scalford impressions from a noob

[vinilli]

First time at Scalford, not my last. General impressions: Everybody I met very friendly. No exhibitor refused to play my left field music. Size, cost, price and age of system has no correlation to quality. Managed to see/hear almost all rooms, would have liked to return to some for more in depth hearing. My biases: pefer vinyl but accept good digital, scale and dynamics important, more so than soundstaging/imaging. Push pull valves and class a transistor, but also good class ab transistor if not harsh.

My faves:

Gun room with heavily tweaked old Urei studio speakers: Scale and dynamics galore

Impulse horn speakers in rooms 208 (Brumjam) and syndicate 24 (crimsondonkey and bolts), the latter with DIY crossovers.

JBL 96's in room 211 (oldius and it cost how much) driven by excellent classic Lentek amp and TEAC CD with proper DAC. I could have stayed there all day.

Of stuff you can actually buy new the ART Alnico 8s impressed me most (syndicate room 23, maverick and 68 rednose) driven by excellent valve pre Audio Research) and solid tranni amp (SIM Moon) with Linn Sondek and an Axiss as vinyl sources (both good).

Heco Direct speakers in syndicate room 21 showed promise, but couldn't deliver on my music, which is dynamically very demanding (Blue Man Group). This could be due to the 10 watter vale amp from Puresound running out of power/control.

My experience with speakers with big bass cones is that they need an amp with lots of control and sufficient power, even if on paper they don't due to sensitivity. All good sounding large cone speakers above were powered by strong transistor amps.

Surprise of the day: Room 205 playing classic KEF 104's driven by a modest pioneer amp. Excellent sound. According to the exhibitor (greybeard) inherited from his father and not modified/repaired. Vintage MF digilog dac. Just shows there is no correlation between cost age and quality of a system.

Special mention to lodgesound reel to reel with vintage bbc active (quad 404 amps) speakers. Most relaxing but not boring sound .

Klangfilm vintage horns in Lenco heaven room were great as well. Not hifi (too rolled off for that) but beautiful coherent sound. Which is something the room below(Colman behind reception) with a massive actively driven multiple horn system, 5 figure turntables and amplification etc. didn't manage. I went there 3 times, dull once, good once, very disappointing third time. Too much complexity is dangerous!

There were other good rooms and some I didn't like (but to each their own taste). But all exhibitors deserve praise, as well as the professional organization.

I will have to return next year.

 

[oldius]

JBL 96's in room 211 (oldius and it cost how much) driven by excellent classic Lentek amp and TEAC CD with proper DAC. I could have stayed there all day.

Thanks Chris. Give me a shout if there were any tunes you liked in the room that I can send you the details of.

 

[vinilli]

JBL 96's in room 211 (oldius and it cost how much) driven by excellent classic Lentek amp and TEAC CD with proper DAC. I could have stayed there all day.Thanks Chris. Give me a shout if there were any tunes you liked in the room that I can send you the details of.

Geoff, unfortunately I stayed too short to hear lots of music but did pick up on Jon Martyn (one bell I believe) whom I had never heard of before. Excellent. I see you also have 104''s (KEF I presume). Another speaker I liked at the show. To me it seems wide baffle large diameter bass speakers are more dynamic and have more meat on the bones than narrow (multiple) small bass anorexic high floor standers.

 

[oldius]

Mine are the 104.2, among others, which are a different beast to the original 104.

If you like John Martyn then his seminal 'Solid Air' is the place to start.

 

[Hayward]

...coherent sound. Which is something the room below(Colman behind reception) with a massive actively driven multiple horn system, 5 figure turntables and amplification etc. didn't manage. I went there 3 times, dull once, good once, very disappointing third time. Too much complexity is dangerous!

My mother told me that if you can't say something nice, say nothing at all.

2 further visits to something you didn't like on your first, is a waste of time. I see that you are a 'noob' but for future reference, it is best to keep negative comments to yourself. To exhibit this year I have taken four days off work, spent a tidy sum of money, which actually I can't afford and generally exhausted myself . It has been great fun but you ought to realise that it is an enthusiasts show and everyone involved does it for love, is a member here and can read your comments.

