The big HiFi show in Chicago gets bigger every year. Attendees topped 10k this year and listening rooms were up over 200. That’s a lot of speakers, amps and audiophiles all gathered together to talk some serious shop. Our partner site PartTimeAudiophile has curated some of the best rooms and product launches from the show in their YouTube channel, so we thought we would provide a few of our highlights for the AXPONA videos as well.
Focal And Naim
The Focal And Naim room at AXPONA this year was one of the big ones set just off of the exhibitor halls by registration. The highlights from this year’s were plentiful (including a huge Utopia rig), but take careful note of the new Naim Uniti Nova PE (power edition). The multi room display also included both in wall options from the Focal line as well as a small section of pro-side monitors.
New Devore Fidelity Orangutan Bronze Speaker
John Devore of Devore Fidelity has a really cool display of 78s spinning intermittently over the show, but the real draw was his new limited edition Bronze Orangutan speaker set with a 800b tube amp. The room was packed most of the weekend, but when we managed to get in we were greeted with some seriously unique sounds (78s can have a high noise floor, but the energy in the room was spectacular!).
New SVS Floorstanding Flagship Speaker Series
The team at SVS has been hinting at the release for a new flagship series for a while now, and the Ultra Evolution has now officially arrived with its demo at AXPONA 2024. The new floorstanding models wrangle in as the most expensive yet for the company, but also pack a ton of new tech and market know-how gathered over the years making speakers and subs. The big Ultra Evolution Pinnacle houses two full pairs of 8 inch woofers for plenty of low end slam.
Zu Audio and Kimber Cable Demo
The YouTube channel caught up with the Sean Casey of Zu Audio early in the morning on Saturday and Sean was kind enough to give them the run through of the cable A/B demo they had set up. It incorporated a Mytek source with a Rupert Neve mixing board into matched pairs of Pass Labs XA.25 and his new popular DWX full range speakers.
ZMF Headphones New Prototype
Zach from ZMF headphones is always on the move. His latest appearance at AXPONA’s Ear Gear Experience marks yet another unveiling of a new headphone prototype. In addition to the new headphone, he was also showcasing his new amplifier, ear pads and even a custom headphone stand or two.
The rest of the AXPONA videos: PT Audio YouTube Channel