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Asia Premier: Thales Tonarm

The Thales team will travel all the way from switzerland to Hong Kong to demonstrate installation of this technical masterpiece on the Raven turntable. Our customers are cordially invited to meet the designer in person to learn everything about the Thales. A special section will also be hosted for Audiotechnique. Venue for dinner and exact date of demonstration will be announced later in the forum.

The one shown in the picture will be the actual arm to be delivered to us.

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  • The CAD drawing of the Thales on the Raven AC.
  • MIcha of Thales with two engineers will travel from Switzerland to Hong Kong to do a presentation of the Thales arm exclusively to AE customers.

    A dinner will be hosted at Marriot Hotel on April 30 beginning at 7pm. Then on May 1st, the Thales team will set up the arm on the Raven 3 motor turntable.

    On May 2nd, listening sessions will be arranged in the format of 2-hour sessions beginning 10:00am to 12:00pm, 2:00pm to 4:00pm, and 4:00pm to 6:00pm.

    I sincerely thank you everyone who will participate in the dinner seminar. My heartfelt thanks to Raymond who is willing to lend his newly arrived Wavac 805mk2 to drive the Cessaro Alpha One for demonstration of the Thales arm.

    J.Lam Music Nation
  • See everyone tonight!
  • JLam, please arrange the return of the 805mk2 to me before next Friday.
  • Thales Presentation Dinner at Marriot Hotel Tonight
  • The menu (sorry the picture is out of focus)
  • Finally see the real thing after many months of painful waiting.
  • I feel so glad to meet young people but I never expect them to be that young. Micha Huber is only 28 years old and his assembly expert Daniel is only 24! I really feel I am getting old after meeting them.

    The presentation belongs to the academic type. Micha indeed went through the whole history of tonarm design dating back to the 1920s. He showed us many patented solutions in the past century. The very spirit of research is highly regarded as it is important for the designer to understand how the technological solutions have evolved over time. Along the line, he has to understand the pros and cons of different design so as to challenge his own.

    The math is simple but the implementaion/execution of the simple mathematical solution requires merticulous skills from the world of horology to achieve the daunting task. We were all shocked by the amount of background work involved, let alone the skill set to make them. Mr.Huber told us he had thought about such idea when he was 18 years old.

    I will let Marvel bro to post higher quality pictures. I believe everyone was impressed tonight. Even without actual listening skills, the long journey from the development origin to the end stage of execution represents not only the cutting edge of mechanical engineering and decades of horological craftmanship, but also the passion from within.

    I wish I could be young again.. ...... Just kidding, even so, I don't have such genius mindset.
  • My sincere thanks to AE for inviting me to attend the design walkthru. I will post some photos on Sat after I have had an audition on the Thales arm.

    My first impression entering the banquet room in Marriot was: Was I in the wrong room, 3 youngsters, like college students. Until I saw my dear friends PT, Jlam talking to them, I realise this is the 'Team'!

    The walkthru went very smoothly with Micha going through some of the other exotic tonearm designs which have also been patented similar to Thales. How they address the tracking problem, what are the pros and cons of their design, etc. I learnt a lot on what inherent issues are associated with the different tonearm designs available in the world.

    The next session was focused on the design of the Thales tonearm on how they approach the problem and the detail design on the movements, bearings, material science behind the tonearm. All I can say is 'Watching is Believing'. Last time when I saw the photo, frankly I didn't have much buy in on this as I thought the design is clumsy and had absolutely no idea on why it has to be designed as such except the designer might just want to make it more 'eye-catching' or 'hi-tech'. After the session last night, I am totally convinced all such designs are essential part of the solutions to the tracking distortion which almost all the design available todate attempted but failed to totally resolve.

    Thanks to AE for arranging this as for 'low life' like me, this is a critical educational step to bring me up to speed. I know PT has understood fully on this and I will have another private lecture (in Cantonese) on Sat to help me further understand it.

    Marvel
  • Thales Tonearm Listening session:

    Due to overwhelming interest in the tonearm, we recommend confirmed participants to arrive timely at their respective pre-booked listening sessions:

    The rundown for today:

    9:00a.m. to 10:00a.m. pre-demo final adjustment

    May 2nd, Friday
    10:00 a.m. to 12:00p.m. PTsang
    12:30 p.m. to 2:00p.m. Alecy
    2:00 p.m. to 4:00 p.m. Mr.Zanden
    4:00p.m. to 6:00p.m. (AudioTechnique: Big Grass, Ball, Rebecca)
    7:00p.m. to 8:00p.m. Mr.Lai
    8:00pm to 10:00p.m. Studiogrey/CCN
    10:00p.m. to 11:30p.m. Charles

    May 3rd
    9:00a.m. to 11:00a.m. Marvel bro/Fat brother
    2:30pm to 4:00p.m. Dso

    Just a bit for to share: we were under the training sessions yesterday. We learn the whole setup step by steps. Micha then presented us three exam papers for us to fill in all the name of the parts, the required steps, size of screws/keys to be applied on what components, adjustment sklls, even down to how to unpack the package.

    The whole learning session carried an academic atmosphere. The LPs that Micha tests involves ALL KINDS OF MUSIC from different years of recording dating back to 50s to modern pressings. We also fine-tuned speaker positioning a few times. This is one hell of learning experience for us. Marvel bro, can you spare a few more Frederick von Stade LP for me as I want to make sure AE fellows can conquer this LP.

    Thank for PT for voicing the amp correctly in a short period of time. I am highly charged by brilliant young spirit now!



  • Thanks for the pre-show last night. The design is clever and the sound quality is mind boggling.
  • How's the arm? Any preliminary comments/impression?
  • Some photos of that night.
  • sorry..come again
  • forget about rotating it...find some others...
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