We cover a lot of stuff at every show, but as always, a few things stand out by the end. At High
End 2010 it was the sound of a particular room, a line of products, and, finally, one component
that was the talk of the town. Here they are:
We heard a number of good-sounding rooms at High End, some of which we already wrote about
in the Standout Demo section. One that I liked was presented by Ascendo, a German loudspea-
ker manufacturer who always shows at High End and always delivers great sound. The music they
played through this system sounded exceptionally good, with voices in particular sounding this
close to real. I listened to this system longer than I listened to any other at High End 2010.
This year’s system featured the Ascendo System F loudspeakers, Convergent Audio
Technology’s JL3 mono amps and SL1 Legend preamp, Audio Aero’s La Source digital player, and
Masterclass’s cables and rack. The system’s price hovers around ? 150.000, an obscenely large
amount of money for a stereo, but, ironically, the least expensive component was the speakers
themselves — the System F retails for ? 11.800 per pair.
Typ „DAS TONMÖBEL – DT – SINGLE“
(Bild zeigt Endstufeneinheit von „DAS TON-
MÖBEL – DT“ mit Stromkabel Typ „BASE“)