VTV - 2006 Los Angeles
by Dave and Carol Clark, images by Peter Clark

Vacuum tube Valley held a show in LA last year and they appear to be heading full steam with shows happening every so many months around the US. The previous LA show was rather small with a handful of exhibitors and a smattering of attendees... later shows held on the east coast were reported to be quite good. So with HE2006 just up the road and asking a LOT more to either exhibit or attend, my expectations were that this one could (should) to be a bigger hit with both parties... but alas, there were only a handful of rooms and not much in attendance during the time we were perusing the show. That was at opening hour, so I can only hope that things picked up later on.

Come on people... support the community!!

Those exhibiting did put a good show and the rooms offered a sound equal to many of those we heard at HE2006...anyhow on with the show report!

You have got to be kidding... and look who we meet while signing in... Joe and Howard from Kubala-Sosna! Seems they were staying at the hotel and were on their way back to HE2006...

Audio Note was in the house and as always sounded very... VERY nice! Yes, not inexpensive to say the least... but check out the flames on the speakers... way cool... or HOT!

An Audio Note M5 preamp doing its thang... with the DAC-4 and transport...

an Audio Note Quest amplifier...

one of the AN systems (they had two rooms... one for the new US distributor Josh Turney at  http://www.audionoteusa.com and one with the man himself... Peter Qvortrup

a bigger AN amplifier...

...for the second room... which was not playing due to a goof by the shipper... where's the bloody cables!

American Electronic Project showed four different... yet oh-so-look-so-similar Cheer integrateds based on different tubes... very clean looking.

Sounded nice and sweet...

... look who the cat dragged in... good guy Randy Bankert with Royal Device electronics (the 300B Sara $3.2k) and his own Sonist loudspeakers... http://www.ossaudio.com

... and he said let there by speakers... rather good ones too... simple system and nice sound.

Top Audio and Triode Corporation showed speakers from JM Labs, ProAc, and these little guys from Micropure (from Japan) which feature a Murata super tweeter. The CZ302ES sounded much bigger than it had any reason to and was quite nice on the ear...

...in the same room was a plethora of tube gear from Triode Corporation from Japan... very cool in that oh so Japanese audiophile sort of way... http://www.triode.co.jp/distributer.htm

Tekline showed Speaker Art, TRL, and Mr. Cable... cool stuff... really liked the preamp! Big knobs are fun...

A pair of Audio Art loudspeakers...

Jumping Cactus showed their loudspeakers, and while the looks may be deceiving... they sound rather good.

DeHavilland was here and they showed their electronics with Prana cabling and Nola loudspeakers. Their room always offers the listener real music...and this time was no different. Good stuff! Seriously real.

...a tangle of Prana...

...the new-ish deHavilland preamp...

...and their solid amps.

Juicy Music had their preamps (coming in for review)... cool with that very retro-ish-made-by-myself look... which belies their real worth in terms of musical enjoyment...

...and the Juicy amplifier. Nice people too!

Madisound/Tonian Labs brought the house to the show...

...which also sounded rather fine.

In the Ballroom we found good guy Bill Steirhout with his Quantum line of power conditioning products... yes they work as advertised.

Bill showed the new minipod which is aimed at the...

...stuff from Gini Systems... who came with their mini-systems... every ready for the iPod generation... seriously good stuff.

Fritz Speakers had a static display ...we have reviewed his stuff, so check the archives to learn more about these quite good speakers...

and we found some tube for sale... who would have though at a show named after... nah!

...and custom guitars too!

And that was it... if your room is not mentioned here.. well we did pass by several not open, so perhaps at another show.

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