LOUDSPEAKERS: Does the Totem Mani-2 still rate as one of the ...

Touring the Old/New Show
“Lo ok
at t he b e aut i f u l
tubes,”said
a visitor as
he walked
into the room, calling his
friend over to a table display,
completely oblivious to the
music being played. There
it is. I think I’ve cracked the
mystery of why there are
so few female audiophiles.
While men and women may
equally love listening to
music, men have that unique
tendency to also want to
read about, to talk about and
to argue about…the gear.
This article is about them and the gear, and most importantly
about the sound and the music they listened to and
their reactions to it. Warning: you will read about personal
opinions. If you don’t like personal opinions and prefer a
detailed account of what was played and displayed, you might
consider putting this magazine down and delving into the
complete list of exhibitors and components available in the
official brochure.
You may find praise in the next paragraphs, and occasionally
harsh comments. However, this is not a listening test, by
any means, and we won’t blame anything unless we mean it
specifically for the purpose of improvement.
“You must listen to these speakers,” said Michael and
Jimmy, as soon as we met in the lobby. “They’re shaped like
huge horns, and the sound is so natural and smooth,” they
added, pointing to the name of the Edgarhorn
Titan II speakers on the
brochure. Off we went.
Along the way we stopped
by the Totem Acoustics home
theatre demonstration. Neatly
placed on the walls, front
and back, the new, discreetly
styled, 3.5" deep Tribe 1 and
2 speakers gave an absolutely
spectacular performance of
Hero, with the dramatic contribution
of the Storm subwoofer.
Played on the Arcam DV 78
player with Arcam’s AVR, the
sound was riveting and carried
tons of impact
while outlining
the finest details.
I did return
to that room
by Albert Simon
more than once during the next days,
with different visitors, and their
reaction was always the same:
they remained speechless. That
such quality (and quantity!)
could issue from such diminutive
speakers was amazing.
We were no less impressed
by the Simaudio room, where
we listened to an excerpt from
Holst’s The Planets, played on
the Andromeda CD player and
power supply, the P-8 controller
and preamplifier, the W-8 power
amplifier and the large Dynaudio
Confidence C-4 speakers. Before
leaving the large room, Michael and Jimmy wanted to have
their picture taken in front of the huge Simaudio monobloc
power amp on display.
(Can you ever, ever imagine a female audiophile asking for
a souvenir shot such as this?)
In the small Fidelio room, everything was quiet and refined.
The first track of Nemesis, their latest album of percussion, was
playing on an Esoteric deck through a Nagra PL-P preamp and
a pair of pyramid-shaped Nagra PMA power amps, into Verity
Audio’s shiny black Parsifal speakers.
“I feel good,” said Michael, as
we were going out into the hallway
“Just a few minutes in that room
and I feel so relaxed.”
Soon after, Jimmy really wanted
us to listen to the Revelation speakers,
and as we walked in we noticed
the energetic sound of the K&D
Sessions handled with authority
by the Revelation Mistral S-6
speakers (at right), helped by a pair
of Odyssey Stratos power amps, a
DSC VAC Auricle preamp, and a
Naim CDX player. A request to
play Un Aeroplano a Vela, a song
by Gianmaria Testa from his CD
Montgolfières, demonstrated convincingly
the imaging capabilities
of that system.
Just as fascinating was the sound
of a ClearAudio turntable, playing
Take Five, linked to a Korato Anni-
At top: Albert at work in the Bluenote
room. At left: the Opera SP
speakers. At right: the two-part
Revelation speaker.
versary Series
R e f e r e n c e
Valve preamp,
t wo Korato
tube monob-
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