Mike, I own Aerial 8's which have similar load requirements. I drive them with CA-150's as monoblocks. This recommendation is from my audio dealer-Overture and they were correct. The bass is tight and the treble is accurate. I use a CJ 14L as the pre. Hope this helps. The Classe amps are often on audiogon for reasonable money. Steve |
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I drove my 10t's for several years with a pair of Classe CA-301s. I take it you're using yours in a HT system so maybe you want to get the best LF slam you can. In my experience with the 10t's they need all of the quality power they can get. 250-300 watts per channel is about the minimum. They do start to sing at that point. I may be moving mine in the HT system soon.
Good luck,
Dan |
To power the Aerials, I believe your best bang for the buck is a big solid state amp. I drive my Aerial 9's with a McCormack DNA 500 which is a great match. While these would not better my McCormack, I have been watching this ad and wondering how good they might sound:
http://cls.audiogon.com/cgi-bin/cls.pl?ampstran&1155913376
some other possibilities:
http://cls.audiogon.com/cgi-bin/cls.pl?ampstran&1155942345
(maybe find only one for sale, or better a 350 Reference)
http://cls.audiogon.com/cgi-bin/cls.pl?ampstran&1155914421
http://cls.audiogon.com/cgi-bin/cls.pl?ampstran&1155396878
http://cls.audiogon.com/cgi-bin/cls.pl?ampstran&1154992041
http://cls.audiogon.com/cgi-bin/cls.pl?ampstran&1154139842
http://cls.audiogon.com/cgi-bin/cls.pl?ampstran&1153626378
Good luck. |
The best amps I heard on 10Ts were:
Jeff Rowland Model 112
McCormack DNA-1 (but nowadays I would give the DNA-500 a try)
I also heard a Gryphon that was nice on them too.
These would be on my short list.
Good Luck! |
I drove my Aerials with the Anthem Statement P5 - 325 W. It was the only amp I heard that could tame the bass. |
i own a pair of 10T's that i just recently mated with a Krell KSA-50s. Dont let the 50 wpc fool you, specs can mislead you and i was certainly guilty of that for years. i made a good friend who reviews audio equipment, a guy who has had the very best in his system, and he recommended this amp to me. clean, more detailed bass. the highs are not as harsh or bright as they were, but still accurate and resolving. the amp improved the speakers performance so much that it was unreal. its not neccesarily how much power it can produce at 8 ohms, but how good the power is below 8 ohms. buy a krell, you cant go wrong. |
I own the 10T's too.I intent to use a pair of Rogue M150's on the top with a Rogue Zeus on the bottom,in a bi-amp mode.
I do have all the amps e.t.c at home in storage at the moment due to my ever ongoing renovations,I am hoping to be done in the next few months.
Regards
George |
I would be seriously concerned driving 10t's on 50 wpc. They'll clip that amp before you even know it. Please be careful with the volume. |
Dan_ed Hi
I like to share this experience with you.I bought my Aerial's from none other but Gilbert of Blue Circle Audio.The guy goes through speakers a lot in his demo room.
The day I brought them home I had nothing avalaible to drive them with to check the operational status.Please note that I had my system dismantled due to starting renovations.
I did however had my Conrad Johnson MV-55 still on the rack,and guess what I hooked it up.NO PROBLEM.I was going to play for an hour and ended up playing music the whole night.The speakers are great and did a good job on 45W per side as you know the MV-55 provides.Actually I left everything wired and played some more music the following day while packing.
Best regards
George |
people are stuck on the wpc spec, they really dont know any better. its how good the power is, not neccisarily how much. |
I'm not stuck on specs, I'm an EE.
Guys, I'm not saying you can't run the 10t's on 40-50 watts. What I'm saying is that these speakers have a nominal impedance of 4 ohm, which means they can drop really, really low under the right conditions. You do run the risk of clipping low powered, and even some higher powered, amps. More specifically, these speakers need a high current amp. User beware. I know several dealers that will not even attempt to run the 10t's on tubes. I wouldn't go that far, expecially considering some of the big tube amps that are available. If you listen at low to moderate volumes you probably will be just fine.
