McIntosh Labs president Charlie Randall and some of his favorite things.
(Credit: Steve Guttenberg)
Totem Acoustic's Vince Bruzzese with one of his latest creations.
(Credit: Steve Guttenberg)Recession? What recession? New York City's venerable fixture of high-end audio and video, Stereo Exchange, celebrates its 25th anniversary this weekend. It's running a sale through Sunday, November 8 with substantial discounts on select products from several manufacturers. The opening night party on Thursday was jam-packed and there were no shortage of customers!
For the opening night party, many of the participating companies were demonstrating their wares. Featured products on display include: Panasonic's new 85-inch plasma HDTV; NAD's new M2 Direct Digital Amplifier; McIntosh Labs' MEN220 Room Correction System; and Grado's PS 1000 headphones, which I just reviewed for CNET.
Stereo Exchange also sells Anthony Gallo Acoustics, Arcam, Audio Research, Ayre, B&W, Crestron, Furman, Integra, JA Michel, Kaleidescape, Marantz, Meridian, Peachtree Audio, REL, Rotel, Sonus Faber, Totem Acoustic, Transparent Cable, and Wadia. Stereo systems at Stereo Exchange start about $1,000.
For more information on Stereo Exchange, visit its Web site.
The best sounding room at Stereo Exchange featured Vienna Acoustics speakers and Ayre electronics.
(Credit: Steve Guttenberg)As an "investment" video sucks. Before you plunk down big bucks on today's cutting edge video just ponder for a second that what you buy today will be tomorrow's landfill.
Pick up a good set of speakers and they'll stick around for a long, long time. Anybody who dropped $15K on an early generation plasma display has surely replaced it years ago, and is probably on their second or third set by now. So their total investment may be approaching twenty Gs! Remember too that early plasmas were standard definition sets and their picture quality was pretty awful. Last year's shiny new HD-DVD, Blu-ray and high-end DVD players are likewise doomed to early retirement, but they'll make excellent doorstops. Computers are even worse, they get old really, really fast so unless you're rich or a pro that needs the most up to date technology, investing in cutting edge gear is a fool's game. Seven years ago Nikon introduced its first professional digital SLR, the $5,500 D1 (body only). It's a beautifully made camera, but it goes for around $300 on eBay today. The big and bulky 2.7 megapixel SLR is hopelessly out of date.
High-end audio is by contrast remarkably stable; a ten-year old, Martin-Logan or Verity Audio speaker system still sounds killer today.
The video market has a serious size obsession, demanding ever-bigger screens. If The Sopranos is your thing, the dramatic effect is pretty much the same over an iPod or 65-inch screen. So unless you're living on a steady diet of eye-candy/special effects flicks, super-sized screens don't buy you much. Great movies are still all about well-written stories with complex characters.
Audio is a more emotional trip. Play tunes or movies that get your mojo workin' over a great system and you'll be in heaven. Play 'em over a desktop iPod speaker with 1-inch "woofers" and Jimi Hendrix's glorious Strat will get emasculated to the point it's mere background noise. Music, when it sounds really good, works on a deeper more blood and guts level. And not just because the big systems can play nice and loud, no, that's not necessarily the point, but they always have more soul. It's like comparing frozen pizza to a slice fresh out of the oven in NYC's Little Italy. If you really love music, don't you want to hear every precious drop of it? Hold off on that video upgrade and put the money where you'll hear it.
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