ESL Cologne was nice. Big arena, good atmosphere, amazing sound (aka deagles that you felt in your stomach it was great).
There were hardware booths and a bunch of other stuff - but I didnt really check them out. The signing situation was a bit tricky though, unless you had a premium ticket then it was easy (there was a signing booth for normal ppl and then another one for premium ticket holders that was way emptier).
And it was super crowded in general, but it makes sense it was the biggest CS event at the time. Age restriction was 16+ too which was great because no annoying children anywhere.
Definitely a whole different size than the stuff Quiche talked about. None of that "players and casters would just walk around" stuff. They only occasionally walked around in the premium area - but yea premium tickets were expensive.