Ken Micallef

Tom Vu founded TriangleArt in 1999, and he’s not about to let up now.

With the debut of the futuristic Hyphn loudspeakers ($95,000/pair), Monitor Audio and Chicago’s Saturday Audio Exchange made an unmissable statement.

John DeVore brings more than music to his rooms: he brings thoughtfulness, a sense of discovery, and superbly curated recordings.

In his review of the J.Sikora Initial turntable, Stereophile's resident artist/sage Herb Reichert wrote, "Extended bathing, lighting candles, making tea, and preparing food are ritual work forms that prepare my senses to accept both pleasure and illumination."

When it comes to playing records, I too have a ritual. It involves carefully cleaning the vinyl, first on a Pro-Ject VC-33, followed by immersion in a HumminGuru Ultrasonic vinyl cleaner. Before and after, I inspect the record's grooves with a pricey VisibleDust Quasar R magnifier. Only then—black coffee hot, glasses cleaned, stylus brushed free of contaminants, notepad at hand—am I ready to receive the messages ingrained in a shiny black vinyl disc.

Linn brand ambassador Lorenzo Pacitti earnestly offered demos in Room 481, and I happily obliged.

Ryan O’Connor, president of ReVox North America, was working the rooms and the halls, but his ReVox B77 reel-to-reel machine ($15,900) failed to make it to Tampa for the ReVox room. No matter; the room offered a solid setup, including a Playback Designs IPS-3 integrated amplifier ($13,000) producing 260Wpc into 4 ohms, driving Aretai Contra 100S speakers ($9000/pair).

As I wound down the mad dash from first to fourth floors, from imbibing coffee to considering cocktails, there was still more coverage to put to bed. Deep Dive Audio of Palm Bay, Florida, resuscitated my senses with a large rig of top-flight entertainment components.