To a degree Friday and definitely Saturday the question was answered in the affirmative: they did show up! In large numbers as best as I could see in this spread out place and the demographic skewed remarkably young. Every exhibitor i spoke to said the room was packed all day Saturday. Generally everyone was happy. What's below was lifted from the AnalogPlanet YouTube channel because it's Sunday 10:22 AM and I've got to go to the show and spin records for a hour at a 11 in the PS Audio room (the new $2400 Stellar Phono Preamp sounded so) and I want to get this posted before I head downstairs.
Despite the pessimism expressed by many within the industry (including me) RMAF 2019 seems to be a big success. "Seems" because there's another show day and it's somewhat difficult to know the real attendance because of the hotel's expansive layout.
The exhibitors with whom I spoke were all happy with Saturday's attendance. Mostly I heard "room full all day". The demographic skewed younger than usual from what I saw and more than one "kid" approached me about writing for AnalogPlanet and I hope some of them follow through with writing samples.
Please visit AnalogPlanet and watch the embedded video of the "Record Cleaning Made Difficult" moderated panel discussion I ran with more than a half dozen record cleaning machine manufacturers and importers. It was informative and entertaining.
I played records and told stories in the PS Audio room to large groups of listeners and will do it again today, Sunday. Among the highlights here is the new Schiit Audio SOL (Schiit Out of Luck) turntable now in production. It sounded great for $799 with arm. There's coverage of many affordable stuff in this video so please keep the jealous bitching to a minimum.
 | ||
|
||
COMMENTS
That magnetic floating table - I wanna hear the rumble on that!
The arm at the 13-14 minute mark is interesting...but any "servo" requires some error in order to "correct" and can't be geometrically perfect.
The designer was fascinating. Thanks for giving him the time, he seemed charming. I like that he says he's never heard it! (Like that old joke about Stevie Wonder's piano.)
It would be cool to make a mini-air bearing to put into the headshell on a pivoting arm!
You 'heard' it here first!
Hello Anton D,
I am perplexed as to why I said that I never heard my tone arm. I have devoted many hours listening to my tone arm. Every time I made a significant change to the design, I listened to most LPs of my modest record collection. (~250 LPs)
As to the servo requiring an error to function, yes, that is true.
However, that error does not affect the accuracy of my tone arm. That is my claim to fame. I will prove it to you, if you are ever in Prescott Arizona.
Sincerely,
Ralf Dieckmann
I am hoping to go to RMAF next year, I would be honored to hear your tonearm!
Hello Anton D,
As I mentioned elsewhere, my main purpose of exhibiting at RMAF 2019 was, to find a manufacturer for my tone arm. I have done that. If all goes well, you may indeed be able to hear my tone arm at RMAF 2020. Please wish me Luck :).
Sincerely,
Ralf Dieckmann`
Listened to this turntable at RMAF today and was impressed..it is already sold out 4 days after its debut.
Thanks Michael for all you do in this industry. Above and beyond......
The SOL looks so interesting.
I thought it was a good show although not the best of the thirteen RMAF shows I've attended. In terms of exhibitor participation it was the smallest RMAF in my experience. The 10th floor, for example, only had six exhibitor rooms. It was hard for me to judge visitor attendance because the show was so spread out. Many of the rooms I visited were standing-room only. I did hear some very good sound. Just to name a few: Falcon Acoustics, Wilson Audio, Alsyvox, Vaughn Loudspeakers and Joseph Audio all had great sounding rooms. For me the standout was the In Living Stereo room on the 5th floor with the Mactone electronics and the Trenner & Friedl Osiris speakers. I heard nothing else at the show that captivated me the way this system did.
Michael,
I saw in your coverage that when you went to the NOLA Speakers room the door was locked. When I went there there was no one in the room. Meaning, no one present to run the room. The lights were on but there was no one home.
Another guy who followed me in there suggested it was "self-serve". I don't think so. Waited 5 minutes and left. Not sure what was going on there. NOLA makes great stuff so I'd love to have heard that system.
I love this guy that has a $10,000.00 tone arm, has sold none and does not actually know how it sounds. Please let him know I will be more than willing to audition one if he sends it to me.
Because of the background noise, in the video,I cannot tell where in the video I said that. Maybe it was stress. But please rest assured, that I have listened to my tone arm many many times and it sounded great to me. Having a hearing loss, the final judge as to what my tone arm sounds like, will not be me, but some yet unknown audiophile.
Sincerely,
Ralf Dieckmann
I had hope to see more show coverage of PS Audio's new Stellar Phono Preamp.. Most all that I could find is submitted from PSA's site only Perhaps too early for an un-biased review?
... [fill in the blank].
Hello Mike Fremer.
Thank you very much for including my tone arm in your video. The purpose of attending RMAF 2019 was not so much to sell a tone arm, but to find a manufacturer for it. And possibly, thanks to you, I have.
Sincerely,
Ralf Dieckmann
|
Equipment Reviews | |
The Gruvy Awards | |
Blogs Analog Tips | Columns Music | |
Show Reports | |
News Resources |
© 2024 AnalogPlanet
