The High End Munich Audio Show 2024 Report

 

The Munich High End Audio Show is commonly regarded as the leading international audio show. It has hundreds of exhibitors and hosts thousands of visitors. 

It is spread over four days, from 9th May to 12th May, and is set in the beautiful Bavarian city of Munich. I was in attendance on the first two days, the trade days. I found an Airbnb on the west side of the town. I'm unsure why, considering the MOC (exhibition hall) is on the east side!! Anyway, I was in an up-and-coming district close to a station for the return leg to the airport.

I flew into a cloudy Munich International Airport from Heathrow on Thursday morning. This time, the flight was with Lufthansa. I was particularly impressed that they handed out 10g chocolate biscuits and that the flight was on time. I headed to the bus stop, where a free shuttle bus was waiting to whisk me away to the MOC. By the time I arrived the clouds had lifted.

I spent the next two days wandering the MOC's 4 Halls and 3 Atruims and visiting the somewhat smaller offshoot Deluxe HiFi Show at the Munich Marriot Hotel. A free shuttle from the MOC was on hand to take you there. With the mix of U-Bahn, S-Dahn, and their trams, getting around Munich is incredibly easy. I also sampled a few steins of Bavarian beer and ate some great local food. It is an awesome place to visit in its own right.

A new feature of this year's show was the inclusion of the IPS, the International Parts Show. A section of the MOC was dedicated to electronic parts used to manufacture Hi-Fi. Of particular interest to me is being in the DIY market. There weren't many exhibitors here, but it was just a start. I made a few more contacts as well.

As you can imagine, I saw a lot of Hi-Fi, and I saw many Hi-Fi Collective associates with whom we have done business over the years. I also met a few new prospective associates, and it was great that customers came up to say hello. 

Munich is fabulous; the show is always brilliant and worth visiting. I took many pictures, so please feel free to browse through them and read my brief captions.

Many thanks

Nick Lucas

This is the first time I have ever had a row of seats to myself

Graeme from Furutech is showing off his wear. We took on this new brand a year ago. They make incredible connectors and wires and are very popular thus far.

I bumped into the guys from Network Acoustics, our great customers who specialise in streaming and network cables. It's always good to put a face to a name.

This is the Tsakiridis valve tester. Two brothers own this Greek company, which produces fantastic valve equipment. Check them out.

This year I noticed a lot of fine examples of incredibly engineered turntables, such as Clear Audio's Statement, weighing in at 350kg...

I have always been a big fan of the Fostex's 300B headphone amplifier, shown here in all its glory.

My Fostex dude, Markus from Mega Audio (Germany). Always great to meet people you have only ever emailed.

On the subject of headphone amps, here we have another prime example of a fantastically engineered 300B amp from Auris Audio.

This is Bevendi, one of the handful of Chinese capacitor makers I met in the IPS section of the show. I feel this needs more investigation...

WBT was ever present at the MOC. We chatted and looked at their new products, such as the WBT-0120 RCA plug and the new winged WBT-0707 binding posts.

I love a good Japanese valve amplifier, such as Triode, Japan's ones.

Ixoost Artistic Audio was showing some fascinating speaker designs fitted in sections of car exhaust systems.

Viborg, China, had a great selection of connectors which I will be having a closer look at.

If you like your amplifiers with a chrome finish then Audio Phonique are your guys.

Another fantastic example of an industrial-sized turntable, this time from Thorens.

A rather long distance shot of Kevin Best, from ETI Research and myself. I first meet Kevin, some years ago at my mayden voyage to Munich. Great to see him.

Closer Acoustics Vigo, full-range loudspeaker. Loved that design and crafting on this one. Sounded very promising.

Neotech and Harmonic Technology's very own Brian Oh was manning their stall. It was great to catch up.

RTM who specialise in audio tape and accessories had a stall. Great to see the old tech still alive and well.

I took a short break and headed over the road to Motor World, a homage to all things car. Showing off many classics in the old Deutsche Bahn repair shop. 

Ran into my old pal Simon Pope, from the Hi-Fi World days and my new pal Kevin Walker. The both work for Technics, so managed to get an invite for drinkies in their showroom after the first day.

After a very long day, I enjoyed a hearty meal at a local bar down the road. Can you guess what the red item is on my plate?

I managed to get up early on Friday to do a 10K run around Westpark. This happens to be the location of one of Munich's Parkruns on Saturday morning, which I was going to miss on account of my early flight.

I spent most of the Friday in the Atrium spaces at the MOC. These were mostly listening rooms rather than stalls. This was the Chord (UK) room, where they were showing off this rather clever "how to wire up board." Brilliant.

Focal had joined up with Naim, and it was a good partnership. It's great to think that we supply some of the parts that go into Focal speakers.

This was one of the larger rooms, featuring some of the amazing Aries Cerat product. Huge sound.

A stunning display from Avantgarde, sounded incredible.

Nagra put on an astonishing show.

The Linn Sondek turntable, beautifully displayed. Once of my favourites.

Linn went all out on their room.

I was very impressed with the sound coming from the Marten room, showing off their Coltrane Quintet speakers.

The Stenheim room had an interesting look. 

The Zensati / Broadmann room had a remarkable cable layout going on.

Airtight and Primary Control had an impressive room. 

Horn speakers were certainly in vogue.

The Avalon room had a serious set-up.

Good to see audio grade parts being used by manufacturers, here I can see some Duelund and possibly rebadged Clarity Cap CSAs.

French amp makers, Jardis had some quirky designs on display.

Engstrom's Arne 300B integrated amplifier.

Bumped into Fredrik from Duelund. Had a quick catchup; more new capacitors are in the pipeline.

Cube Audio's Qualio 3-way speaker sounded amazing. 

Western Electric had a large room, showing off their beautiful valve amps.

For those who like their drive units and crossovers in a suit case.

Had a good catchup with my main man from Mundorf, Christian. They are relaunching the ECAP AC plain bipolar electrolytics. Good news for crossovers.

Great to see some classic British heritage equipment.

An interesting speaker design that sounded very good.

The Grimm Audio room.

No expense spared in the ESD room. $811,111 no less.

With the MOC completed, I caught the shuttle bus to the Deluxe Hi-Fi Show. Audio Note were playing their amazing Near Field speakers. Such energy. A mix of live Cello playing and a recorded compliment. That evening I joined Audio Note for their infamous dinners at the amazing local Italian restaurant.