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Topic: New Audiopax L50/M50 review.

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Posted by Paul S on 05-31-2015
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I went to THE Show again this year, along with a couple of audio friends. This year I was better prepared, with preconceived notions about what I wanted to see/hear, and where to find that gear. I did not try to “cover” the show, at all. I just want to share the things I found most interesting.

TechDas AF-1: We started here. I happened to walk into the AF-1 room while the TD rep was being regaled by a top LA area dealer. The dealer first complained of operational problems with the AF-1, and the rep assured him that the problems had been corrected. The dealer also complained about the pricing, saying it was “too much money” to ask for the TT, to which the rep replied, “There’s plenty of money around here; take a look.” Then the dealer said, “Well, where’s Michael? I need to talk to him. No one will buy it unless Michael likes it.” To this, the rep replied that a positive review from another reviewer was just posted, and a review from MF was in the works. So, keep your eyes peeled. We spent some time in the AF-1 room, listening and trying to “target” the TT. Electronics and phono cartridge were from Einstein (nothing to say…), and speakers were small-ish, stupidly heavy, 4-way, dynamic-drive units from the all-but-invisible company, AudioMachina. I have to say, this was some of the least problematic sound at the show, and there were NO problems I could blame on a TT. I left the room with my little brain churning, trying to figure out how to get a chance to play with that TT in my own room for a while. Sorry, but it seems like a very nice TT, indeed. The AF-2 was next door, but tiny speakers there made “evaluations” altogether impossible.

AudioMachina: Back to the speakers in the AF-1 room, I generally liked them, but I think they were not well placed in the room, and I think the designer tries for too much from the (dual 10”?) boosted LF module. I would also like to try them out with paper drivers and a silk HF dome in place of what I presume is Kevlar (or something like that), and Be for HF. Sealed boxes, by the way, machined from solid Al, weigh something like 175 lbs./ea.

Audio Note: This room had THE least problematic sound at the show, better tone and more Music. System was not stressed by classical music as they played it, with a “perspective” that +/- “compensated” for the relative “lack of dynamics”, compared to bigger systems we heard. Not my personal Nirvana, but I have to hand it to them, and I think perhaps most music-loving audiophiles should spare themselves grief by starting (and stopping) with something like this.

ATC: This venerable British firm still makes its own drivers, is widely known in “pro” circles, hardly “markets” to audiophiles. We heard smaller speakers; not bad at all. I have heard the larger speakers, as well, and these are on a very short list of “monitors” I would consider.

Salk: These seemed to be the “large” Salk speakers. Not bad. Good luck finding them!

Audiopax/Avantgarde: This room also had “good” sound, despite the tweeters were placed nearly 2’ from time alignment. Maybe they calculated the distance and figured out the exact point where the tweeter “came back into phase”?

USA Tube Audio/Tineo Horn: I would not mention this, except, was this the same set-up I liked last year?!? Boomy LF, colored, boxy sound; bleh.

Herron: I would like to play with their phono stage, pre-amp and amp. Music chosen and speakers used ensured ambivalence during show demos, but there was a “lack of fatigue” from the electronics that intrigues me; I think it comes from more music, less not music.

Others: Sorry, all else was either shite or there was no way whatsoever to tell what a component might do from its “demonstration” at the show. I had high hopes for the Polish blogger, Lampizator, who had his electronics there but not his speakers, unfortunately, and no way I could “evaluate” anything in his room. Another disappointment: I was hoping for the new WAMMs, but no BIG Wilson speakers, at all. Something predictable (also disappointing to me…): The most popular source – by far – was streaming digital. If anyone knows a good place to hear this stuff at its best, please tell me.

If anyone (or anything) jogs my memories of this show, I will amend this post, apropos.

PAX,
Paul S

Posted by jeff1225 on 05-31-2015
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agreed with your comments about the show. I go mainly for the record shopping as the local record stores bring out their better records. I picked up several excellent box sets, including Webern and Bruckner coral music. 
I also went to see the Airforce 1 and was quite taken by the Audiomachina loudspeakers, I thought the sound was terrific. Adjustable crossovers, serious machined metal cabinets and top of the line drivers. What I found most interesting was the tweeter, and yes just the tweeter, was time aligned. 






