The Linn Exakt system and the future of high end audio.

[DaveyF]

FWIW, I heard the Exakt system at Definitive Audio's Music Matters last year.

They used a Linn Akurate Exakt DSM and Akurate Exact-Akubarik loudspeakers. Frankly I wasn't impressed. The worst sound of the night was Devialet's Phantom presentation, but if they hadn't been there, I would have rated Linn's demonstration the worst and this is from an owner of Klimax gear (at the time). Best sound of the night was ARC gear with the new Wilson Sabrina speakers and it wasn't even close.

Here's Stereophile's report on the event http://www.stereophile.com/content/music-absolutely-matters-definitive-audio

Interesting how the sound of a system can vary so much from room to room and from dealer to dealer. Obviously the set up at Alma audio was done correctly and with some thought as to how to optimize the sound for the room.
While the system that I heard that night wouldn't be in the top ten that I have heard, nonetheless it made music and was impressive for what it accomplished with a digital feed. I have heard much much worse- and from gear that is far more expensive.
I do think that one cannot judge a system or gear from just one exposure to its sound in a specific event. Much better to take the gear home and listen at one's leisure to the music that you are used to and in your own room, IMHO.

 

[7ryder]

Interesting how the sound of a system can vary so much from room to room and from dealer to dealer. Obviously the set up at Alma audio was done correctly and with some thought as to how to optimize the sound for the room.
While the system that I heard that night wouldn't be in the top ten that I have heard, nonetheless it made music and was impressive for what it accomplished with a digital feed. I have heard much much worse- and from gear that is far more expensive.
I do think that one cannot judge a system or gear from just one exposure to its sound in a specific event. Much better to take the gear home and listen at one's leisure to the music that you are used to and in your own room, IMHO.

Well, if the selling point of the Exakt system is that it can make any room sound good, then I would certainly hope that they optimized the sound for the show using the Exakt system. Otherwise what's the point? We were in a small room & had prime seats and it didn't sound good at all. Now compare this to the ARC/Wilson room where there were probably 8-10 rows of seats and I was in the next to last row towards the wall and it sounded great. In both cases I wasn't familiar with the music, so that wasn't a limiting factor.

I agree that we probably can't judge a system or gear from just one exposure, but given what I heard, it didn't make me want to hear the Exakt system again.