Shenzhen Audio Show II

Letter from Shenzhen (23-5): SIAV Audio Show, Part II

For Part I and Part III, roll up or down or click link.

Note: Coverage of the show follows no particular logic: Very good is Green; Good is Yellow; and Average is Red. Believe me, I'm very lenient! More so towards others than myself!

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Horns Canor LampizatOr Sikora This can be termed the East European Tube Room. Slovakian Canor drove the Polish Horns loudspeaker. Horns is a new company to me, but I’ve heard of the others. Despite my reservation in general about plastic round horns, sound was surprisingly decent, smooth and musical (if you ask me, it sounds better than the similar looking Avantgarde). Looking at the size of the amps, I asked if they employed KT150. The sales took a while to remember and replied yes. Now, the most interesting thing to me was the tube thing on top of the rack. No, it’s not an amp, but it has as many tubes. It is Polish LampizatOr DAC! Many readers will be familiar with the name. Writing this article, I researched that this was the flagship Horizon DAC, selling in North America for USD 49,000. Wow, do you spend this kind of money by clicking buy and checking out your cart? Surely, though, it has contributed to the good sound. As I don’t see a CDP (rare for this show) I think files were played through Aurender. I didn’t get to hear the handsome Polish Sikora TT. This is one of the rare cases where 2 Poles managed to screw on the light bulb in my head (with assists from neighbors). Well, to clarify, this is a paraphrase on the old “Polish Jokes” that used to be prevalent in the US (haven’t heard them in a long time). Mind you, I love all things Polish (including Kielbasa) and would love to visit the country, especially to visit the sites that are in Kieslowski’s Ten Commandments and Double Life of Veronika.

Perlisten Canor Given my good impressions of the Canor’s, I was a bit surprised that they had failed to warm up the Perlisten. Indeed, as with so many things, this loudspeaker shows up what is wrong with the US (vs the old world above). Probably some would like the “accuracy” and “neutrality” but music should not sound frigid. Worse, there was also some grain on the top, which I’m sure did not come from the Canor’s. I do reckon the choice of an Esoteric CDP (usually kinda cold) is a mistake here. Doing some research, I see the loudspeaker company is into materials like Beryllium and carbon, both of which in my experience usually do more harm than good right (but when done right, as in the use of beryllium in the immortal vintageYamaha NS-1000). I also read that their loudspeakers have complicated crossovers, another minus in my book. So, Perlisten gets a red flag but Canor not responsible!

ATC Playback KR Audio When I walked in, I noticed the Special Edition of the ATC 100, much taller. Unfortunately, it was not playing, rather a smaller pair was on duty (I prefer the early ATCs; I loved my first gen 20). Digital duties were performed by US Playback Designs (which I suspect is defunct, as there is no recent news and their website is down). The Preamp is interesting. KR Audio P135 uses J-FET input, followed by 45 tube buffer and then transformer output. Not cheap (as with anything KR) at Euro 5800 for just a Line Preamp (ss phono board is optional). Amps were ATC’s own. Sound was decent enough, but small speakers don’t usually light my fire (a few exceptions exist, like LS3/5A or this show’s Ensemble Reference).

Tecsun I have long heard of this company because of their LS3/5A clone (model SP80A). The company is the pre-eminent radio manufacturer in China and possibly the world, though for a long time they have developed a full line of digital products and amps. The boss is a fan of the LS3/5A and he later collaborated with loudspeaker manufacturer Ho (何氏) to develop the SP80A. Most HK readers would have heard of Ho, as he had earlier developed a version of the LS3/5A himself. Well, now the loudspeaker line has fleshed out to include the large horn 1501. When I walked in, they were playing their newest SP60A (despite the name, about twice the volume of the SP80A) with their own electronics. This has a titanium dome tweeter seated in a wave guide, and the woofer is paper come with hard-edged corrugated surrounds (I totally approve). Sound was not bad at all. I asked to play the SP80A (front pair on wooden pedestals which are open in the back) and listened for a while until an irritating fellow sat down behind me and leveled all kinds of critical opinions at the manager, who was trying to ignore him. So I couldn’t say I really got an handle on their stuff. So the rating is provisional.

Impeto Boaacoustic This room is dominated by a white pair of the weird Impeto lacquered loudspeakers, driven by Impeto electronics.  Sound was alright. There is a booklet but the only thing I learned is it’s called Warrior-1 and is 8 ohm and 92db in sensitivity. The website only has a front page. The only Impeto products I could find were a few cables on Amazon. Nada, Nothing else. Searching “Impeto” returns a lot of “Impetigo”, a skin disease. Boaacoustic is a German cable brand that is at least honest in admission that high end cables are basically boa constrictors in look as well as sound effect.

KEF D’Agostino Simaudio Finally I got to hear the LS60. When I walked in, the Blade 2 was playing. Sound was decent driven by D’Agostino integrated. Source was Simaudio CDP. When there was no one else, I asked for the LS60, which they fed not by Bluetooth but by coaxial digital cable from the CDP. Sound was in the same vein, though necessarily proportionately smaller in scale. Nonetheless, not bad. I’d have liked to test out the BT (the raison d'etre of this product really), but I didn’t insist. Should have been yellow but I upped it for its simplicity and decency.

Weeput 小沛知音 This product puzzled me. Supposed to be for AV and Karaoke. It is too clumsy in size to be used on a desktop, and the screen is too small to be used on its own. Didn't really evaluate.

legendsound Pylon Falcon Lab legendsound is is the kind of company I detest. Its glossy booklet has "Canada" prominently featured, and it reprints many articles from Chinese press, of course all waxing lyrics. The inner page, like its website, is a joke in terms of English. You must read and you will laugh, Guaranteed! Just one example: "Fantasy CD drive plus DAC is a combination of a separate set." Now, that's jitter and oversampling in language, which I hope does not extend to its somewhat pricey digital products. Tell you what, these companies (registered or not in a western country) are almost certainly run by Chinese. That may not be a problem, but if you are proud of your products, why not show your face or name somewhere? One will not find any details on the owner, sales and designers of these companies. That said, sound with Polish Pylon loudspeakers (black) was not bad. I'd have loved to also hear the Japanese FalconLab (wood). No relationship to UK Falcon Acoustics. Small Italian Atomica bookshelves were also on silent display. So! Red for the cowards legendsound, and yellow for the innocent bystanders.

Ologe Unusual and small multi-national loudspeaker maker Ologe comes with flight case. Sound was pretty good. Equipment used was ad hoc: vintage TT, Lyngdorf, etc. And they were featuring Wonder Audio Labs phonoamp (not played), said to be designed by HK legend William Tam, but I'm sorry to say I don't know who he is! The sales was waxing lyrics, and so I asked him what this WT had designed before and he just could not answer me, but that maybe just his limitation. Maybe someone can educate me. I suddenly recall I have previously seen Ologe in HK shows on display. For the small size, a bonus upgrade from yellow.

Shanling Triangle Veteran Shanling still has a tube-buffered CDP, except it has gone from the first gen's WE2C51/396A/5670 to 12AX7. That brings back memories. I had one of those, and even after rolling in WE 2C51 I concluded that bypassing the tube buffer was the best sound! LOL! Sold it! Now, Shanling has branched into amps and other digi products. Sound with Triangle was not bad. Incidentally, Shanling had acquired French YBA long ago, and there's one on display, but it seems nothing much is happening on that front.