The Jimmy Awards quest got off to a woeful start this morning. In the Ars Aures room, I watched in shock and awe as an Art Audio Quartet monoblock went into condition red before expiring in a flash of sturm und drang. In the Bösendorfer room the treble response of the beautiful VC7 loudspeaker was so muffled by an overabundance of room treatment that I wondered whether the tweeter had been left back in Vienna. In the Opera Audio room, their $2800 loudspeaker outperformed one selling for four times the price. The infamous "show conditions" started off the CES with a morbid unpredictability.

Having visited a total of 12 rooms today, I was only able to spot three potential Jimmy Award winners before an agenda of business meetings intervened: the Eben X-3 speaker ($15,800) that I liked so much last year sounded even better today with a crossover change and Nordost internal wiring, driven by Art Audio’s Vivo 300B push-pull stereo amplifier ($12,000); Opera Audio’s 200Wpc Forbidden City hybrid Calaf integrated amplifier ($3400) and Turandot CD player ($2400) sounded detailed, as well as harmonically enticing, while driving Opera’s Eric Grand loudspeakers ($2800); and the Wisdom Audio/Edge Amplifier demonstration performed a minor miracle. It enabled me to understand Rickie Lee Jones’s enunciation all the way through an entire track. However, Wisdom’s Adrenaline loudspeakers retail for $75,000; the Edge electronics for $20,000. Even a RLJ lover like myself would need an undivided winning lottery ticket in order to justify purchasing an Adrenaline/Edge system.

Unfortunately, this abbreviated report circumscribes my first half-morning of CES 2006.

With a dawn-to-dusk day at the Alexis Park scheduled for tomorrow, I promise to submit an expanded overview then.

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Today’s rush-around uncovered a number of viable contenders for Show awards. In the "cool hardware" category, two data storage systems stood out: the Kaleidescape Entertainment Server ($25,000) with the capacity to save up to 600 DVDs and 6,000 CDs was purpose-designed to deliver high-quality movies and music throughout the home; (2) The Soaring Falcon Media Center ($4000) and Soaring Audio SLC-A300 stereo amplifier with Signal Loss Compensation ($1250) uses a computer-hard-drive platform and Windows software to enhance the digital playback experience. Video in the Kaleidescape room was stunning to the eye while music in the Soaring Audio room was sweet to the ear (using Magnepan MG3.6/R loudspeakers). With data servers looming large, are CD players an endangered species?

In the "intimate" music category, several rooms made glorious work of a CD of Schubert Impromptus (Naxos 8.550260). The value leader was the LSA Group LSA2 loudspeaker ($2500/pair) driven by DK Design’s VS.1 Reference Mk II hybrid integrated amplifier ($4995). The new Silverline La Folia ($9000), driven to near-perfection by Pass Labs monoblocks, reminded me why I gave the loudspeaker an award at the New York Show three years ago. Dynaudio drivers sound superb when designed with music in mind rather than corporate profits.

Two rooms excelled at large scale music. The Kharma/ASR/Kubala-Sosna system rendered the opening to Straus’s Thus Spake Zarathustra with spellbinding verisimilitude. And well it should have at a retail cost well in excess of $100k. Surprisingly, Chinese manufacturer Jungson Audio, brought over a system that was almost as pricey. Their Deity No. 1 ($59,000) loudspeakers and JS10/JS200 preamp/power amp combo support the notion that massive driver arrays and heavy "old" class-A amplification can sound extremely good -- at a huge price ($110,000).

I was pleased to see that a couple of famous brand names do not plan to go gentle into that good night. Quad, now owned by IAG of China, displayed a brand new full-range electrostatic transducer. Partnered to Quad electronics, the model 2905 ($11,500) revealed all the nuances of Aaron Neville’s miraculous voice. Later on, Vandersteen’s Quatro ($10,995) combined with Audio Research VS55 monoblocks ($2995 each) to perform a similar tribute to Hugh Massakela.

On a subliminal level of self-justification, I was gratified by the demonstration in the NuForce/Usher room. Since last year’s CES, I have championed those two brands in print and by using them extensively at home. Driven by the NuForce Reference 9 ($2500), the Usher CP-8571 ($7795) reproduced quiet passages with shimmering delicacy and bombast with virile sonority.

However, having had a chance to listen to a system in the Usher Audio room where Usher’s own electronics motivated Usher’s magnificently- appointed BE-20 ($16,700 a pair), I am now in a quandary. I know I should prefer the more technologically advanced loudspeaker -- the BE-20 utilizes beryllium oxide not only as tweeter coating but also on the midrange driver. However, something about the haunting beauty of the music in the NuForce room makes me hesitate -- that, and the fact that I can save about ten grand by "settling" for the smaller 8571. However, an audiophile’s lust is unconquerable. The BE-20 beckons to me like a Lorelei.

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Today produced a number of strong award candidates, including some traditional marques. Although I am usually immune to the charms of Magnepan loudspeakers, I was stunned by the holography of their MG3.6/R in the Wolcott Audio room. Henry Wolcott’s smallest amplifier, the 120-watt P220-S ($6000), is said to thrive on driving "difficult" loads. If the MG3.6/R qualifies as such, the P220-S was a rabbit in a briar patch.

