Highlights of the 2011 Capital AudioFest

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Here's some of the audio equipment that was shown at the Capital AudioFest in Rockville, MD. Most of this stuff is really expensive. But it's nice to see that the spirit of innovation is still alive, even with a down economy.

 Dan D'Agostino's amps pack tremendous dynamic capabilities. If you think your system is underpowered, these amps can produce 2200 watts of dynamic power into a one ohm load.

The Wilson speakers can recreate a grand piano with a level of realism unlike anything you've probably ever heard.

The Audience speakers are way better than their appearance might suggest.

Here's a view showing the passive radiator on the Audience speaker.

The McIntosh equipment has the same look as it has had for decades.

Meridian showed one of the most fun to use media servers, with touch screen capabilities.

 The Surreal Sound speakers (the smaller tower on the right) was one of the best sounding at the show. They use extremely light materials, including a modified Heil tweeter, for very fast transient response.

Polk's speakers had beautiful fit and finish.

Polk's cutaway of their upcoming LSiM speaker showed impressive construction quality.

The MBL speakers were certainly some of the most unusual ones on display.

Deja Vu Audio from McLean showed some very retro looking, but modern sounding, equipment.

A refreshing change from the huge amps at the show were the small and attractive Synthesis amps. This one is an integrated amp. These are made in Italy, but Deja Vu in McLean is the distributor.

Horn loaded speakers were quite prominent at the show. These are made in Maine by Volti Audio.

Some of the most amazing sounding pieces of equipment were the Border Patrol amps. These reproduce music with a really effortless quality. These are designed and assembled locally.

Another interesting product being represented was the upcoming DaVinci digital to analogue converter. It handles sampling rates up to 384K. It wasn't really hard to hear the difference when sampling rates were switched. A deeper and taller soundstage, and a more airy sound quality was apparent with the higher rates.

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