

- explained to me that their server "was like a record player", and I "couldn't buy one at Best Buy".

- I think they were asking $10-20K for their server, which my old laptop blows away. Bigger display too.

Verdict Snake Oil.

DIGITAL AMPS

This is one area where I believe performance and quality gains are being made,

and drastic price performance improvements and next gens of chip sets entering the market.

Techincs has their own digital amp they are very proud of, their demo sounded pretty good. All techincs gear

11 Channel surround amps are definitely a driver in the segment, but also in the high watt stereo systems.

AMPLIFIERS- INTEGRATED AMPS

The sweet spot in Solid State, if you only want 50 watts. $350-500 you are in like Flynn.

There are lots of great choices in the integrates from every manufacturer. Uber competitive segment.

Yamaha offering an entry product and ladder of integrated more for your money products.

If you are running Klipsch heritage, the question is what does the first .5 watt sound like ?

Component systems SS

For me, Yamaha, McIntosh, Pass, are all safe bets and in the same sweet spot $ 7.5 - 15K

I would have to do more homework on Pass before throwing down the cash.

I am all in with Klipsch for 45 years, so I don't need hundreds of watts.

Accuphase was there, but they sounded terrible in the demo room. Speakers, room, source ?

If you want tubes, the options are limitless with Klipsch, you don't need many watts.

I would limit my search to less than 30W amps

If your speakers need 30-50 watts to turn on and 100 to do anything

then you are into different manufacturers.

Class D and the new performance chips, are the only hope of affordability if you need hundreds of watts.

TURNTABLES ARE HOT

Lots of choices, will any of them last 50 years like my old Duals ?

Using gold vs dollars, my old Dual would be around $3K in today money

Declining marginal returns set in fast at around $300-500 IMHO

Denon has one that resembles the units they made in years gone by, I should have looked for it.

I took some photos, but too much of a hassle shrinking them to fit here.

Good sounding headphone amp from Poland, OTL design $1K

Closed cans helped, but detailed and sweet

Headphone hall is noisy, but you can get a good listen with some work.

https://upscaleaudio.com/products/feliks-audio-echo-mk-ii-headphone-amplifier

Audio Research and McIntosh were the winners for meters, big meters

These were interesting, sounded pretty good, I think the salesman said $70K

Diptyque audio is a unique concept of flat speakers, high fidelity, made in France,

but we are convinced that the one that brings together the most advantages and allows music to be reproduced most naturally are isodynamic loudspeakers, also called Magnetostatic.

https://fidelityimports.com/pages/diptyque-audio