All men are cremated equal. In spirit, very true but lady misfortune grimaced at one room in particular which, on Friday to Saturday night, broke out into a small fire which triggered the sprinkler system and eventually had the Münchner fire brigade arrive: "We had all the systems switched off and do never burn in during the night, of course! There was far more destruction from the water than from the relatively small fire (no curtains burned, minor burns to the carpet, almost no smoke against the walls as there seemed to be a very localized increase in temperature and no big flames). Fortunately and whatever may be the investigation's final conclusions, I always insure the goods that we show for the duration of the show while my company has worldwide liability insurance. Just to cover such liabilities in the USA multiplies the cost by five so we have been spending lots of money during the last 10 years and fortunately never had any issues. Just this time our motivation and faith seemed to be due for a test. The first two days were extremely dense for us and we had all the press meetings, distributors and important customers in the room by the end of Friday. So the loss in PR was not big considering that Saturday was less active and Sunday quite depressing."


I contacted show management: "Has the Münchner fire brigade issued their report for the cause of this fire yet? If so, what was the outcome? Also, what are the insurance provisions for such mishaps on behalf of the exhibitors? Is every company liable for themselves or does show management issue their own coverage as part of the exhibitors' attendance?" Branko Glisovic replied: "As of today [5/27/09], the Munich fire brigade as authorized expert has not issued their official report yet. It requires more time. Of course every single exhibitor is liable for their own insurance whilst exhibiting at the show and must report to their own insurance whatever damages were incurred. Afterwards, their insurance company will claim back paid-out funds from the party held responsible for the fire."


On a perhaps related note, a PS Audio power plant AC regenerator was rumored to have measured 300V of incoming AC power during the first day on the ground floor. According to this chart, Germany's standardized wall power is supposed to be 230V. Such over-voltages could spike further during the night with reduced load burdens. As the affected exhibitor put it, "perhaps we will never really know but at least the damage will be covered by insurance."


Alphabetical show coverage
The French 3D Labs brand from Charles Henri Delaleu's S.I.A.E. was new to me but had a static display in Halle 3.

Accuton's Adrian Bankewitz was making the rounds. Also known as Thiel & Partner GmbH, his ceramic, diamond and white sapphire loudspeaker drive units are very popular. Adrian was letting on that he was working on something "really big" which I understood to mean both a new larger woofer and a radical complete loudspeaker that will demonstrate his company's transducer know-how for a new technology statement. Time will tell.


Deader than dead. That would be vinyl as demonstrated conclusively with absolutely massive product showings by the likes of Acoustic Solid, clearaudio and Transrotor among others. Karl Wirth's tables below are actually produced by his company Wirth Tonmaschinenbau GmbH so Acoustic Solid is merely the brand name. And yes, that giant table is fully blinged out with red, green and blue sparklers - garish if you ask me but then nobody did.

The remainder of the display was classy to the extreme however, with the live orchids a marvelous touch.

Adam Audio is to pro audio what Mark & Daniel aspires to become for hifi - the purveyor of air-motion-transformer speakers. One obvious difference with Dr. Thomas Frohn is the dedicated midrange AMT in many models; and fully activated drive via active networks and built-in amplification for specific ones.

The A5 Active Nearfield Monitor below would make the perfect setup for either a precociously wise audiophile newbie or a disillusioned career 'phile. Requiring nothing else but a source and one interconnect, such systems are compact to the extreme and due to their active and equalized crossovers, capable of far more linear and higher SPLs and bass extension than conventional passive speakers. Alas, audiophiles snuff such intelligent solutions in favor of a haphazard mix 'n' match approach that entails far higher complexity, cost and -- usually -- rather inferior results. That's why it tends to be the rare newbie who learns from the mistakes of others; or the been-there done-that expert who has finally come to his senses. As a professional reviewer, I'm wedded to stupidity and complexity of course. I could only practice what I preach upon retirement. How silly is that?

Adam's high-end Tensor home line has now gained four new models, the Epsilon 2-way, Delta 3-way and a matching Center and Sub 15. All Tensor models benefit from the new X-ART tweeter improved for higher efficiency, output and extension to 50kHz; the new X-ART midrange; a hexacone woofer; quartz sand-filled double-wall construction with aluminum honey-comb baffles for driver decoupling; a parametric bass EQ; force compensation for max bass SPLs in certain models; and high-gloss black, silver or silver/black cosmetic trim. It seems high time to look into this line with a review on 6moons, don't you think? Readers needn't duplicate my own stupidity after all.