West of Scotland Hi-Fi Club
2010-2011 season
West of Scotland Hi-Fi Club2010-2011 season
|
|
|
West of Scotland Hi Fi Club visit to the National Audio Show 2009, Whittlebury Hall, Northampton
Roger our driver picked us up outside the BBC at 16:00 prompt and we headed into the maelstrom that is the M8 at rush hour. Although, being a holiday weekend in Glasgow it was actually quite quiet. The journey proceeded well until around Penrith, when we encountered road works, the first of many on the journey. After this we stopped for tea. Roger and I opted for the Burger King option while George plumped for Fish and Chips from the Eat and Drink Company. When George arrived with his Fish and Chips the Burger King option turned out to have been the better choice. The fish looked like it had been caught close to the nearby Sellafield nuclear facility.
Off we set again, fed and watered and headed south and after another stop for coffee arrived at the Premier Inn, Harpole at 23:45. Roger had a few problems checking in, as another Mr Davis had already booked into the hotel and this caused all sorts of issues resulting in our Mr Davis only having a room for one night.
Next morning, after a hearty breakfast and Roger getting his room sorted we headed off to Whittlebury Hall. On arrival and after getting our goody bag of free magazines we all headed off in different directions. Much time was spent walking up and down the same corridors as the place was a maze with demo rooms everywhere and very easy to get lost.
Alistair and Tom arrived about 15:30 courtesy of Alistair’s lean, mean, green machine, otherwise known as a Toyota Prius. With a fresh set of PP9 batteries he had made the journey in good time.
As for the actual goodies the following stood out: Quad electrostatics EL-2805 and EL-2905 at around £6500.
The Cabasse La Sphere’s (shown below) - although a bit expensive at £108,000
The Avantgarde Acoustic Horn loudspeakers sounded awful when I went into the room. A track was just finishing and there was applause at the end that sounded like it was coming through a telephone. The next music track wasn’t much better.
The Aurousal A1 speakers sounded so harsh that I couldn’t listen to them for any more than a few minutes.
The only “home cinema” set up was very impressive. The company displaying it was called SIM2 and they were using an up rated 3 chip DLP projector and about £12000 (special show price!) of 7.1 audio amps and processors. It looked and sounded exceptionally good with a variety of clips ranging from the usual bangs and explosions to more musical items.
There was a BOSE demo room where there was a demo every 15minutes. This was to “launch a major new product to the European market”. On entering the specially built darkened room with about 20 seats we were faced with a table and a black cloth draped over it, obviously concealing the major new product. An LCD TV for the PowerPoint presentation and the Bose employee. A short presentation followed with several pieces of music played to demonstrate the superior qualities of the still hidden major new product. It sounded very good it has to be said and then the big moment arrived. With a fanfare that would normally be reserved for the launch of an Airbus, the major new product was revealed……..it was the new Sound Dock 10 for your iPod. Now call me cynical but if you bought one of these, took it home and stuck your iPod into it I doubt it would sound anywhere near as good as it did in that room.
Talking of iPods. Docking stations were very much in evidence with valve ones taking pride of place. There were a few music “servers” like SONOS and Naim but not as many as I thought there might be. Vinyl still seemed to be king. One thing that I noticed was that blue LED’s seem to be very much in vogue; there was even a cartridge with one in it
One gratifying aspect of the show was that there is still a huge interest in Hi Fi. Okay the design and “look” of the gear may be more important than it used to be but there are still companies and individuals out there striving to make good quality equipment that sounds good……although this comes at a price. Pretty much everything was hugely expensive. £6000 for cables, £450 for a mains conditioner and a company that would burn in your cables for a couple of pounds an hour!!!
After the show we forced ourselves to have a few drinks before an enjoyable dinner in the restaurant next to the hotel. Very handy for the short stagger back to our rooms later that night.
The Motley Crew
Alistair ordering a few drinks.
How does this work then?
Doy you really want another brandy? … I'm a pensioner you know! All in all it was well worth the long drive with more exhibitors than you could shake a tone arm at and very well attended.
B.Goldie |
Copyright Alistair Biggar
|
