I have been attending the UK HiFi Live Show for many years now, originally it was held in Windsor but for the last few years this changed and they moved to the prestigious location of Ascot racecourse which is a stunning venue and due to the immense size spread over 6 levels in the main building and features huge rooms for exhibitors to show of their latest and greatest HiFi.
This venue really does elevate the way this show feels and to me it is probably the biggest and best HiFi Show currently running in the UK. The time and effort that goes into getting this show off the ground and up and running is in part to the brilliant team at HiFi News who really do organise this show so well and want to thank them massively.
There is so many exhibitors and as you can imagine getting round all the rooms is quite a task so even though I had 2 days at the show I’m sure I missed a few but on the whole I managed to listen to all the best systems at the show and get plenty of content for my social media pages, which if you follow me I’m sure you have seen at least one or two of my videos of the show.
In this report I am going to list which rooms and distributors had the best at show from top to bottom so that you can get at least a small taste of what impressed me the most and what rooms I felt deserved the appreciation from The Speaker Shack for outstanding sound quality and the systems performance as a whole.
Sound Design Distribution with Vivid Audio, Halcro Audio & Grimm Audio.
On the first day which was the Friday 20th September I was invited by Sound Design Distribution to the press event being held for the incredible Vivid Audio Moya M1 speakers, and to chat with the owner and designer Laurence Dickie. He gave one of the most insightful talks about Vivid Audio as a company and where it all started including the time he was working with Bowers & Wilkins and the beautiful Nautilus speakers that he designed. The introduction also had different styles of music to show what the speakers could do and the talk and demos lasted for about an hour but the time just flew by as it was so interesting and so much fun to listen to the Moyà’s in action, it was clear from the demonstrations that these speakers have been designed to be the best and the pinnacle of Vivid Audio’s journey in the design of speakers.
When I heard the speakers in Munich they were playing organ music and as I wrote back in May there is not many speakers that can replicate a church organ in the way that the Moya M1 speakers can, the lower Octaves sounded and felt incredible. This time round I got to hear a lot more and it did not matter what was played they performed flawlessly and managed to play music and fill the large room with absolute ease, bass was tight and powerful with the midrange sounding lush and the top end was just mind blowing with superb instrument separation, imaging from the speakers had sounds spread across the huge soundstage with sounds and music filling the room, one of the most impressive pieces was when the Castanets were playing with stunning clarity and danced across the soundstage, the speakers seemed to disappear as the Castanets were everywhere spread across the huge soundstage.
This was my favourite for the show and good reason as the demo and talk from Laurence Dickie was so good, so interesting and most importantly the sound quality was exceptional, partnered with Halcro Audio and Grimm Audio this proved to be a formidable partnership and sound.
Cadence Distribution with Siltech Cables, Nagra Audio and SME
Cadence distribution had a stunning room and system last year and this year was no exception! They are once again demonstrating with Nagra Audio HD electronics but this year they featured the stunning Siltech Symphony speakers which are an open baffle design and like the Moyà’s look very serious and intimidating with so many drivers used for each of the different speakers.
Focusing on the vinyl with 2 x SME turntables playing they had various talks with guests introducing the music being played and to talk about the difference in sound between the different turntables that were used for each of the demo’s. The music used which I found to be quite exhilarating was America’s and and it is an old recording but to the highest level of performance and sound, it proved to be quite insightful as each of the tables had different strengths in the sound that you heard and with the ultimate fidelity of the system being heard in full, the first turntable I felt sounded more dynamic and vibrant in its presentation where as the second turntable had more subtle nuances in the music which sounded clearer and a more refined sound overall with and presentation of the track being played, as a whole though the systems sound was simply sublime and managed to portray the music to such a high level with superb musicality and it was thoroughly enjoyable, another killer system from Cadence and such great demos !
Karma AV with Perlisten Audio, SVS, SA and MoFi electronics
Karma AV had such a great presence at this years show and demonstrated some stunning systems with Perlisten Audio, SVS, SA and MoFi electronics all having their own rooms and partnered with Primare electronics.
The Perlisten Audio demos were superb and seeing as I have reviewed a few of their speakers I am already a huge fan of what this brand creates as their speakers perform brilliantly and with the S7t speakers playing partnered with dual 15” subs it sounded sublime with incredible resolution to the music being played, Primare electronics had multiple amplifiers powering them and it is such a good pairing as the music they make together and works so well.
SVS had the new Ultra Evolution on demo in one of the other rooms and playing one of my favourite Hedegaard tracks Ratchets, they sounded superb with plenty of low end detail and power, another favourite of mine was the Dave Brubeck track Take Five which showed how well they perform no matter what music was playing and came away very impressed by this latest offering from SVS.
