As Ralph Werner's review of their EL-170 model explained, Advance Acoustics from France also makes speakers and in fact started that way but today is perhaps best known for their amplifiers.

Airtight's Miura-San was showing a new phono stage. His distributor Art Manzano of Axiss admitted that US sales were way down but that his European arm more than made up for it. This reconfirmed the earlier comment about diversification of market penetration.

Massimo Costa of Civitavecchia was showing his very stylish Italian Albedo speakers.

They combine a tuned Helmholtz resonator for linearization of the down-ported bass response with a transmission line variation dubbed Helmholine and Adrian Banekwitz' ceramic Accuton drivers. Review samples have been requested.

Anssi Hyvönen of Amphion finnished requests and brought his new Krypton 2 flagship models.

Analysis Audio from Greece showed their big Amphitryon ribbon planars with the equally big Kronzilla monos from KR Audio in full bi-amp mode - not that the two spherical subwoofers in the corners were chopped liver. Notice the elegant dispersion sculpture in the middle? Whenever you spot the red star throughout this report, take note of the acoustic room treatments employed in that room. They're a must for good performance yet home decor considerations often forbid them. As you'll see, some options are rather more attractive than others to soften or entirely remove the sting.

This is what Glow Audio should have provided with their Voice One speakers - a stand adapted to desk-top use. Ank Audio speakers run similar 4-inch widebander and matching subwoofer but distinguish their construction with concrete. Had I grabbed a business card, I could perhaps provide a URL. As it is, neither Google nor Yahoo can.

Jeany Hartmann's arcus GmbH found a new definition for the point-source principle with their quad cluster of midrange domes surrounding the tweeter.

But speakers aren't all this company has on offer.