High End Munich - trade fair report part 1

HighEnd Munich 2022 is over. It was exciting, loud, inspiring and also a bit tiring. 😅 And although Head-Fi, i.e. everything to do with headphones, only made up a relatively small part of the trade fair, it was still worth it! 

We had great conversations with some of our manufacturers, potential new partners and were able to try out a number of exciting products - and even take two of them home with us. But more on that later. 😉

Special thanks to Spirit Torino, who, as co-exhibitors, enabled us to present a few Cayin products with their headphones. 

Spirit Torino

Spirit Torino were represented with 4 employees and presented their entire range of headphones and a large selection of materials, also demonstrated structure and construction and even had three completely new products up their sleeve. 

These are not industrial products like most of our competitors - these are handcrafted - craftsmanship at the highest level. Except for the drivers, which are specially manufactured by the supplier in South Africa, every headphone, every single part, is made by hand in Turin, Italy, and you can see, feel and hear it.

New products

It starts with a variant of the Mistral, the Mistral Radiante (Pro). In contrast to the open Mistral (Pro), the Mistral Radiante is a closed headphone that, like the eponymous "Radiante" headphone, has a passive external radiator to the pressure to regulate in the closed chamber. The result: The same tonality as the Mistral, but more bass pressure and of course acoustic isolation from the outside. 

The Mistral Radiante is available as a Bluetooth (+cable) and pure cable version (Pro).

Spirit Torino had been looking for an amplifier perfect for the "Valkyria" for quite a while, but were not satisfied with any of the devices on the market. So they decided without further ado to build such a device themselves. 

In Richard Wagner's "Ring of the Nibelung" Sigfried, the hero, and the Valkyrie Brunhilde are a couple. Andrea Ricchi wanted to achieve nothing more and nothing less when he designed Spirit Torino's new hybrid amplifier "Sigfrid", which was perfectly matched to the "Valkyria.

I saw live how the former boss of a well-known German headphone manufacturer listened to the combination of "Sigfrid" and "Valkyria", after a while jumped up from his chair, Andrea Ricchi and the im He looked at everyone in the room and said that this was the best headphone and amplifier combination he had ever heard. 

Even the founder of Meze, Antonio Meze, spent a whole hour with this suit and then left the room with a pale face. 

The "Sigfrid" will soon be officially available and, like almost all Spirit Torino products, can be freely customized visually. You can choose from different woods for the front, different designs for the side panels and different colors for the volume control. It remains to be mentioned that the "Sigfrid" of course also brings out the best in other headphones! 😉👍

Last but not least, my very personal highlight: completely unexpectedly, I suddenly saw a variant of the "Valkyria" dressed entirely in black in the Spirit Torino listening booth. 

My questioning face was met by Guido Haschke, co-founder and long-time advisor of Spirit Torino, who just smiled and said that this was not a Valkyria but the new sister model "Pulsar". Of course I immediately wanted to know what it was all about and what the differences were. 

He told me that the "Pulsar" was basically identical to the "Valkyria" and would even use the same drivers as its big sister. The goal was to make the sound of "Valkyria" accessible to more customers without having to forego the essence. Anodized aluminum is now used instead of titanium and the cable has been replaced by a simpler, but still very high quality silver-coated copper cable.

Since the production of the "Valkyria" is extremely complex due to the titanium used, a whole lot of money was saved here, which is ultimately reflected in the price: The Spirit Torino "Pulsar" is available for a price of 6000 CHF/EUR ( instead of 12,000 CHF/EUR at the Valkyria). That's still a lot of money, but the sound you get is definitely worth it in my opinion!

The "Pulsar" is not just a stripped-down "Valkyria" and calling it a "little sister" is almost a bit cheeky of me. 😅 I apologize deeply. “Twin sister” would probably be more correct, because the customer doesn’t have to make any compromises in terms of processing quality or configurability. 

The most important thing at the end: the sound is damn close to the Valkyria! You get the same signature, the same power, verve and grandeur as with the Valkyria. Only a listening session on the "Sigfrid" revealed small but subtle differences.

Due to the different resonance behavior of the materials titanium and aluminum as well as differences in the cable, there are tonal deviations, but they are not huge. 

While the Valkyria works with "weight", the "Pulsar" appears a little more light-footed, is a little airier at the top and a little slimmer in the bass. Voices are just as clear, natural and haunting as those on the Valkyria. 

One thing is very clear: the "Pulsar" is just as real a flagship headphone as the "Valkyria"! 

I would recommend the "Valkyria" to music lovers who already own a suitable flagship headphone amplifier or are planning to buy one and simply want to have the maximum of what is technically possible.

The "Pulsar" is a dream of headphones that is a little easier to achieve for half the price, but with which you don't have to make any compromises in terms of sound!

The surprise came at the end when Andrea Ricchi quickly gave me his very first "Pulsar" ( Serial number 1/1000 🤩) was packed up, signed and given home so that our customers can test these extraordinary headphones for themselves as soon as possible! 

There's only one thing left for me to say: 

"Grazie mille, Andrea. Grazie a tutto il team di Spirit Torino che era presente!"

You gave everything to present your wonderful products at HighEnd. 

Cayin & Satin Audio

As already mentioned, we ourselves brought a few products from Cayin and Satin Audio to test, which were presented in the Spirit Torino cabin.

The new large Cayin HA-300MKII tube headphone amplifier and the portable Cayin C9 were able to demonstrate their skills with Spirit Torino's Valkyria, among other things. The new Cayin N8II digital audio player served as the highest quality source. 

A Satin Audio Perseus cable (4.4mm Pentaconn to dual XLR) and a specially manufactured Satin Audio Perseus jumper cable (4.4mm to 4.4.) ensured the highest quality connections mm).

In the next part of our HighEnd Munich conclusion we visit Ferrum Audio from Poland and introduce a few new acquaintances and products. 

Stay tuned! 😉👍

HighEnd Munich - trade fair report part 2