System Audio (SA) really impressed me last year with their speakers and this year they had their latest Legend 5 stand mounts playing partnered with Primare electronics this one sweet sounding system and really did enjoy the music in this room.
MoFi electronics had a great sounding system spinning vinyl from one of their turntables and the beautiful SourcePoint 888 speakers playing, Michael Jackson’s album sounded dynamic with lots of top end details and good resolution of the music played.
In all the rooms Karma AV were showing in each of them excelled with excellent music and their demos were very enjoyable.
Tannoy Speakers, Zeiler Audio and Montaudio with Symphony Distribution and Connected Fidelity
Symphony Distribution had a really nice sounding room partnered with Connected Fidelity who make a wide range of products but I was there to listen to the beautiful Tannoy Kensington GR speakers which were partnered with Zeiler Audio and Connected Fidelity products and using Montaudio racks which really do look gorgeous. The big Tannoy speakers sounded so sweet and I have a soft spot for Tannoy’s with the dual concentric cone design which offers some beautiful resolution and resolve to the music, this system was powered by the equally impressive Zeiler Audio valve preamp and power amplifier and they sounded so good together with the vinyl that was being played.
Monitor Audio
Monitor Audio had an excellent sounding room once again this year and rotated demos between speakers from the newly released Gold series of speakers which is at their 6th generation of this particular range, also showing was the new Studio 89 model which I absolutely love the look of and for such a small standmount sounded much larger than it looked, the Gold series also sounded very good with a gorgeous top end and came away impressed by what this great British brand had to show and by all accounts it proved to be a very popular room with the visitors.
PS Audio in the Signature Audio Room
One brand that I made a mistake of last year by not sitting down and listening to was PS Audio but thankfully this year I managed to have a good listen to what they had on offer and it was with the beautiful sounding FR5 speakers and full range of electronics. The FR5 features a passive bass driver at the rear of the speaker and they sounded so good with stunning imaging from the music that was played.
Absolute Sounds room with Wilson Audio
Absolute Sounds always put on an excellent showing at the HiFi Live Shows as I started so many years ago visiting them and always spent so much time in their rooms listening to all the incredible products that Ricardo has in his portfolio. This year was no different and located on the 5th level they have the biggest presence at the Ascot venue with a few demo rooms and also massive areas showcasing all of the wonderful products that Ricardo has carefully curated and chosen to sit under the Absolute Sounds banner.
I will always love what Wilson Audio produce as I previously owned a pair of Yvette’s and have reviewed quite a few of their speakers over the years but one of the most iconic speakers that they ever produced was the Watt Puppy. It is 2024 and it has been reimagined by Daryl Wilson for their 50th year in this fabulous industry and he has produced a new Watt Puppy and brought it bang up to date and into the 21st century, Daryl is so talented and most certainly inherited his late father's David Wilson’s talent and passion for building some of the best speakers in the industry.
The new Watt Puppy was partnered with Dan D’Agostino’s stunning Momentum monoblock amplifiers and the latest Momentum Preamplifier with dCS DAC and Antipode music server streaming the music. Bill McKiegan of D’Agostino was introducing the music that the Wilson speakers played, the new Watt Puppy speakers had incredible resolution of the music and with some stunning bass reproduction considering their size they sounded so much bigger than they looked and came away from the demo seriously impressed by the quality of the sound that I had heard from the latest Watt Puppies.
So that’s a wrap for me and another year and great UK HiFi Live Show I have attended and the above systems are the ones that I feel really did excel in terms of sound quality at this years show, the Vivid Audio Moyà M1 speakers in the Sound Design Distribution room really were quite exceptional in terms of sound quality and after my first listen in Munich I knew I would love them even more this time round, thanks to the brilliant talk by Laurence Dickie which made it even more special and appreciate the work and design that has gone into producing these speakers.
The Cadence room and the amazing Siltech Symphony speakers were a close second partnered with Nagra Audio HD electronics and SME turntables which made for a truly magical musical experience and loved the music and demos from this room.
I want to thank all the distributors and brands who make the UK HiFi Live Show so good as it takes a hell if a lot of work to get these shows going and your efforts are greatly appreciated.
Paul Miller and the HiFi News team have once again done a Stirling job at organising another brilliant show for 2024 !
I hope you have enjoyed all the content that I have brought to my social media channels and website and if you have missed any of it please make sure you check out my Facebook, Instagram, X and Threads pages for lots more videos and pictures of the show.
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