Capital Audio Fest 2016

Darn I missed the Volti room somehow.  Sounds like it was a worthwhile listen.

Larry,

I am a little confused by your description of the Deja Vu speaker as "open baffle."  The cabinets I saw appeared to be completely sealed front and back.  Did Vu switch speakers during the show perhaps?  The ones I heard on Friday and Saturday were rectangular boxes about the size of a medium refrigerator, very nicely finished, and had a black grill on the front.  If we are talking about the same speakers, I certainly agree this was a very fine system.  It also improved significantly in sound from Friday to Saturday by the way.  By Saturday it had a very smooth, warm, detailed and dynamic sound that suited to a T the jazz LPs I heard during my visit.  Aldo said the speaker used all vintage drivers but not Western Electric.  The midrange horn has an elliptical front and according to Aldo was made in Japan in the 1960s.

I say two rooms with Voxactiv speakers in them and I liked what I heard--very clear and dynamic sound, minus the shrill and peaky quality that is often heard with wide-range drivers. The big Voxactiv speaker at the show had to be listened to at quite some distance to not sound shrill and peaky, but, when thus accommodated, it was very nice sounding.

The smaller room with the Voxativ speakers (the other room had Gary Gill's horns built around Voxativ drivers) was one of my favorite rooms to sit in, and Holger was great to talk to. That room (309) had a great custom David Berning amp that had switches on the front for class A or class AB as well as for feedback (labels hand-engraved on the spare aluminum chassis), and a Linear Tube Audio MicroZOTL2 preamp. The digital end was processed by the fairly new, proprietary R-2R DAC the Metrum Pavane, which Holger seemed to enjoy as much as the vinyl played on the Fern & Roby turntable. We've been using NOS DACs (Metrum, Wavelength, Augio-gd) whenever we can–they seem to be a perfect match with our tube gear. Hard to judge a DAC at an audio show, though, unless there's another source in the room to compare it with. 

I was really impressed by the Benchmark room and those Studio Electric monitors. The room I found the most enjoyment in was with the Larsen 8 speakers. Also nothing wrong with those Focal Sopra 2 speakers!

I recall David Berning related amps in a number of rooms at the show.   Very well represented and a very good showing overall.