I went for a quick visit downtown Montreal to visit the Son & Image Show (more specifically, visit Axiom as I did not have time to see anything else).

Below are the copy/paste of what I wrote on Facebook for those not following that social network.

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Hi! Back from the show. New speaker looks great. Very pretty as a taller version of the M80. Very impressive. It was very hard to make any kind of sonic assessment as it was a large room with a lot of people talking. Nevertheless, I was able to move laterally in font the speakers at various distance and i was very impressed by the steadiness of the imaging. The added presence was hard to admire in a large room. Add reflection needs walls to be properly felt. By it definitely sounded like an Axiom speaker, which is already a good seal of approval. DSP box looks professional and well-built. It was hooked to two Bryston stereo amplifiers (Axiom was co-hosting in a room with Bryston). I'm actually interested in this new flagship product when I move out of my appartment.

Eric Falardeau
Now for the important bit! One of my main motivations to go there was also to meet the people. I met with JC, Amie, Alan, Andrew and Alan again. The reason why I met Alan twice is that the first time my name did not rign a bell and did not realize we "knew each other" from the forum. Amie was, obviously, very gracious and very knowlegeable and it was fun discussing some of the other products (a lot of which I own!). JC is the one I exchange the most frequently with as he is essentially the Quebec representative of Axiom. It was very nice to exchange of some audio points (a lot from the past!) with Alan and I met Andrew with whom I was able to learn about some aspects of the new speaker and some exchanges about the effect of the radiating speakers would have of different room correction algorithms (especially the effect on the processing of inputs as higher frequencies). So, as I suspected, there people are as nice and knowledgeable in persons as through the Internet! That's all for me, folks!

Thanks for the report, Eric! That's too bad about the room not being the best place to seriously demo the new speaker. I hope Axiom will have it set up appropriately when they take it home and let people demo it there. It would be nice to hear some impressions after a more critical evaluation.

Thanks for the input on both the hardware and the good people at Axiom. For me it just enhances the good feeling I have for both the people, and their product.

If they would like to send me a pair (plus necessary amplification), I'll be happy to rent a suitably-sized conference room and review them.

I'll bet Bob, Chris and maybe a few others would make the trip and write reviews also!

I'll go. I think my Pioneer can do it. It has some kind of biamp configuration out of the 9 channels that I will have to read up on.

I meant to put a big grin on my last post. I don't really expect that Axiom would be interested in doing this.

Funny enough, though... and on second thought: I wonder if this might make sense?

Even though I assume the home trial with return for the cost of return shipping applies to these new speakers, I wonder how many people will really shell out that kind of money for speakers at this level without hearing them first?

I wonder if, knowing there are regional get togethers here and there, it might make sense to give 10-20 qualified customers at a meetup the opportunity to hear them? Assuming that the room and setup is suitable, of course.

I talked about doing this with Bob last summer. I even looked into renting the the local VFW. I stopped because the rental was going to be $600 and I just wasn't sure how many people would come. If it was only going to cost me $200, then I would have continued. If you want to do this, I will split the rental cost if we can keep it reasonable.

It should be fun and will make us famous on the boards. Except Bob, who is infamous.

"Qualified?" Are you going to run credit checks first?

Wait, I've got it. What if you bought a bunch of the speakers, then rented out a retail space, and let the general public come in and listen to them, then buy them from you?

Ken, that's a unique idea!

If Axiom would front me some speakers to demo, and give me a purchase cost less than what the end-user pays, this could work out! I'll take a cut of the sale.

I need a name for it....hmmmm... today we bought a different brand of baked beans. Instead of Bush's, we bought what we USED to get all the time: B&M Beans.

So, just to be quirky, I'd call my business a B&M store!!

This could be HUGE!

Do you think Axiom would go for this newfangled method of sales??

Well, I was thinking that Axiom wouldn't want to demo these speakers to people with $300 budgets...

We need to be able to demo these speakers at the end of an aisle at Costco, and I could stare down the Vitamix guy across the way.

I don't think Axiom would like it. Licenses, taxes, who knows what else.

Listen, then buy from Axiom is probably the only way.

Bob and Mark store?

Come often, you never know what you'll find?

Merci, Eric!

Chris and I, last summer, had thought about the idea of an Axiom Demo Salon. Get an electronics-online-sales-only-mfgr. to join in. Outlaw's HQ is 12 miles from me and Chris, so we would have approached them first. The idea was to get Axioms into live peoples faces, remove any "online sales" hesitations, and drive them to the site the second they get back home.

We were about to look into the international/legal aspects of it, but then Chris' wife started complaining that her camera wasn't red and the whole thing just kinda faded away.

What, you're giving up already Bob? I'm sure Axiom could whip up an LFR1100 in candy apple red for you. That's gotta be way better than an itty bitty red camera, no?

Not if that's what the little lady wants. You remember the horror of what they "want," don't you?

(Truth is, she's quite hot and you, too, would find yourself buying her little red stuff.)

I wish you straight guys could know how much f'fun it is to say such awful, sexist stuff without the same repurcussions that you'd face. Hey, silver linings where ever I can get 'em. Shhh!)

That has been forever expunged from memory, though it may be buried somewhere underneath the golf clubs and boxes my HT stuff came in.

I know you won't be using the boxes for a long time, but you should get your golf clubs the hell away from there, then.

Hmm... maybe that explains my golf game of late. I thought it was performance anxiety.

Thenks for sharing your experience Eric!!