Posted by Wojtek on 06-01-2015
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 Paul S wrote:



Audio Note: This room had THE least problematic sound at the show, better tone and more Music. System was not stressed by classical music as they played it, with a “perspective” that +/- “compensated” for the relative “lack of dynamics”, compared to bigger systems we heard. Not my personal Nirvana, but I have to hand it to them, and I think perhaps most music-loving audiophiles should spare themselves grief by starting (and stopping) with something like this.

ATC: This venerable British firm still makes its own drivers, is widely known in “pro” circles, hardly “markets” to audiophiles. We heard smaller speakers; not bad at all. I have heard the larger speakers, as well, and these are on a very short list of “monitors” I would consider.


PAX,
Paul S


If it comes to Audio Note the above is true related  to every show I attended for the last 15 years. It is not a "serious sound" from the lack of better word ( I decided against expanding my audio descriptive dictionary) but it can decisively spare a lot of grief for non trivial amount of money unfortunately.
Regarding ATC I kinda regret letting go my bigger ATC based monitor made by Proac some years ago. Probably pne of the most dynamic ,low distortion sounding conventional speakers on the market (many makers claim that but its not a commodity ) still reasonably priced. There is a challenge of finding appropriate amplification of course.
Paul ,
Did you hear passive or active ATC  system?

Posted by Romy the Cat on 06-01-2015
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 Paul S wrote:
Audiopax/Avantgarde: This room also had “good” sound, despite the tweeters were placed nearly 2’ from time alignment. Maybe they calculated the distance and figured out the exact point where the tweeter “came back into phase”? 

It is interesting who run the Audiopax nowadays. The founder,  Eduardo de Lima, unfortunately passed away a few years back and it is nice to see that the company still running. I wonder if they keep cashing the Eduardo’s considerable intellectual wealth and his ingenuity or if they come up with something new, post- Eduardo? Who run the room: the company or it was just a local dealer who still had a stock of the Audiopax equipment?

Posted by Paul S on 06-01-2015
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As I recall, the small ATCs at THE Show were the 19's, with the "long-throw" version of their otherwise-spectacular, domed MF driver, which their larger drivers employ, along with a range of woofers. I think they make amps for "consumers" now, too, but I did not think to check that at THE Show. Of course, they built their reputation on their giant, self-powered monitors.

As for Audio Note, I do not endorse their "methods", only their results in that room. You know people pay many times that kind of money for MBL, etc., and pretty much everybody either goes that way, or they wish they could get away with it. Even our genius friend, David (no transformer) Berning had his name on GIANT amps of some sort that I did not even follow up on, despite they were in a room attended to by an old audio friend.

The AudioPax amps were exhibited as currently available, and they looked just like the originals, with the "tuning knobs", including the "timbre lock". Whatever they do to the amps now, I don't know, but they had "the same sound", if you know what I mean, and IMO, why change it. I just checked their website, and they are coy about their current "status".

Best regards,
Paul S

Posted by Paul S on 06-06-2015
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I got curious and dug until I found out that Alma Audio (a dealer located in La Jolla, near San Diego) was hosting the AudioPax/Avantgarde room at THE Show, Newport, 2015. This dealer's "website" is lousy, and I'm not interested enough to call them, so I still haven't found anything relevant about the current situation/status of AudioPax, but other, related digging uncovered the fact that the Avantgarde speakers on display were the Duo Mezzos. Naturally, whatever passes for the AudioPax "company" these days uses their website to show "strong roots" from Sr. de Lima, but they also fail to say/explain much else about their present doings. I may drop in at Alma at some point, and if I do it I will try to remember to sleuth some AP info for GSC.

Paul S

Posted by xandcg on 07-25-2015
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I don't know a lot (ever they HQ being in my city) but they had togheter (plus Lampizator) also in Munich this year. Seems Audiopax had a new amplifier there and the report from who had there was good - which not say too much. There are a interview on youtube made by one of the guys behind the brazillian htforum.com with Silvio Pereira from Audiopax. Basicaly Silvio said that many loudspeaker brands had there and want their electronics in their rooms next year.

I am droping the link but the interview is portuguese only: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OKa6UsLpjDQ

On htforum you can find a "Clube Audiopax" topic but also in Portuguese: http://www.htforum.com/forum/threads/clube-audiopax.112180/
Seems some people there know a lot what is going with Audiopax and Silvio Pereira also participates there.