 

[hearingisbelieving]

My mother told me that if you can't say something nice, say nothing at all. 2 further visits to something you didn't like on your first, is a waste of time. I see that you are a 'noob' but for future reference, it is best to keep negative comments to yourself. To exhibit this year I have taken four days off work, spent a tidy sum of money, which actually I can't afford and generally exhausted myself . It has been great fun but you ought to realise that it is an enthusiasts show and everyone involved does it for love, is a member here and can read your comments.

Very true and very politely my friend. My system is relatively simple and cheap compared to some of the kit on display but even so significant time, effort, money, enthusiasm and care is required to exhibit so to all those posting their thoughts on the show, please keep any negativity to yourselves.

Personally I thought it was incredible both from a hifi and a social POV

 

[rmsshipbroker]

My mother told me that if you can't say something nice, say nothing at all. 2 further visits to something you didn't like on your first, is a waste of time. I see that you are a 'noob' but for future reference, it is best to keep negative comments to yourself. To exhibit this year I have taken four days off work, spent a tidy sum of money, which actually I can't afford and generally exhausted myself . It has been great fun but you ought to realise that it is an enthusiasts show and everyone involved does it for love, is a member here and can read your comments.

That was a gargantuan effort to display a multi-way active horn system, above and beyond the call of duty. :notworthy:

You feckin' nutcase..........

 

[greybeard]

Glad I can still surprise ;-)

Pleased you enjoyed it.

As said above, please keep negativity about systems to yourself in future. I saw the hours of work that went into setting up that system, and all the people involved have my upmost respect, and thanks, for allowing us to see & hear such an amazing collection of turntables, amps and speakers.

 

[crimsondonkey]

My mother told me that if you can't say something nice, say nothing at all. 2 further visits to something you didn't like on your first, is a waste of time. I see that you are a 'noob' but for future reference, it is best to keep negative comments to yourself. To exhibit this year I have taken four days off work, spent a tidy sum of money, which actually I can't afford and generally exhausted myself . It has been great fun but you ought to realise that it is an enthusiasts show and everyone involved does it for love, is a member here and can read your comments.

Its alright mate, 99% of people understand the scale of what you did and pulled off in some style :hug:

I'd be amazed if anyone topped what you guys did - ever.

 

[craigmclellan]

I recognise the frustration of Hayward because although I didn't spend a LOT of money, I did have to spend considerable time on the Saturday evening and some of Sunday morning, working out temporary arrangements due to my usual pre amplifier failing spectacularly.

Indeed - the negative stuff doesn't need to be aired really, I personally would just be polite and thank the exhibitor before moving onto the next room. I had someone stand by the door of my room, wait 10 seconds, comment on the sound being "hollow" and then laugh. I'd have to put a lot of effort into behaving like that, but, I guess that's what my parents instilled into me from a very early age. You can't please everyone, not that I attended hoping for positive reviews anyway.

 

[Brumjam]

That was a gargantuan effort to display a multi-way active horn system, above and beyond the call of duty. :

Absolutely. For me it wasn't about how it sounded. I was in awe of the massive effort of not just installing the horns, but the meticulous setup applied to each turntable. Top draw wamming :^

 

[russ abbott - royds broth]

My mother told me that if you can't say something nice, say nothing at all. 2 further visits to something you didn't like on your first, is a waste of time. I see that you are a 'noob' but for future reference, it is best to keep negative comments to yourself. To exhibit this year I have taken four days off work, spent a tidy sum of money, which actually I can't afford and generally exhausted myself . It has been great fun but you ought to realise that it is an enthusiasts show and everyone involved does it for love, is a member here and can read your comments.

Heard it about 4 times and thought it sounded superb.

Favourites were with a Dr John track and a reggae one.

Have done every Scalford since the start.

From ls3 copies upto my 3 way horns including snell es and AN es.

What i can say is in general the bookshelf type sized speakers are a lot easier to get sounding right.

