With the introduction of the flagshipTriton One, I decided that GoldenEar should make its first appearance at the Rocky Mountain Audio Fest (RMAF) in Denver this year. With the addition of our flagship Triton One, I really felt we had a product that could compete with the stratospheric -priced products common to this audiophile event.
Well, I think I was right - just check out just a few of the accolades we received from our Triton One demo (and even one for Aon 3's in another brand's room!):
GoldenEar consistently scores high at any show they choose to be in, and this year was no exception. It would be impossible for me to say that it was one of the four best exhibits at the show, since I missed a lot of rooms. But of those I saw and heard it was, for me, near the top. What made the GoldenEar exhibit surprising was that it was being driven by a modest set of electronics (by today's standards): a Marantz SA11S3 CD/SACD player ($4000) and a PM11S3 integrated amplifier ($5000).
Stephen Stone: Top Five Systems at RMAF / The Absolute Sound
Sandy Gross' GoldenEar speakers produce exceptional sound that rivals systems costing 10x more. For 2014 RMAF the GoldenEar Triton Ones were mated with a Marantz SA-11S3 player and PM-11 S3 integrated amplifier. The sound was clean, clear, musical, and completely involving.
Spencer Holbert: Best Sound (for the money) / The Absolute Sound
PS Audio Sprout with GoldenEar Aon 3 - An under-$2k system that sounds this good breaks all the high-end rules.
Jason Victor Serinus / Stereophile GoldenEar's
Sandy Gross may be an audio legend of sorts, but it was not until the last day of RMAF 2014 that I finally met the man and discovered two things: 1) His Triton One loudspeakers ($4999/pair) are amazing-sounding, especially given their price, and 2) He is an absolutely delightful individual. The sound was exceptional on Reference Recordings' Minnesota Orchestra version of Copland's Fanfare for the Common Man. Note as well that this was not with ultra-expensive electronics, but rather with Marantz's SA11-S3 CD/SACD player and PM11-S3 100Wpc integrated amplifier, with everything strung together by AudioQuest cabling.
Steve Guttenberg / CNET
The GoldenEar Technology Triton One speakers produced the best sound for an affordable price, by high-end standards, at the show.
Piero Gabucci / Secrets of Home Theater and Hi Fi
I'm so glad GoldenEar was here at the show, I had missed hearing the new flagship Triton One's at CEDIA last month and was anxious to hear how different they were to the Triton Two I reviewed. As much as I raved about the Two's, the One is frankly, number one! Incredibly smooth throughout the spectrum, very few speakers can produce bass and dynamics like Sandy Gross' Tritons. Natural and effortless, I was struck by the sophistication of the Triton One as Sandy played his own compilation of music from a CD no less! Brass instruments had this beautiful resonance and metallic feel. Voices sounded rich and warm. Bass was how I like it, cleanly integrated. Powered by Marantz gear, as Sandy said, this is real world matching, it worked! The Triton One boasts a 1600 watt digital amplifier for its' subwoofer section of three 5" x 9" quadratic drivers coupled to two 7" x 10" passive radiators on the side. Two 5" mid-range drivers flank the exceptional High Velocity Folded ribbon tweeter. At $5,000 for a pair, these are I say coyly, a steal.
Home Theater Shack / Rocky Mountain Audio Fest (RMAF) 2014 Show Coverage
I've heard almost all of the GoldenEar speakers at a local hifi hut, and find it amazing they can bring all of these different drivers together to sound as one. I've played the trumpet (and most of the other brass horns, too, when I was younger) and Hugh Masekela:"The Coal Train" played through the Triton One portrayed that instrument as real as any other speaker I have heard. No added warmth, not cold, nor sterile, the Triton One just tells the truth. Tsuyoshi Yamamoto Trio: "Misty" was a piece that really brought out the best of this system's capabilities. During the solo upright bass intro, you could hear the fingers on the strings well enough to almost envision fingers plucking away. Piano (an instrument my mother insisted I take lessons on), probably the most difficult of all instruments to reproduce, was almost perfect. Again as good as anything I've ever laid ears on. Definitely one of my favorite exhibits of the show.
Wayne Myers' Adds -
I have heard so much about GoldenEar in the last year that I had visiting their room as top priority on my RMAF Gotta Get There list. Wow! I wrote the word 3 times in my notes. The soundstage was simply gargantuan, with image clarity as sharp and precise as any at the show. The disappearing act performed by the Triton One was so complete that you could be blindfolded and never never guess their location sonically. I noted more than once how effective the room treatment was to help accomplish this. Attention to detail, everything about room and speakers said it. And the tweeters? Throughout the show I was listening for and to tweeters. It was as though the Triton One speakers had none, and the treble frequencies were conjured into the air by some other means. The high-velocity folded-ribbon tweeter was exceptionally transparent. Getting ready to spend $5,000 on a pair of speakers? If you buy something else, be sure you avoid any and all contact with a Triton One afterward, or you will probably just cry. I was able to listen to a number of my test tracks, and for most of them simply wrote the word "perfect". That is how good everything sounded through the Triton Ones.
Chris Martens: Searching for True Value in High-End Audio at RMAF 2014 / HiFi+ Blog
As followers of the Hi-Fi+ newsletter already know, our magazine has a review in process on the remarkable GoldenEar Triton One loudspeakers, and as our preliminary blog on the Triton Ones indicated, they offer terrific value for money. This fact was driven home with added force at RMAF where GoldenEar teamed with Marantz to provide a demonstration that showed just how good an affordably priced audio system could really be... a serious high-end performance tour de force sourced from a system that-let us now heave a collective sigh of relief-did NOT cost the proverbial arm and a leg. The system ... could really do all things well: full-range frequency response, macro and micro dynamics, 3D soundstages, pinpoint imaging, and brilliant tonal colours-the works. Indeed, one visitor to the room reportedly exclaimed, "This system makes many of the high-priced offerings at this show seem just plain silly!" Quite honestly, the man was not wrong in that assessment.
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Triton One Setup at RMAF 2014
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