Conrad-Johnson's Lew Johnson demos CJ's $7500 MET1 multichannel enhanced triode preamplifier. The twist? It's an analog six-channel preamplifier! It sounded exquisite, whether on two-channel sources or multichannel—only the MET1 can synthesize multichannel from the higher resolution two-channel PCM tracks present on many multichannel DVDs.
Speaking of resolution, Johnson touted
The Resolution Project disc that takes two tracks (a jazz trio and a Haydn quartet) and presents them in MP3, WMA, AAC, 16./44.1kHz, 24/96kHz, 24/192kHz, 16/44.1 surround, and 24/96kHz surround. Lew started with the higher resolution tracks and ran down to MP3—and it really showed what you throw away when you dump data. What a great learning tool—one every dealer should have on hand.