As for performance, 500 watts is no guarantee of great sound, I agree. The quality of power is what matters with the 10t's. This is especially true with bass response as Holenneck posted before. My experiences with the 10t's lead me to believe that the more quality power you give them, the better they respond.
Best to all and enjoy those 10t's!
Dan |
Dan Thanks
I agree,what I was trying to say is that although not optimal one can still get by with a smaller amp on the 10T's.
Now Holennecks's Krell is a very nice amp and I am sure it does a fine job pushing the 10t's.What I will do is use my Zeus on the bottom and the M150's on the top.According to Mark'o'brian @Rogue the Zeus will drive anything out there by it self.When told him about bi-amping with the M150's he caaled me "nuts".Anyway if not satisfied with the above solution I still got my mint ML27.5 to drive them with in fact I got my eyes open for a second one in a 9/10 condition with the intention to bi-amp the 27.5
All the best and enjoy the hobby.
George |
FWIW, I was once truly impressed by the 10T's run by Pass X1000's. |
Thanks for all your input. It just goes to show how many good alternatives there are out there.
A couple of amps I see often on Agon that look worth pursuing include the Classe' CAM-200 mono blocks, the Plinius SA-250, the Krell KSA-250, and possibly the Jeff Rowland Model 201's.
The CAM-200's look like the best bang for the buck, but I don't want to get the upgrade bug after 6 months of using them.
Your opinions are appreciated.
Thanks again,
-Mike
PS Does the upgrade bug ever go away? I always say I'll be satisfied after this last purchase - but a couple days on Agon and I'm at it again! |
Hi George,
Up til this last week I was running my 10t's with a pair of rogue M150's and a classe CA 301 on the bottom. This classe puts out gobs of amps, but is perhaps not the ultimate in control. These worked very well as the gains of the rogues are perhaps just slightly higher than that SS amp. I would image the M150's and Zeus would be a terrific match.
I would bet Holenneck's Krell would be very sweet on the mids and highs with another amp on the LF. It really is amazing how the additional power just opens the soundstage that much more. The depth goes on forever and air around the instruments is much better.
Mfishhead, I've had to go to stupidly priced speakers to unseat the 10t's. But I'm also going in a different direction, higher efficiency and lower power.
Best of luck,
Dan |
Mike,
I've used Bryston 7bST monos with my 10T's for about three years. Great range and tight base. Good luck. |
I used a Pass X350 for a couple of years (after moving up from an Aragon 8008ST). The improvement in the mids & highs was so stunning it sounded like a new, much better, speaker... smoother, angelic, sweet, airy, etc. Vocals were suberbly natural.
Curiously, the bass was a little too prominent until after a long break-in (3-400 hours), but then settled in nicely, especially after I switched to Cardas Golden Ref speaker cables (and interconnects) at the time.
The bass is said to be much more tuneful on the new X350.5, so I would give that a try if I still had 10Ts.
Soundstaging was about the same on the Pass, which is not the 10t's strong point (tonality and a non-fatiguing nature is where they excel, IMHO).
Good luck! |
I don't know, Rgs92. Mine image very well, but it is room and placement dependant. Once I got them about 1/3 of the room length from the front wall bass and imaging really came into focus. I agree with you about cables improving their sound. The 10t's will show the differences, if they're truly there, in any upstream change you make in your system. |
Dan_ed, you may be right, as I had them only 2.5 feet from the wall. There just didn't seem to be much depth to my ears, and images were a little smaller-than-life. But I nevertheless loved them for their natural, un-hi-fi sound. They are very forgiving of even the harshest recordings, but still provided a sense of real-life, there-in-the-room presence. They also did a great job of removing digital grunge.
I still recommend a Pass X-series amp, but one problem is the heat it generates. |
I also own the 10 T's, which I love. The issue with the Aerials is that the 10T's Love power, I have the Mac 2500 monster Solid state Amp(500wpc), and At times the 10T's cause the red led clip lights to blink. I would not recommend a Amp less then 250wpc. I have Jeff Rowland Mono Blocks in another room(Model 7's II-750wpc/4ohms)& I'm temped to hook them up, just to see how they handle the load! Do not underpower the 10Ts. |
