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Hi End 2004 Europe's Largest HIFI- Show
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Clement Perry
For the first time in twenty-one years Hi End
2004 shifted from Frankfurt's Hotel Kempinski
to Munich. The venue was quite different from
the more comfortable, living room type spaces
offered at the Hotel Kempinski to a more
professional Show Room style setup. The rooms
were nicely setup I must say and most of the
sound was better than decent. There was
little to complain about with such good sound
coming from so many different rooms. This was
certainly one of the better shows I've
attended. Last year's Frankfurt Show, which I
also attended but was so overwhelmed I never
got to do a show report, was also super
impressive considering all the electronics
that never see the light of day here in the
US. This year's event was more successful as
it was just teeming with exuberant and
enthusiastic show goers, industry bigwigs, and
over two-hundred press photographers from the
various audiophile publications, many who
stayed long after the show's 7:00 PM curfew.
In the Atrium (above), most rooms looked like
sophisticated store fronts that reminded me of
my excursion to Singapore's Adelphi Building
back in 2000 [where
there are more high end shops per square feet
than probably anyplace in the world].
In addition, the outside was more of a meeting
place with very cozy seats located right
outside many rooms. Naturally one would think
that all these glass fronts
would attribute to poor sounding setups. Not
so. This may be true in theory but the sound
in most of the rooms I visited sounded quite
good
considering time constraints to get the best
sound possible and the usual [read: less than
ideal] show conditions.
Statistics don't lie and this year's
attendance growth was quite impressive with
167 rooms featuring 540 brands of audiophile
equipment. On the average, there were over
2500 visitors per day (not including
Thursday's press only day) but more important
was the cheerful atmosphere. The place was
quite festive and all in all the wonderful new
venue is my guess for why everyone was so
upbeat.
I just couldn't resist taking this
photo. Don Dixon and I traveled far arriving
from the Big Apple and were not disappointed.
Munich's quite a place. The weather was near
90 degrees but plummeted sharply two days
later. Made me wish I had traveled with winter
clothes. Munich's also one squeaky clean city
with a population that seems almost perfect in
balance: never were the trains or buses too
crowded nor were they considered empty--at
rush hour no less. The one thing I noticed
most were the advertisements. When was the
last time you saw a cigarette ad (right)
at your local bus stop featuring two senior
citizens puffing away?
 
I'm sorry but one of the most beautiful sights
for this audiophile was the equipment racks
from Copulare (above left). The attention to detail
of these assorted equipment racks, the feel,
fit, as well as functionality, is something
I hereby nominate as special. These ain't ordinary racks
even by extreme audiophile measures. So much in fact, the first
time I saw them were in conjunction with the Transrotor Turntables
and I didn't know they were two separate
companies (but I guessed the price correct at
astronomical with the combo selling for about
$65k). I did also happen to run
into a familiar sight with respect to my new
Belvedere turntable (above right $3,995) from Bluenote Audio. Minus any super rack system
supporting it I
was impressed with its unique style and
personally can vouch for the performance of
this worthy piece.
Speaking of which; how do you like your
vegetables? I would love mine with the
delicacy of Transrotor's double armed Pianta
40/80/L (left). The entire line of products
from this company are astoundingly beautiful
and in keeping with their looks sounded quite
delightful.
 
The Living Sound Room featuring Fast Audio
Acoustics and Lumen White loudspeakers seemed
to keep the audience captivated no matter the
time of day. On the left was a photo of the
room near the end of press day, which of
course was great because there was lots to
listen to undisturbed. But once the doors
opened (right) it was first come first served.
Fast Audio's Franck Tchang (above seated) had
plenty to smile about as his Resonators were
doing some job in the Living Sound Room. I've
got his amazing products here and will be
reporting on them. Stay tuned.
Don't think for a second that I wouldn't take
a moment to pose with the folks responsible
for making such wonderful sounding
loudspeakers in the Lumen White! Actually, it
was Stefan Fekete (above right) who turned me
on to an incredible new music label that I owe
a gratitude of thanks. That label is Quinton
Records.
If there is one thing that all shows have in
common it
is MUSIC LOVERS! There were so many showgoers
searching for that long lost or Most Wanted
CD/LP. And of course, you could have found me
right there looking for those hard to find
gems from labels like ECM, Turtle and the
surprisingly wonderful sounding Quinton
Records label. This relatively new label has
some notable music makers like Don Alias,
Victor Lewis, Wolfgang Puschnig and Steve
Swallow on a CD entitled "Grey" that does not
disappoint in the least. I absolutely love
their slow paced rendition of Down by the
Riverside which features Puschnig on alto
sax. For more information go to
www.quintonrecords.com
Walking about this huge show among many of the
attendees while admiring all the new fangled
Plasma and LCD displays proved a sight for
sore eyes. This truly was a mini CES event.
And if there was any one thing that gave me
sore eyes it was the new Blu-Ray hard disc HD
Recorder from Sony. In case you're wondering
Blu-ray,
 (BD)
is the name of a next-generation optical disc
format jointly developed by thirteen leading
consumer electronics and pc companies (Dell,
Hitachi, HP, LG, Mitsubishi, Panasonic,
Pioneer, Philips, Samsung, Sharp, Sony, TDK
and Thomson). The format was developed to
enable recording, rewriting and playback of
high-definition television (HDTV). Blu-ray
makes it possible to record over 2 hours of
HDTV, or more than 13 hours of SDTV on a 27GB
disc. There are also plans for higher capacity
discs that are expected to hold up to 54GB of
data.
Who was it that said competition is a good thing?
 I
dunno but I'll tell you what, this
new all-in-one A/V Media Center: HDTV
Receiver, Hard Disc Recorder, DVD-Player and
web browser from German newcomers Allcanview
was quite impressive if not overwhelming for
all it could claim out of such a small box.
For more info visit
www.allcanview.de
Part 2
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