I visited the show yesterday. Very interesting how some demonstrations seamed to get things right and others so very wrong. I agree with the posts above, the KEF Q series Dolby Atmos demonstration was great fun and sounded good. Compare this to the Arcam room, where they had a huge rack stuffed with Arcam amps and a processor and a full compliment of far more expensive KEF Reference speakers. This was a big room, but I would say about 90% of the sound power appeared to be emanating just from KEF Reference centre speaker. The main front speakers were KEF reference 5's and I could hardly hear them. Maybe an issue with the mix on the Blu ray disc they were playing, but hey, they chose the disc as well!
I too listened to the Devialet Phantom golds, but cannot really give much of an opinion of them because they were absolutely hammering them. OK, for sure they go loud and produce lots of bass (which I am guessing was the point of the demo), but I don't think any system in the building would have been listenable at that volume. By contrast, I dropped by later and listened to the Devialet 1000 Pro driving Wilson Sasha II's, this was a much better demo, and just about the best I have ever heard the Saha's.
Another disappointment was the Vertere Acoustics room, which featured the RG-1 Reference Motor Drive turntable, FM 123 Phono Linearizer; FM Preamplifiers and FM 108 Mono Power Amplifiers. FM Inspiration XS-III Loudspeakers. Apparently this was £500,000 worth of kit. OK, not something I was interested in seriously evaluating because it is a little expensive, but I was curios as to just how good it might sound. I arrived at the room just as one track was finishing, and sat down to hear what might be played next. Things then got slightly comical, the person demonstrating sorted out the next record, and at the same time was engrossed in conversation with a small group sat at the front of the demo area. About six times he move the record towards the turntable, then stopped and re-engaged in conversation. We were sat there watching, each time it was 'will he play it this time?.... No!' Eventually the record was queued up and music flowed. I am not sure what the recording was, it sounded like something from the late 50's or early 60's, but the thing is, it was not a particularly good recording, so half a million quid's worth of kit ended up sounding no better than a Sonos or similar. Very strange. I am not criticising the kit, I am sure that in different circumstances it would sound sublime, it's just that if you are going to lug half a million pounds worth of kit to London, why not pay a bit more attention to how you demonstrate it? I would have stayed to listen to the next track, but it was by this time getting late and it had taken 15 minutes for the first track to actually get played. In fairness to our man demonstrating, the group at the front may have been interested in making a purchase and if I had some folk interested in making a £500,000 purchase, I would give them my full attention also.
I too spent some time listening to the Yamaha NS5000M's. Was it the best sounding room in the show? Probably not, but I simply sat there for a while and really enjoyed having a listen. Plus I now have a very good idea of what the Yamaha's are capable of, which is more than I can say regarding the Vertere Acoustics kit.
As a final observation, for a show in west London on a Saturday, it was very quiet indeed. I walked into some rooms and I was the only person there apart from the company reps. (which is great if you are interested in what is in the room and want to arrange a demo with music of your choice, but a little awkward if you wander in and find nothing of interest and have to make your excuses) Considering the costs of an event like this, I cannot see that it is fanatically viable to be honest.