Posted by xandcg on 07-31-2015
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There are a review about the new Audiopax products on 6moons:

http://6moons.com/audioreviews2/audiopax/1.html

Posted by alma on 10-03-2016
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Hello Paul (and everybody else),
My name's Alex, and I'm from Alma Music and Audio, the US distributor for Audiopax (and also local San Diego dealer).
First, my apologies for the "lousy" website we had. That is now gone, with a new website, but we're still working on proper information for the Audiopax products. We're getting new info soon, and the site will be updated to show the entire product line!
Audiopax is more alive than ever, with new products having been released just last month, two integrated amps, one music server and one speaker!
It's rather unfortunate that Eduardo passed at the peak of his creativity, as he left literally dozens of products in several stages of completion. The current Audiopax principal, Silvio (who co-owns it with Eduardo's family), is also an engineer, and he has now hired a few more local talent to help move the company forward.
We currently have the L50/M50 combo available for audition, as well as the massive M100, which, with the right tubes, will drive just about any speaker! We also have the well-known Model 88 amps and the Model 5 pre-amp available. 
If anybody has questions about Audiopax, please feel free to contact me at alex@almaaudio.com, or (619) 243-4924.
Thank you,AlexAlma Music and AudioUS distributor / Audiopax



Posted by Amir on 05-26-2019
AudioPax now is directed by Silvio , a good guy who continue producing Audiopax in Brazil. Silvio now is finishing the 5th Generation of these Classic Models. I follow Audio Note , Border Patrol and AudioPax because they are different to other manufactures. I know this forum is not about product specs but i would like romy let me to publish it.

AudioPax New Model 5 & Moled 88
Both the Model 5 as the Model 88 work without any feedback on their audio circuits, something that is really much harder to implement with low noise and thermal stability but that, at the end, allow us to achieve a unmatched performance. But I would like to remember that what we call “audio circuit” is only a kind of “control” path for what, at the end, really “moves" our speakers drivers – the power supply current. So, it’s fundamental that this path also have all the care we normally take on the audio circuit regarding instantaneous and dynamic performance. In our case, all our power supplies has no regulation at all, something that could be considered as a kind of feedback (a very strong one, by the way). This is a really rare concept (I use the word "rare” but I don’t know any other company that uses it), probably because most of our “formal” Engineer education is directed to think about tensions (not currents – although everything are, at the end, moved by it) and looks as pretty clever to keep a fixed tension on the power supplies at any cost (even the audio performance, in our thoughts!). Besides it we work with a minimum of capacitance on our power supplies (1000 times less when compared with some manufacturers), another concept that makes our power supplies much faster than the usual ones.

On the fifth generation of our products we have completely redesigned power supplies that now are even better, faster and with lower noise figures than the original ones. I believe this was our biggest change ever – the result of these new circuits are simple incredible and will be presented for the first time on the next show.

Silvio



Posted by Paul S on 05-27-2019
Sounds pretty smart to me, when they start with a "signature sound" that "works", yet they want some more attention, to do what they've done and tell it like they've told it, pretty much, "more of the same, only better". So many companies ultimately lose everything worthwhile that they started out with as they become more "corporate", and the most powerful people in the company come to think that this is a strength rather than irrelevant. Then we start to see more and more "features", often presented as acronyms, which is the ultimate goal and destiny of every "major corporation", to become a well-recognized cipher.


Paul S

Posted by montesquieu on 06-04-2019
Fascinating info. My first post here though been a lurker for years. @Amir I assume the info you posted above about PSU changes come from Silvio?  It's quite fascinating so if there's any further info published I'd appreciate a link to it.

I've just placed an order for a new Audipax Model 5, latest generation, via the UK distributor.  I was looking for a separate phono stage + preamp upgrade to my one box phono-preamp EAR 912. The EAR is a tricky act to follow as it has a truly superb all-tube LCR phono stage, with inputs for two arms, and some decent enough internal SUTs (though I have been using externals). However experimentation with a few line stages demonstrated that its line stage could be significantly bettered. Still I've had it for years and it's a tricky thing to change something that's given much pleasure over the years.

As part of the auditioning process I came across an original 2004 Audiopax Model 5, first generation, all black with no handles. Despite some issues with reliability and a noisy first generation power supply (long, long since superseded), I was actually blown away by what I heard - it truly was stunning through my Silvercore 833C monoblocks/Tannoy Canterburys. Timbral purity, wonderful 3D space, spot on timing, dripping with emotional expression  - it was all there.

