Tokyo Trip - Day 1

The day began with a visit to the home of noted Japanese audio reviewer and recording engineer Mr. Sugano. Here I experienced my first earthquake ever. Everyone there gave it little notice as everything shook for a couple of seconds and then it passed. The second picture shows Mr. Sugano seated at far right. On the couch is Dan Ashcraft (JBL's industrial design consultant) on the left and Gina Harman (Vice Chairman of the Board for Harman International) on the right. Behind them is Ken Yasuda (President of Harman Japan) on the left and Paul Bente (President of JBL) on the right. The last picture is of Mr. Sugano's custom JBL loudspeaker.

Next it was off to Stereo Sound magazine's offices. There we met with the magazine's publisher and management and were presented with copies of their JBL 60th anniversary edition. The next two pictures show Stereo Sound's listening room and reference system. Greg Timbers and Stereo Sound Chief Editor, Koji Onodera discuss the setup in from of their K2-S9800 reference loudspeakers. The following picture shows their reference source and amplification gear consisting of a Sony SACD player and Accuphase pre-amp and power amp.

The next stop was the Akihabara district to visit a number of JBL retailers. The first was Dynamic Audio which has a seven story shop. The top floor had their most expensive systems as shown in the second photo. The third and fourth pictures were on the floor dedicated to JBL speakers.

Next we visited a second store owned by Dynamic Audio that specialized in more moderately priced gear. At the entrance were a pair of used 4430's.

We continued on, getting closer to the heart of the Akihabara district. On the way we stopped at a new, very modern high end dealer whose building is shown in the second photo. While Dynamic Audio was more in keeping with a traditional Japanese dealer with small rooms stacked with gear, this modern dealer is similar to a North American high end dealer, only much larger. The third photo shows one of the sound rooms in this dealership with K2-S9800's and a pair of Wilson MAXX's. The final photo shows JBL drivered Westlake BBSM-15's and a $100,000 pair of Avantgardes.

Now we are at the heart of the Akihabara district. The last two photos illustrate the Akihabara Station that is the focal point of the district.

The last stop was an electronics superstore adjacent to the Akihabara Station. This is the Japanese version of Best Buy, only it has seven floors and each floor has at least twice the square footage of an entire Best Buy store. In the second picture, Greg and Paul check out JBL's Creature multimedia system. The third photo shows Paul and Gina examining JBL's Ipod speaker system. The fourth picture shows the JBL sound room. The last picture shows the exterior of this superstore at dusk which seemed a fitting illustration for the end of our day.

Link to Day 2

Link to Day 3

Link to Day 4

Link to Day 5

Link to Day 6