Dagogo California (NorCal) Audio Show 7/30-8/1/10

[Asr]

Saw this mentioned over at Audio Asylum. I'm sure at least a few of the NorCal folks here will probably want to attend. Lots of interesting vendors too: California Audio Show by Dagogo

At first I was semi-interested in traveling out for it, but man, whoever picked a location way out in Emeryville needs a smack upside the head. The hotel venue isn't even close to at least the Oakland airport?! The date will probably be a conflict for me anyway, but that is some serious planning ineptitude. Way to kill the incentive for out-of-town travelers.

[ironbut]

Yup,.. I'm figuring on going on Saturday.

AES is in SF this year too,.. and maybe I'll get over to Denver this year. (man, I love those mattresses at the Tech Center hotel!)

[Grahame]

Strange-ish location. Handy for Ikea, or if you come by Amtrak I suppose. Aways from the newly opened Five Guys though

[ironbut]

Yeah, weird huh? Maybe the town council is trying to improve on their image as a toxic waste dump.

But,.. it's not very far from Oakland's Jack London Sq and Yoshi's Jazz Club.

John Pizzarelli is playing that weekend,.. great guitarist!

[Iron_Dreamer]

Yeah, bleh location, unless you actually like maze traffic

I might be coerced into driving in for it, depending on what sort of a group we can muster.

[Asr]

Event's this coming weekend, thought there'd be more NorCal folks interested in this by now....? (plus I'd rather see impressions & pics from any HC-ers attending as opposed to the usual audio press publications)

[Voltron]

Somebody else was just asking me if I could go, but nobody seems to have a good handle on how it will be. Can't make it but curious how it turns out.

[Icarium]

Yeah I have plans that weekend too.

[robm321]

Yeah, weird huh? Maybe the town council is trying to improve on their image as a toxic waste dump.!

LOL

[ironbut]

I went on Saturday. It was actually a nice little show with a high percentage of good sounding rooms IMHO.

The Magico room driven with VAC electronics was one of the highlights. So was the Evolution speakers/darTZeel room. The Quad/Convergent Audio Tech. and the Audio Note UK rooms also had really good sound.

Kind of a sleeper demo that had surprisingly real life sound was a small company called Inex Innovations. They build a cable system that uses optical cables for analog signals (I think?). All I can say is if the sound they were getting from a pretty modest vinyl system was the result of these cables, then these guys are really onto something. They're local here in the Bay Area and I might just have to beg them to borrow a pair ($2k a pair,.. yikes!).

I was able to listen to just about everything in one afternoon. It seemed like there was a much more relaxed atmosphere compared to the big shows. Maybe these smaller regional shows are the wave of the future.