The bigger you go the trickier it gets.

I'm glad that people are prepared to take risks and bring some mad,bad,old and bold stuff.

It's what keeps the show interesting.

 

[pure sound]

Heco Direct speakers in syndicate room 21 showed promise, but couldn't deliver on my music, which is dynamically very demanding (Blue Man Group). This could be due to the 10 watter vale amp from Puresound running out of power/control.

My experience with speakers with big bass cones is that they need an amp with lots of control and sufficient power, even if on paper they don't due to sensitivity. All good sounding large cone speakers above were powered by strong transistor amps.

To be fair the set up was far from optimal. They were put to one side of the big Westrex speaker & set far closer to the rear wall than would've been the case normally. But thanks for your input anyhow.

 

[Hayward]

Hey, I'm not looking for anybody to kiss my ass. I have an excessive nature, even my nine year old son takes the piss out of me for having too many buttons to turn on my hifi! I do think though that the show is kind of a sacred thing. It isn't commercial and if you go there to judge, you are missing the point massively. I didn't get around the other rooms much this year but the 2015 show I just walked around and enjoyed every room I went in. It's a unique event, a bit spesh and with something for everyone.

 

[bandit pilot]

Absolutely. For me it wasn't about how it sounded. I was in awe of the massive effort of not just installing the horns, but the meticulous setup applied to each turntable. Top draw wamming :^

Absolutely this^^^

If you pull lucky in the room lottery, you might end up with a really good system on the day that people will pour honey over forever. But whether you end up in a great room or not, it's still a massive effort to break your stuff apart at home, lug it from all over the country (and beyond), and at personal expense to every exhibitor simply for the hell of doing it and the willingness to share in reality what we rattle on about behind a keyboard for the rest of the year.

There's no show like Scalford. It's absolutely unique. But you need to look at it with the same attitude that makes it happen.

 

[myles]

I had someone stand by the door of my room, wait 10 seconds, comment on the sound being "hollow" and then laugh. I'd have to put a lot of effort into behaving like that, but, I guess that's what my parents instilled into me from a very early age.

That is outrageous. I hope whoever that was is proud of themselves.

 

[YNWAN]

Regarding the huge multi way system - coherence and an even blend between drivers is never easy in a system such as this. However, if you sat in the furthest central seat (by the rear wall) it did come together very much better than in nearer seats - in fact it was very good . Personally I tried to make it a point to thank exhibitors as each and every one had gone to a great deal of effort to demonstrate their systems.

 

[Camverton]

My mother told me that if you can't say something nice, say nothing at all. 2 further visits to something you didn't like on your first, is a waste of time. I see that you are a 'noob' but for future reference, it is best to keep negative comments to yourself. To exhibit this year I have taken four days off work, spent a tidy sum of money, which actually I can't afford and generally exhausted myself . It has been great fun but you ought to realise that it is an enthusiasts show and everyone involved does it for love, is a member here and can read your comments.

Absolutely right. On my last visit to your room a Bartok Piano Concerto was playing. It was amazing, I was transported straight back through the decades to the Festival Hall to experience the thrill, scale and drama of a live classical concert. When the brass came in it was spine tingling. Wow!

Thanks for all your very obvious efforts.

 

[vinilli]

My mother told me that if you can't say something nice, say nothing at all. 2 further visits to something you didn't like on your first, is a waste of time. I see that you are a 'noob' but for future reference, it is best to keep negative comments to yourself. To exhibit this year I have taken four days off work, spent a tidy sum of money, which actually I can't afford and generally exhausted myself . It has been great fun but you ought to realise that it is an enthusiasts show and everyone involved does it for love, is a member here and can read your comments.

Hayward,

sorry if I offended. I didn't mean to. As I said in my post :

"There were other good rooms and some I didn't like (but to each their own taste). But all exhibitors deserve praise, as well as the professional organization. "

And I also recognize the enormous and non trivial effort of building that system

In the end it all comes down to personal taste, but in the interest of the Wam, I will refrain in future from critical comments.