March 30, 2003.
The 2003 edition of the Montreal Hi-Fi-Expo has come and gone, and it hasn't been a very good year. This year, the event has been scaled back down to its more traditional Delta and Four Points hotel locations which by itself shouldn't be a great deal since last year's exhibit was unusually big. But what was disturbing this year was the number of empty hotel rooms in the upper floors of the Delta hotel. Where we'd usually find about ten or twelve rooms on a single floor, some floors only had three or four rooms open to the public during the entire weekend! Another disturbing element was the number of poorly set up audio rooms. Somehow many companies felt it necessary to crank up the bass to intolerable levels, making you feel as if you've taken up residence inside a subwoofer. But since I'm here to review the home theater rooms, let's move on to those particular rooms.
I wanted to call this year's review "The LCD's Strike Back" because of the increased number of affordable LCD projectors recently introduced on the market. Unfortunately, none of those projectors were presented at this year's show. Instead, the home theaters presented this year included a few plasma based systems, a few widescreen tube configurations, and plenty of expensive widescreen DLP projectors equipped with the new Texas Instruments 1280x720 resolution HD-2 chip. It made for a very one-sided show.
Starting with the Delta Hotel, Plurison presented the DreamVision DreamWeaver projector in the Strauss room. Last year, Plurison presented in the same room what I thought was proof why no one should ever consider purchasing an 800x600 resolution projector any time soon. This year, Plurison made up for their past deficiencies in a big way! The 1280x720 DreamWeaver projector shaped like a flying saucer and retailing for $15,500 was capable of revealing the utter sloppiness of the special effects seen in the movie "Star Wars - Attack Of The Clones". Also presented in the room was a DreamVision plasma display which performed very well even though the image appeared rather blue.
In the Beethoven room, Totem Acoustics was showing off Accuphase components, Shaman loudspeakers and their Thunder line of subwoofers. Using a basic Yamaha projector as a video source, the T-Rex intro in the movie "Jurassic Park" was simply not very loud. For a reputable company specializing in subwoofers, this was a bit of a let-down. How could you possibly under-use a subwoofer when that's what you're selling?
The Opus 1 room was jam-packed with Sony toys, most of them consisting of their line of HDTV compliant video systems including one direct-view set, a few plasma sets, and one impressive RPTV. The front projection room was equipped with the VPL-HS10 Cineza ($6,000 retail) and VPL-VW12HT ($12,000 retail). The HS10 was actually struggling to deliver a decent picture which didn't make any sense whatsoever considering this projector is equipped with 0.9" 1366x768 resolution LCD panels and has already received rave reviews from other Web sites. The 12HT however had no problems whatsoever, delivering excellent detail and color fidelity with the help of its huge 1.4" LCD panels. This is further proof that LCD technology is far from dead, delivering an excellent picture without the rainbow headaches experienced with single chip DLP technology.
The Opus 2 room was shared by a few smaller retailers and LG's own wide booth. The devices displayed here ranged from their diminutive portable DVD player to their huge plasma and RPTV displays and their RD-JT12 SVGA compliant (800x600) DLP projector. Unfortunately, the environment where the DLP projector was displayed was terrible! A low resolution image projected on a plain white wall with a seam running along the middle. Yuck! It's a good thing their other products fared so much better.
In the Haydn room, Euphonie was presenting a complete line of NAIM speakers and components. The speakers included the NBLs for the fronts, the AXENT in the center, a pair of ALLAE in the rear, and one INTRO used as a rear center channel. Electronic components included various combinations of NAP amplifiers, NAC processors and even a SUPER-CAP power supply. The video source was a single chip Runco VX5000CI projector with a long throw lens projecting an image over fifty feet away on an average sized screen. Overall, this room probably had the best sound of the show. The music clips were loud without being too loud, and there was very decent bass. This room actually sounded much better than many of the audio rooms!
In the Mozart room, Multi Électronique was showing off a pair of very decent RCA HDTV sets along with the new Yamaha DPX1000 DLP projector (1280x720, $18,000 retail) with Faroudja image processing and a Fujinon lens. The projector was mounted at the end of a small crane which actually solved a few logistical problems in the room. Components included the Parasound HALO processor ($11,000 retail) and a complete set of JM Labs speakers. Overall, the image and sound were very nice (Madonna concert clips) but was just missing that all important "WOW" factor.
The Bach room was hosted by Fillion Électronique and consisted of Paradigm's line of Reference 90P speakers for the fronts, a pair of ADP370s for the rears and a CC370 center speaker. The display device was one of Sony's Grand Wega displays which is a significant improvement to last year's plasma display that had way too many color banding problems. Spend five minutes in this room and you know why Paradigm has such a solid reputation in the speaker industry. Even better, Paradigm is now much more flexible in allowing people in their room even after the demos have already started.
The Paganini room had the home theater setup with the smallest display device in the show measuring about 25" diagonal. The explanation for this actually made sense. Griffin Audio wants to sell you the excellent Lexicon system with the Pro AC HEXUP speakers, not some fancy video display device. It's a different approach from all the other rooms, but it has worked for them the last few years.
Room 206 by Just May Audio was equipped with the Bel Canto eVo line of components along with the ASW Reference line of Genius 100 (surrounds), 200 (center) and 300 (L/R) speakers. The display device included a Revox plasma display which color-shifted towards blue. Overall the presentation did a decent job of showing off what can be accomplished in a small room.
Down the hall, room 216 by Emerald Audio showed off Arcam components along with Ruark Prologue II speakers and a Faroudja plasma display connected to the Faroudja Digital Cinema Source processor. In all honesty, I would have preferred to see the processor connected to a front projection system instead of a puny plasma display. To me, most plasma displays are simply too expensive for what they offer in size. At least the room sounded nice. But is it really a good idea to put a lamp on the subwoofer?
The last home theater room of the show was located at the Four Points hotel in the Mont St-Michel room. Sim Audio had on hand Monitor Audio JR10 speakers connected to a Musical Fidelity A308 processor. The projector was the new InFocus 7200 projector ($15,500 retail) which according to the representative was practically set up properly right out of the box. This is not the first time I've heard of this. Sim Audio did an excellent job with this room, using plenty of black cloth around the screen and side walls to absorb as much stray light as possible. Even the light streaming through open door in the back of the room wasn't enough to wash out the image. And the sound? The clips included Roger Waters concert footage which looked and sounded very nice. As a complete package, this was definitely the best room of the show.
This year's home theater offerings were actually a mixed bag of expensive components and a total lack of decent budget front projection systems. All you could find this year were display devices that were priced well within the five digit range. I was hoping to see a room similar to the NEC LT150Z set-up from last year featuring some of the new ¼ HD (960x540) resolution projectors introduced in the last six months, but those projectors never materialized. Considering you could now purchase one of these highly affordable projectors for much less than the cost of an RPTV, it was a real shame no single company offered us the opportunity to see one of these babies in action.
Oh well. There's always next year.