The French and British came marching into Raleigh this weekend, although thankfully nobody brought muskets, red coats or plans to retake the colonies. The city has survived British taxation, Sherman marching through North Carolina and generations of arguments over which barbecue sauce constitutes an act of treason.
Focal and Naim instead invaded Audio Advice Live 2026 with something considerably more dangerous to the average audiophile’s bank account: four very different systems spanning custom installation, immersive home audio and some of the most ambitious high-end loudspeakers either company has ever produced.
Now in its fifth year, the Raleigh event packed more than 60 experience rooms and over 10 immersive Dolby Atmos theater systems into the Sheraton Raleigh Hotel from August 7 through 9. More importantly, this is a consumer-facing show where people can actually hear the equipment, ask the people selling it why it costs what it does, and decide whether any of it belongs in their homes.
That matters even more with Audio Advice itself in expansion mode beyond its traditional North Carolina footprint, including its moves into St. Louis, Miami and Las Vegas. The Raleigh show increasingly feels less like an oversized dealer event and more like a very public statement about where the retailer thinks the premium A/V market is headed.
Focal and Naim apparently got the memo.
Rather than bringing one obscenely expensive system and calling it a weekend, the two brands demonstrated products ranging from the $5,597 Focal Omada/Naim CI system all the way to the $210,000 Diva Alta Utopia active wireless flagship.
That is quite a walk across the financial spectrum before you’ve even finished your sweet tea. Better bring a pitcher for Coach Brind’Amour. Rod the Bod just brought the Stanley Cup back to Raleigh, although judging by the man’s conditioning, he probably considers sugar a controlled substance.
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Focal Diva Alta Utopia: $210,000 and Almost Everything Is Inside
The unquestioned headliner was the Focal Diva Alta Utopia, launched on June 17 for $210,000 per pair. It is Focal’s flagship active wireless loudspeaker and arguably one of the more audacious products introduced in high-end audio this year.
Calling it a wireless loudspeaker does not really explain what Focal and Naim have built.
Each 235-pound loudspeaker uses a four-way architecture with seven drivers, including four 8-inch W-cone woofers in a push-push configuration, an M-profile W midrange driver and Focal’s new PRISM tweeter. Each enclosure also contains 600 watts of Naim Class AB amplification, along with the DAC, DSP and streaming electronics required to make the system essentially self-contained.
The two loudspeakers can communicate over Ultra Wideband wireless technology, while Focal supplies a wired high-resolution connection for users who want 24-bit/192 kHz communication between them. HDMI eARC, optical and analog inputs are also included, along with Wi-Fi 6, Ethernet and support for high-resolution streaming.
That is the real point of the Diva Alta Utopia. A conventional Focal Utopia/Naim system at this performance and price level normally involves loudspeakers, amplifiers, digital sources, racks, cabling and enough boxes to make your electrician wonder whether you are opening a small data center.
The Diva Alta Utopia puts almost all of it inside the loudspeakers.
At $210,000, simplicity has apparently become a luxury feature.
Focal Scala Utopia Evo M Makes Its North American Debut
The Focal Scala Utopia Evo M was arguably the more important traditional high-end demonstration because Audio Advice Live marked its North American debut.
Introduced July 2, the three-way bass-reflex floorstander represents a substantial evolution of one of Focal’s best-known Utopia models rather than a cosmetic refresh with a French accent.
The Scala Utopia Evo M incorporates the new PRISM inverted-dome tweeter, an M-profile W-cone midrange derived from Focal’s professional Utopia Main monitors, a redesigned 10.6-inch W-cone woofer with dual ferrite magnets, TMD suspension and Focal’s OPC+ crossover system. The loudspeaker is rated at 92 dB sensitivity with a 27 Hz to 40 kHz frequency response.
Pricing starts at $50,000 per pair for Black High Gloss, Off White High Gloss and Warm Taupe High Gloss. Light Walnut with an Off White front panel and Dark Walnut with a Sepia Brown front panel increase the price to $56,000 per pair.
Focal paired the Scala Utopia Evo M demonstration with Naim’s NSS 333 high-resolution streamer ($10,999), NSC 222 streaming preamplifier ($8,999) and two NAP 350 monoblock power amplifiers ($8,499 each).
