My ears had a particularly good weekend at the end of April. Yours would’ve too no doubt, had you also attended the first-ever hi-fi show held in Australia by Future, the publisher of this very magazine. The Australian Hi-Fi Show 2023 was the first of its kind in Sydney since the pandemic stopped the planned HIFI2020, and saw four floors of the Novotel Sydney Central packed with products from more than 100 brands, and floods of fortunate visitors who were able to hear them being demonstrated. Indeed, the threeday show rewarded showgoerS with demos of some of the finest audio and AV equipment from Australia and around the world, including some brand-new kit that Aussie audiophiles were given sneak peeks of before their appearance at the High End Munich show the following month. It was personally fantastic to see so many well-set-up, good-sounding rooms —yes, good sound within a hotel room! — and interesting, oft-interactivedemos, so hats off to the retailers, distributors and manufacturers who were able to get those rooms to sing.
If you couldn’t make it, don’t fret — my almost complete* showfloor highlights of the hi-fi and home cinema celebration can be found on the following pages, so you can at least see what sonic heaven at the show looked like and have an idea which product demos to chase your local retailers for as the winter months draw close.
And hey, there’ll always be next year’s show! And
