Steven Stone's Best of CES 2011
Best Sound (cost no object)
The Wilson Alexandria X-2s tethered to a pair of Lamm ML3 signature amplifiers playing Peter McGrath’s recording of Leonard Shure’s rendition of Beethoven’s Op. 109 was so beautiful that it brought me in tears.
Best Sound (for the lowest price)
PSB’s new $799 a pair Imagine Mini driven by a S899 NAD C 165BEE preamp, $1199 C275BEE power amp and $799 C 365BEE CD player was the best budget sound I heard.
Most Significant Product Introduction
Sony’s new $27k/pr SS-AR1 gets my vote. Source and control components from EMM Labs, a pair of Pass Labs X330.5 power amps, and Kimber select cabling all worked together to make Ray Kimber’s recordings sound as real as anything I’ve ever heard through a loudspeaker.
Greatest Technological Breakthrough
The almost overnight ubiquity of DACs that support USB drives and memory sticks. With 96/24 being the new 44.1/16 a memory stick is the new CD.
Most Important Trend
Amarra, Pure Music, or Ayrewave playback software could be found on nearly every computer playback system in the Venetian. Mac Minis and MacBook Pros were the overwhelming computers of choice for computer playback.
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Comments
Steven:
This is out of context with the 2011 show but I don't know how to contact you more directly. That said, I have a question concerning the Olive 04/06HD Servers. I am about to purchase the 04HD and use it with an external DAC, perhaps the W4S DAC-2. I heard it at my local dealer in combination with the NAD M2 and was very impressed when the NAD was doing the converting and less so with the Olive. Question, is there any difference in audio between the 04HD and 06HD if used with an external DAC?
Paul Porreca - cpporreca [at] comcast [dot] net
Hope to see you at RMAF 2011
paul j. porreca
Since Anthony Cordesman spent FAR more time with the 06 than I, he would know better, but I found the 06's sound to be comparable with the Wyred4Sound DAC. And if you have the funds for the 06, You should also look at the Media Core 200 from Sooloos/Meridian. It offers a more complete meta-data library as well as Meridian's digital processing.
Steven Stone
Contributor to The Absolute Sound, EnjoytheMusic.com, Vintage Guitar Magazine, and other fine publications