CES 2010

[wizard]

Sanders Sound Systems

 

[wizard]

Sound Lab

 

[wizard]

Kiso Acoustic

 

[wizard]

Audio Note

 

[wizard]

Constellation Audio Sirius DAC & CD Player

Designer Peter Madnick, one of the original founders of Audio Alchemy a couple decades back, has returned as part of a new Southern California company called Constellation Audio. In addition to preamp and amplifier offerings, on hand was the $50,000 Sirius DAC and CD player two box system. One box (which they call the "clean box") contains the DAC and audio stuff and then the "dirty box" houses the transport and power supplies (pictured above).

The company's entire line of products have a unique Jetsons retro/future look with clean lines that suggest fine cloth stretched over wire frames. The company is just getting off the ground and delivery of the Sirius is expected by mid-year.

One thing I found curious (other than the price) is that though they call it a CD player, the Sirius will also play SACD and DVD-Audio, outputting native DSD to their DAC. The company notes that the AES/EBU on the back of the DAC will only output PCM however.

DAC inputs include the usual suspects: AES/EBU, SPDIF, Toslink and USB. Also included is a proprietary optical link. The DAC uses an upsampling algorithm where the user can set the time and frequency domain behavior.

 

[wizard]

Constellation Audio Altair Pre

 

[wizard]

Constellation Audio Hercules mono

1000W

 

[wizard]

Scaena

 

[Brasse]

Audio Note

"Bra jobba" med det rommet, Audio Note.

 

[wizard]

Blue Smoke Black Box Music Server

Music server manufacturer Blue Smoke returned to CES this year as part of the Rockport Technologies suite in the upper echelons of the Mirage. The company's product is the $6,995 Black Box music server where they focus on creating an optimal environment for digital music on the hardware side and assume the customer will choose a Windows compatible music player and interface. For their demo, Windows Media Center was used with a Dell touchscreen (seen on the right) and keyboard/mouse combo for the control functions. A MSB DAC, located under the Black Box in the photo above, converts the data to analog.

Blue Smoke's Peter Sills explains that inside the box one half is devoted to the PC and the other to their proprietary sound system. The company has adopted some of MSB's technology that makes use of ethernet connectors and cables to facilitate high rez audio data and networking in addition to all the usual input/output suspects. Blue Smoke has also spent time coming up with some software tricks to handle audio files at all resolutions in as clean a method as possible.

What really caught our attention was the company's claim that they had a process to convert and store SACD's DSD data with their system. Due to Sony's draconian implementation of SACD copy management, Blue Smoke has had to develop a somewhat complex work-around to legally get the files that started life as an SACD disc to play from your hard drive. Sills explained that you first start with an SACD player that has been modified internally with some MSB DACs to convert the data to PCM before sending it out of the machine. After doing some editing with Sony's Sound Forge Pro to chop up the stream into FLAC files and adding meta data you ultimately end up with a 32 bit/176kHz PCM files with copy protection still in place.

 

[wizard]

Behold + Ascendo

 

[mteinum]

Blue Smoke Black Box Music Server

... After doing some editing with Sony's Sound Forge Pro to chop up the stream into FLAC files and adding meta data you ultimately end up with a 32 bit/176kHz PCM files with copy protection still in place.

Det var da litt av en selvmotsigelse. copy protection og flac i samme setning... : flac komprimerer wav/pcm - wac/pcm inneholder ikke kopisperre. - men dette virker spennende. Spørsmålet er om dette er lossless - altså konverteringen fra dsd til pcm. kan de gå andre veien og ende opp med samme dsd strukturen? tviler på det - isåfall så har de en lossy prosess for å rippe sacd.

--

Flotte bilder wizard!

 

[wizard]

Avalon Time
$48000

 

[wizard]

Bergmann Sleipner
$54000

 

[wizard]

Zanden Model 1200 Mk 3 phono stage
$25000

 

[Valentino]

Dinosaurenes tid er ikke omme skjønner jeg.

 

[wizard]

Quintessence Acoustics

 

[wizard]

Herve Deletraz

 

[wizard]

PBN GrooveMaster

 

[wizard]

PBN Olympia riaa

 

[wizard]

PBN EB-SA1

 

[Brasse]

Setter pris på dekningen, wizard!

 

[wizard]

Rockport Alya

 

[wizard]

Ocean Way + Viola

 

[wizard]

Clearaudio Innovation Compact
$7000

 

[wizard]

Magico M5 + Soulution

 

[wizard]

Technical Brain forsterkere i Magico sitt rom

 

[Rudi]

Clearaudio Innovation Compact
$7000

Noen som ser en viss likhet ?

 

[Rudi]

Kjempe reportasje, men har du sett noen pickup nyheter ? Bla Lyra skulle vel presentere noe/noen ?

 

[KW]

Takker for fine bilder Wizard!
Jeg likte finishen/fasongen på Magico Q5, tror jeg heller vil ha silkematt enn piano, men det er meg.

www.designwsound.com/dwsblog/?p=2251

Trykk på merket med 4 piler ut mot hjørnene etter at du har valgt dag 1-2 eller 3 og bilden vises i hel skjermstørrelse.

Mvh.KW

 

[O.P.K.]

Hvor er " merket med 4 piler " ??
Mvh

 

[RBN]

Det er bra vi har deg Wizard. Flott reportasje. Pøs på med bilder.
Så et glimt av Bladelius Embla også

Mvh
RBN

 

[wizard]

Wisdom Audio

 

[KW]

Hvor er " merket med 4 piler " ??
Mvh

Der i den røde sirkelen



Mvh.KW

 

[wizard]

 

[wizard]

Tidal Piano Cera
$36000

 

[wizard]

Tenor 175S

 

[wizard]

Gershman + VAC

 

[Cappuccino]

Resolution Audio Cantata, $6,000.

Digital preamp/DAC med innebygget CD spiller og nettverk for tilkobling til ekstern NAS e.l.
Innganger: SPDIF, Toslink, AES/EBU og USB (opp til 24 bit/96kHz).
Utganger: XLR og RCA. Fast eller variabelt volum.

Heftig design!

 

[wizard]

ADN Acoustics Innova "The Secret"