First stop of the morning -- in large part they were on the same floor as my sleeping room -- was the Notable Audio room -- with the new Joseph Audio Pearl 20/20 Graphene speakers fronted by Doshi Audio's V3.0 generation of electronics.
The analog source was the massive J. Sikora Reference table from Poland; one mount held a Kuzma 12-inch 4-Pt arm and the other mount a J. Sikora KV12 VTA arm. Mike Trei mounted a Koetsu Onyx cartridge in the Kuzma and an Ortofon Anna Diamond in the Sikora. Cabling --as usual on Joseph Audio setups -- was provided by Cardas Audio.
The sound was one of the best so far at the show especially in those ever so critical midrange frequencies. The soundstage was expansive and the solidity of the center image was super rock solid.
With one caveat. The Koetsu really outshone the Anna Diamond. The Diamond just sounded lackluster and unlike the Century heard in the shorter Kuzma arm at Rich Cohn's a while back. Of course the Sikora arm is an unknown quantity and Mike Trei returned after hours tonight to swap the cartridges between arms. More manana.
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