Another loudspeaker line that I have come to overlook because of its consistent competence is Wilson Audio. A visit to the Audio Research room removed my complacency. There, the Sophia Series 2 ($13,900/pair) did a disappearing act to rival that of the Great Gambini. Of course, the lineup of brilliant new Audio Research electronics (Reference CD 7 ($8995), Reference 3 ($9995) and Reference 210s ($19,990/pair) certainly helped the illusion. This was ARC’s best showing since the bygone days of the Golden Nugget exhibits.

From time to time, the way a product looks draws my attention. Today’s head-turner was the Reference 1 mono amp ($20,000/pair) from Audio Space Acoustics Laboratory Ltd. My SoundStage! colleague John Crossett assures me that the sound in the Audio Space room was very good. This opinion is reassuring, but unfortunately I was so aesthetically waylaid that I forgot to note the name and model of the loudspeakers playing.

Other components to which I attribute a measure of excellence despite being unable to isolate their contribution to the sound of a system are the ASR Electronics Emitter 1 Evolution integrated amplifier from Germany and the Bluenote Stibbert Improved CD player from Italy. Both products were used in a variety of third-party rooms, indicating the high regard in which other manufacturers hold them.

An old acquaintance, Robert Lee of Acoustic Zen, and a new acquaintance, Brian Tew of Red Dragon Audio, teamed up to produce a musical experience. Tew’s ICEpower-based Leviathan monoblocks in handsome zebrawood ($5995) powered Acoustic Zen’s equally handsome Adagio loudspeaker ($3700). As a first outing in the highly competitive loudspeaker market, Lee shows that his long experience in the brutally competitive cable arena has given him the marketing sense to develop a product that appears to be excellent value for money.

Finally, the high-tech product of the day was CL3 Audio Engineering’s Gemincore stereo amplifier in prototype form (price to be determined). The Gemincore’s class-D switching power module produces 150 watts and has a bandwidth from DC to 70,000 cycles! The company’s strategy is "to avoid most problems from rising up at the switching moment rather than to get rid of their consequences afterwards, using DSP for example." The Gemincore comes complete with an engineering white paper to support the company's argument. All the mathematical equations recalled for me that in the 12th grade I had a choice between taking calculus or typing class. As this report shows, I wisely chose typing.

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Sunday at the Alexis Park brought an embarrassment of riches, as well as a few embarrassments. Presentations that seemed to me particularly ineffective included the Swedish Statement array ($400,000), the Zanden room, where a full complement of beautifully styled tube components costing $90,000 did not bring out the best in the Peak Consult The Empress loudspeakers, and the Zetex Semiconductors exhibition in which their long-awaited (by me) class-D Acoustar amplifier (price to be announced) embodied all the edginess that the term "digital sound" connotes.

On the positive side, a large number of systems were so congenially constituted that one could have spent hours listening to them. Acapella, which normally shows its loudspeakers with Accustic Arts electronics, this year switched to Einstein power and source. As a result, the High Violin loudspeakers, in Mk 3 version ($48,000/pair), sounded better than ever. Einstein’s The Tube preamp ($13,850), The Final Cut Mk 60 OTL monoblocks and The Last Record Player Mk 2 CD player ($25,250 for both).

Another smash hit was the King’s Audio Limited King full-range electrostatic loudspeaker ($6000/pair). Last year I drifted into the King suite at the Hilton Hotel and was both impressed and dismayed by the sound. To my ear, the large paneled monolith was unworthy of its "full-range" billing, and I did not repress my frank opinion at the time. Apparently, King’s Audio’s designer took my candid complaints constructively and responded with an engineering vengeance. I would venture that the King can now put to rest nostalgic memories of Martin-Logan’s original CL3.

As good as the King’s Audio King was, however, I was even more impressed by the slender hybrid Queen ($1500/pair), whose electrostatic panel is detachable from the woofer cabinet. With the ‘stat panel setting on the floor beside the woofer, the Queen sounded almost as full-range as the King (the -3dB point is 38Hz, versus 32Hz for the King) and because the speaker did so little to block the view, it imaged with even better width of field. The amplifier was JoLida's Musical Envoy, which costs $8000.

Another sonic oasis was the Margules Audio room, where the newly revised U280 SC amplifier ($3300) sounded as sweet as ever, but a bit more extended at the frequency extremes. The Margules Orpheus loudspeakers ($6000/pair) positioned for nearfield listening sounded much better to me than a famous German brand similarly ensconced in in a different room.

As the day wound down, I almost missed a real treat, the sound of my Aaron Neville test track in the Aurum Acoustics room. Taking the total system approach to equipment choices, Aurum Acoustics denies audiophiles their much-loved freedom to mismatch and otherwise foul-up the sound of separate components. However, if I had the money, I would gladly surrender to Aurum’s siren call. The Integris CD player ($10,800), a CD preamp, and the Integris Active 300B active loudspeaker ($27,000/pair with amp) portrayed the Neville musical instrument with eerie verisimilitude. Was this the best sound of the show? You’ll have to read the full post-show report to find out.

…Jim Saxon
jims@soundstageav.com