CES 2008

I have seen few turntables, no any mechanical devices more likely to induce flat-out gadget lust than the $150,000 Transrotor Artus. It has a magnetically coupled drive assembly, which means no points of contact between motor and platter. It's machined from solid billets of high-grade aluminum, finished to an impeccable sheen. Its deck is gimbal-mounted to freakishly huge counterweights for absolute level and stability (think gyroscope here). Its power supply uses something called "Konstant M3," which I gather is pretty special, but my limited German and the Transrotor rep's far less limited English prevented me from determining in what way.

You wouldn't tell by looking at him, but Martin Tremblay is camera-shy. He's modest, though he has every reason to be proud. Triangle's new Genese Series continues the French firm's tradition of sophisticated styling. With its slender, elegant cabinet and smooth, glossy finish, the $4900/pair Quartet descends from Triangle's Magellan Series and is just as lovely.

Pictured are Dotson, Alazard, Jon Iverson, and Wes Phillips in the specially "tweaked" air molecules.

The Sumiko suite at CES provided a huge listening space to introduce the new Vienna Acoustics' full-range, four-way Die Musik loudspeaker ($25,000/pair). Designed by Peter Gansterer (see photo), a pair of Die Musiks produced some of the best sound I heard at the show. The speakers were positioned quite far apart against a side wall, and the listener sat on a couch closer to the plane between the speakers than the distance between the speakers. This created a very wide, coherent soundstage quite unlike any other than I heard at the show. Bass response, which was superb, actually could be credited, in part, to a huge REL Studio 3 subwoofer, which was parked and running in the nearest room corner.

It exists; we saw it for ourselves! Wadia's $349 iTransport can take the digital signal out of an iPod before the DAC, outputting 16-bit/44.1khz resolution for uncompressed files—it doesn't upconvert lower-rez files like MP3s, but it does reformat them to 16/44.1, according to Wadia's John Schaffer.

Back home, at the end of a long day, John Atkinson will often come into my office and wish me a good evening. It's very sweet.

Several rooms this year are sporting 1/4" reel to reel decks as source components. The">http://www.stereophile.com/news/012907master/index.html">The Tape Project has caught on with exhibitors in the Venetian including Pioneer/TAD & Magico. Representatives from TTP were often spotted hauling reel to reel tapes, along with the machines that play them (such as this modified Technics 1600) up and down the halls.