Florida International Audio Expo Days 2 and 3

By: Michael Fremer

March 15th, 2025

Category:

Hi-Fi Shows

Florida International Audio Expo Days 2 and 3 Video Coverage

at 44 minutes put on headphones and "listen" to the room

Get your headphones ready because at around 44 minutes into the video embedded below, there's a binaural recording using Sonic Presence "on the ear" microphones, in the Vienna Acoustics, Java Hifi, Esoteric Playback Distribution room in which I had them play a 96/24 file I brought of the Classic Records special 78rpm pressing of part of Reiner/CSO "Pictures at an Exhibition".

You'll really get to hear the room sound and why I thought it was among the best sound at the show though the speakers cost under $8000. Stay tuned for a video with only binaural recordings done at the show but for now, the rest of this video includes coverage and interviews with Advance Paris's Cèdric Leon....

and Lucca Chesky who's having great success with his circa $1000 speaker...

Oneiros's, Jerry Bloomfield whose ambitious circa $600,000 speaker is a huge financial distance from his Falcon Acoustics box speakers...

Metaxas Audio's Jeff Garshon showing the new turntable/arm combo as well as the R2R tape deck and electrostatic speakers all designed by Costas Metaxas.

You'll see new products from Linn, Perfect8, Clearaudio's new flagship Unity tonearm, making its debut at this show, Benny Audio's Odyssey turntable, VPI's Avenger Statement turntable with Fatboy arm holding DS Grand Master Optical cartridge into the new TB100 tube phono equalizer, Audio Research Reference 330M mono block tube amps.

Also products from Western Electric, Volti, J. Sikora, Franco Serblin, Lumia, EMM Labs, Wireworld, Gobel, WADAX, Tripoint Audio, Spendor, Cyrus, Audiolab, Mission, and more. There were some turntables, obviously but this was not a heavy into vinyl show, and some 'tables were on static display. This needs to be improved upon for next year!

Lazy streaming held sway with smatterings of tape playing and occasional CD. The new venue was really appreciated by most participants and show attendees alike. It was a good debut for organizers at this improved site that took FLAX from small to the big time, even though the hotel rooms upstairs were kind of small.

No one recorded the seminar J.R. Boisclair and I conducted titled "Your Tangential Tracking Tonearm Really Isn't". But to sum it up: most styli are inserted into cantilevers at anything but the necessary 90 degree angle required for the stylus "contact patches" to produce groove tangency. And since most tangential tracking arm designers believe their arms ride tangent to the groove across the entire record surface, most provide holes not slots, so there's no room to compensate for the "off" stylus placement. Therefore the stylus does not achieve groove tangency anywhere along the line it traces across the record surface! Ironically a pivoted arm with slots can be adjusted to do a better job. Sorry, but those are just the facts!

Enjoy the video and be sure to listen to the Vienna Acoustics speakers while wearing headphones!

Comments

2025-03-16 03:19:29 PM

bwb wrote:

I think your statement "a pivoted arm with slots can be adjusted to do a better job" is a bit misleading. Sorry if I misinterpreted your intent, but it reads to me like you are saying a pivoted arm can always be adjusted to do a better job. Perfectly set up, a pivoted arm is still only going to be perfect at 2 points on the record, so which is "better" depends on how much the stylus is rotated AND obviously, whether the linear arm has holes or slots.

First, a consistent error across the record from a linear arm may be less than average error from a pivoted arm that is only perfect at 2 points. Perhaps the maximum errors from a pivoted arm exceed the consistent error from a linear to the point the linear is "better." Second, with a slotted head shell like Kuzmas have where the same adjustment can be made as with a pivoted arm, the linear is clearly better in this respect. Just facts.
- 2025-03-16 10:57:33 PM
  
  Michael Fremer wrote:
  
  A tangential arm with only holes, fitted with a cartridge that has 4 or 5 degrees of zenith angle error, will produce 4 or 5 degrees of zenith angle error across the entire record surface. A pivoted arm with slots fitted with that same cartridge adjusted to compensate for the zenith angle error baked into the cantilever, will produce tangency at the two nulls points. That was my point!
2025-03-16 08:02:03 PM

Come on wrote:

Great sound of the binaural piece! Just the bass was a little slow or bloated, right? But not an easy task for a show.

Re: tangential arms… „perfect theory for superficial engineers“…or for the non-superficial…“a challenge for a lifetime in many regards“.

Everyone would have loved that it was so easy and clear.
- 2025-03-16 10:59:16 PM
  
  Michael Fremer wrote:
  
  I think you are hearing the microphones' deficiencies. On the latest video just posted with numerous room sound, there are certain consistent qualities that I think "give away" the microphone's issues.
2025-03-18 11:52:20 PM

cracking resonance wrote:

Love the Metaxas Audio gear, as much as the Advance Paris and the CheskyJr. Speakers. Gear that doesn‘t take the business too serious, but artsy instead or offers in the achievable range new angles offers. Especially when young are in for themselves, instead of dadpushed.