After some discussion which included considering repairing/upgrading the old model, I have ordered a new one. I'm told that past SE improvements are now included in  the production version, so have gone for the only possible upgrade left which is full-balanced end to end, input and output. This is handy as the Silvercores are balanced-only input (true balanced in their input and output transformers), my AN DAC is true balanced, and so is my new phono stage - Allnic H7000V.  I've had to go quite a length to improve on the EAR phono stage but the Allnic manages it especially with a bit of tube rolling in the rectifier department.

So I'm very excited about the incoming Model 5 - should be the final piece of the puzzle. I did hear the Audiopax L50 linestage in my system and it was truly, gobsmackingly stunning, but out of reach price-wise. Though my experience with the early Model 5 suggests I will be perfectly happy with the latest generation Model 5.
Sounds like I may be a shade too early for the 5th gen PSU improvements referenced above but can always hope. Delivery is still the best part of two months away I'm told so who knows. Very much looking forward to its arrival.

I was at Munich last month but I don't think Audiopax attended this year - sounds like they will be back in future though. What Munich did do was reinforce my decision - I heard nothing better than the Model 5 in the entire show. (And quite a bit of quite pedestrian stuff at much higher prices).

Posted by Amir on 06-05-2019

@ montesquieu  yes , the informations are from Silvio , this is the full text 👇


Some technical information regarding the different versions of the products (both the Model 5 and the Model 88 followed about the same path).


The first and second versions are very close in circuits and components – the main differences are on the way they are assembled, with a great evolution on the second regarding printed circuit boards and wiring (although most of the component directly connected to the tubes still, even today, soldered directly to the sockets).


In the third generation we changed the main transformer (from EI to Toroidal), something that improved the general dynamic and reduced the noise of the amplifier. We have also changed several components, as coupling capacitors, main audio resistors, connectors, etc. and have improved the power supply circuit.


With the introduction of the Maggiore amplifiers in 2011 we decided to make an special edition of the Model 5 specifically to work with it during the 2011’s show (we didn’t have at that time the Maggiore L50 preamplifier). In this case the main changes are on the components – special resistors, capacitors and wiring that match the ones carefully selected for the Maggiore line. The result was so good that we decided to make also an special edition for the Model 88 with the same concept. So, both Model 5 SE as the Model 88 SE are special editions of the third generation, with main differences on the components used.


The fourth generation follows the same concepts of the SE products (special components) with some additional changes on the audio and power supply circuits and an evolution on the output transformers. But maybe the biggest change in performance was the introduction of the use of special coupling capacitors that were developed by Jupiter condensers with our guidance – a project that took us two years of a very close partnership. At some point is very hard to define which parts are better per se but these specific components were developed having as reference both the Model 5 and Model 88 so I am sure we achieved the best possible performance for these specific products.


I’m now finalizing our fifth generation of these products, with major changes on the power supplies circuits (including totally different Power Transformers) and on the chassis of the preamplifiers, as we are also introducing our phono preamplifier (will be the “Model 9”) that can be “stacked” with these new Model 5. Maybe I should here explain a little bit about our philosophy regarding the power supplies…


I have to say that Both the Model 5 as the Model 88 work without any feedback on their audio circuits, something that is really much harder to implement with low noise and thermal stability but that, at the end, allow us to achieve a unmatched performance. But I would like to remember that what we call “audio circuit” is only a kind of “control” path for what, at the end, really “moves" our speakers drivers – the power supply current. So, it’s fundamental that this path also have all the care we normally take on the audio circuit regarding instantaneous and dynamic performance. In our case, all our power supplies has no regulation at all, something that could be considered as a kind of feedback (a very strong one, by the way). This is a really rare concept (I use the word "rare” but I don’t know any other company that uses it), probably because most of our “formal” Engineer education is directed to think about tensions (not currents – although everything are, at the end, moved by it) and looks as pretty clever to keep a fixed tension on the power supplies at any cost (even the audio performance, in our thoughts!).


Besides it we work with a minimum of capacitance on our power supplies (1000 times less when compared with some manufacturers), another concept that makes our power supplies much faster than the usual ones.


On the fifth generation of our products we have completely redesigned power supplies that now are even better, faster and with lower noise figures than the original ones. I believe this was our biggest change ever – the result of these new circuits are simple incredible .



Best regards,


Silvio


Posted by montesquieu on 06-05-2019
Superb - many thanks for this.

Posted by Paul S on 06-05-2019
Maybe Romy could move the specifically Audiopax posts to an Audiopax News thread, rather than this 2015 THE audio show thread?



Best regards,
Paul S

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