Julie Mullins

AXPONA 2022

American Sound's Second Avantgarde System with Phasemation, VPI, Analog Relax

Julie Mullins Apr 29, 2022

American Sound presented a second demo in the suite's smaller room: Avantgarde Acoustics' Uno XDs, a smaller model soon to be upgraded to G3 status, driven by Japan's Phasemation amplification.

AXPONA 2022

Next Level HiFi: Børresen, Aavik, Ansuz

Julie Mullins Apr 29, 2022

When I heard Usher's "Yeah!" being blasted out from the, uh, Serenity Room, I wondered whether to go in or hang back from the crunk. Not hating on the song, but it was awfully early in the day for this. (It turns out there was someone shooting a video in there.) But the real surprise was that the bumping, club-worthy music wasn't coming from outsized tower speakers, but from a pair of stand-mounted two-ways with some innovative porting.

AXPONA 2022

The Sound Organisation: Rega System One

Julie Mullins Apr 28, 2022

It's a good sign that at least some AXPONA exhibitors showed systems that were more budget-friendly than most. On the door to room 666 (perfect, right?) was a piece of paper affixed with blue painter's tape. Handwritten in all-capital letters, it read: "WARNING! DO NOT ENTER IF YOU WANT TO SPEND A FORTUNE ON YOUR HIFI."

Behind that door I encountered a simple but really good-sounding system that didn't call for apologists to stumble over themselves 'splaining.

AXPONA 2022

The Other Sound Organisation Room: Chord Electronics, Spendor, and Aurender

Julie Mullins Apr 28, 2022

The Rega room was one of two rooms the Sound Organisation, a distributor of several brands from the UK, had at the show. Their other exhibit in room 662 consisted of some recent gear from Chord Electronics, such as stacked racks of the Chord Qutest DAC, Huei phono preamplifier, etc. on static display. The active system was rather old-meets-new: It had BBC School Spendor Classic 2/3 speakers ($6100/pair, just over $7000/pair with stands) and a 180Wpc Chord Ultima 6 ($9200) stereo power amplifier.

AXPONA 2022

More MoFi Distribution: Falcon Acoustics, Manger, Dr. Feickert, Schick, EMT, HiFi Rose, Whest, IsoTek

Julie Mullins Apr 28, 2022

MoFi Distribution showed some classic hi-fi geartube amps and classic speakersin two of their four rooms, suites 330, which I cover here, and 346 (report to come). A few products debuted, including tubed amplification from Mastersound, an Italian company with a rather un-Italian name. MoFi Distribution's VP of Sales & Marketing Jon Derda told me that Mastersound winds their own transformers in-house. The brand is new to MoFi's rosterand new to me.

AXPONA 2022

Zesto Audio, Tannoy, Dr. Feickert, Tri-Planar, Ortofon, Benz Micro, Cardas, Stillpoints

Julie Mullins Apr 28, 2022

When I've visited the Zesto Audio room at different hi-fi shows in recent years, I've noticed that sometimes they've shown their tubed electronics driving modern loudspeakers from Lumen White, for instance. Other times, it's been vintage classics, such as Tannoys. At AXPONA, they chose very old-school Tannoy Kensington GR loudspeakers ($18,000/pair), which of course, showed quite different sound characteristics from, say, Lumen Whites.

AXPONA 2022

Malbork Audio with Moon Audio W-5 and Sonos Port (!)

Julie Mullins Apr 27, 2022

From a new company came a new loudspeaker design that was four years in the makingthanks in part to the pandemic. But COVID downtime gave Malbork Audio founder and designer Daniel Fajkis (above) one advantage: more time to refine his inaugural Malbork Warsaw loudspeaker design through more math and engineering and simulations, Fajkis told me.

AXPONA 2022

Vinnie Rossi Audio with QLN, Innuos, Merason, Gigawatt, and Swiss Cables

Julie Mullins Apr 27, 2022

Peace and quiet at a busy audio show is hard to come by. I especially wasn't expecting mellow respite on a Saturday show day. But I found some lovely-sounding music and a chilled-out vibe in Vinnie Rossi's demo room 488. Only a couple of listeners came and went during that time. Control of the iPadand Vinnie Rossi remote controlwere mine.

AXPONA 2022

High Water Sound: TW Acustic, Cessaro Horn Acoustics, Codia Acoustic Design, Stein Music

Julie Mullins Apr 26, 2022

As I scurried around Sunday trying to see and hear as much as possible on the show's last afternoon, Room 594 was one of several visits I was looking forward to. Based in Lower Manhattan, distributor/dealer Jeffrey Catalano's High Water Sound is always, uh, a high point at shows where I've heard his demo systems.

AXPONA 2022

Aretai 100S loudspeakers with Benchmark DAC3, LA4, and AHB2s

Julie Mullins Apr 25, 2022

Discovering new products from new companies is one of the best parts about audio shows. As much as we enjoy seeing familiar industry faces and brands, it's also great to meet new ones.

Aretai was founded in 2018 by Janis Irbe, the technical designer, and Edgars Zvirgzdiņ, the product designer, who hail from Latvia. At AXPONA Aretai presented the 100S entry model from their inaugural Contra collection of loudspeakers.