Using the $50,000 Scala finish, that makes the demonstrated system $86,996, not including whatever cables and supporting furniture were used in the room. Select one of the wood finishes and the price rises to $92,996.
Nobody walking into this room accidentally bought one after lunch. Or did they?
Focal Mu-so Hekla Brings Dolby Atmos Without the Speaker Farm
Focal and Naim also demonstrated the $3,600 Mu-so Hekla, which might actually have been the most relevant product in the room for a much larger percentage of attendees.
Focal remains adamant that Hekla is not merely a soundbar, and after hearing it previously at CES and AXPONA, we understand why the company keeps making that distinction. It is a single-box immersive audio system built around 15 drivers, 660 watts of amplification and Dolby Atmos, with HDMI eARC and extensive network streaming support.
Hekla also uses Focal’s ADAPT room calibration system, which allows users to enter room dimensions and listening distances through the Focal & Naim app so the system can adjust its presentation for the space. Streaming support includes AirPlay 2, Chromecast, Qobuz, Spotify Connect, TIDAL Connect and UPnP, along with Dolby Atmos music support from compatible services.
You get immersive sound without running speaker wire through the ceiling, which in most homes means one fewer argument and considerably less drywall dust.
And no, Focal still doesn’t want us calling it a soundbar.
Fine. Raleigh has enough arguments about barbecue already.
The $5,297 Focal/Naim System Might Be the Most Important One
At the opposite end of the room from Utopia pricing was a combination that demonstrates why Focal and Naim’s strategy has become much broader than exotic two-channel audio.
The active demonstration paired the Focal Omada Nº3 floorstanding loudspeakers ($3,798/pair) with the Naim CI-Uniti 102 streamer amplifier ($1,799) for a complete system price of $5,597.
The CI-Uniti 102 combines network streaming and amplification in a compact integration-oriented chassis and can be configured using Focal & Naim Manager software with loudspeaker profiles for different installations. It also supports integration platforms including Crestron, Control4, RTI, Savant and Elan.
Focal says the Omada range is offered in the United States through participating ProSource dealers, which includes Audio Advice. Also on display in Raleigh were the Omada Nº1 ($1,398/pair), Omada Nº4 ($4,598/pair), Omada Center ($699) and matching Center Stand ($169), along with Naim’s CI-NAP 101 mono amplifier ($1,999) and CI-NAP 108 eight-channel power amplifier ($3,499).
That demonstration may lack the gravitational pull of a $210,000 pair of Utopias, but strategically it matters. Focal and Naim clearly want to be involved in more than dedicated audiophile rooms; they also want a larger piece of the integrated whole-home, media-room and custom-installation market. Naim specifically positions its CI range as the electronics counterpart to Focal’s integrated loudspeaker products.
The Bottom Line
What made Focal and Naim’s Audio Advice Live 2026 presentation work was not simply the price of the Diva Alta Utopia or the North American debut of the Scala Utopia Evo M. It was the enormous distance between those products and the $5,597 Omada/CI system sitting elsewhere in the same demonstration portfolio.
That is also why Audio Advice Live matters.
You could walk from a compact Naim-powered Focal system that a reasonably committed enthusiast might actually purchase, to Hekla’s single-box Dolby Atmos solution, to an $86,996 Scala Utopia Evo M system, and finally to a $210,000 pair of wireless active loudspeakers. More importantly, you could hear all of them rather than stare at photographs while someone explained that the magic really starts after 300 hours of break-in.
Focal and Naim brought four very different answers to the same question: how much equipment do you really want between yourself and the music?
In Raleigh, the answer ranged from almost none to please call my family office.
For more information: focal.com
Related Reading:
- Focal Mu-So Hekla Dolby Atmos Wireless Speaker Erupts At AXPONA 2026: Still Not A Soundbar
- Focal Quietly Drops The Omada Speaker Line In Partnership With Prosource Before 2025 Ends
- Focal Crafts Launch, Wireless Speakers, And CI Amplifiers Headline AXPONA 2026 Showcase
- Podcast: The Focal Revolution: How a French Hi-Fi Manufacturer is Revolutionizing Your Music Listening Experience
