For Sean and Gordonghekko,
Well, as for why. First I had limited ways of demoing (is that a word?) amps. I live in Idaho and you can only guess as to what's available locally. So, I had to purchase the amps I was interested in (from alot of reading and what I was looking for) and then sell the ones that I didn't like. Needless to say this can be rather costly and time cosuming since you have to keep them all until the choice is made. That being said... I listened to the Bryston 7BST, Legacy Monoblocks, and the Moon W-10's. This is what I found with "my" Focus in "my" listening room. The Bryston's had great bass extension with excellent imaging but were overly bright on top (a little harsh with the Focus). The Legacy's were excellent overall but lacked the extra octaves in the lower frequencies, losing some slam. The Moon's had it all. Bottom end was awesome, not bright on top, midrange oh so sweet. One thing that impressed me with the Moon's were you could just keep cranking them up and they would just make those Legacy's come alive, more as the volune increased. Let me say this, all these amps were great midrange producers with the Focus speakers. Their imaging were comparable with each other. If you're doing some critical listening, there's a small sweet spot with the Focus. Neither amp lacked in this area.
Gordongekkho, I'd like to know about the lack of bass you're talking about. I found the opposite to be true. I still have my Kappa 8's and hooked them up to all these amps when I was doing my listening. I found the bass to be much more present with the Focus with all these amps than my Kappa's. Not only stronger with more slam but reaching lower in the frequency extremes. At quiet and loud listening sessions. The reason I did this was that I wanted to see what the Kappa's were capable of with some quality amplification. The Kappa's still sounded good, but they just weren't in the same league, in my opinion. I would have liked to heard these amps with the Kappa 9's however, but, when I purchased my 8's my finances weren't quite able to afford the 9's.
Anyway, I'd like to thank everyone that's put up with my newbie questions in the past. I've learned alot here on Audiogon. What I found to be the most important thing is that you have to learn what to listen for. I'm really enjoying the tuning of my system. For that education, I thank everyone. And now on to some more cable demoing... there's that word again.
Oh yea, I'm purchasing an SACD/DVD-A player and can't wait to start some listening sessions. I have quite alot of Lp's to compare, and want to see if what they say about the new formats are true. CCR SACD's here I come!
