Hi Paul
Ok, first thing is that these speakers take FOREVER to fully break-in. If they don't have at least 500 hours on them, imaging will not be perfect. These types of drivers essentially don't move at all. I thought mine were great until I had them a year and suddenly one night, I experienced teleportation. Its been that way ever since. The midrange's excursion is minuscule so it takes tons of play time for it to properly loosen up. I bet most AG dealers have no idea how good they can sound because they don't use them enough before selling them. You basically have to live with them for months to discover their true capabilities.
Now having said that, the main problems you are hearing are not due to lack of break-in. Whart and Duomike are exactly right: you are hearing your electronics. And you don't like them as much as you thought! Hopefully you won't take it personally but your brain will constantly try to trick you in believing this is not true. It has happened to me many times. These speakers are capable of extreme resolution and dynamic range - levels that go beyond the design considerations for most amplifiers/preamps/sources. When this is the case, the flaws in the amps' designs will become apparent for the first time. Once you have tried several combinations of electronics with the Nanos, you will hear how significant the differences are even when you're only changing one component. People who think all amps sound alike have never experienced properly-setup Avantgardes.
Which leads me to my final point, and Whart mentioned this too: You need to experiment with your sub settings. Freq of 9 is definitely too high for your room and it will cause an imbalance, especially with the speakers that close to the back wall. My room is a similar size and I generally use Volume 5.5 and Freq 5. Even one little tiny click will be an audible change. I recommend you turn Freq down to 3 and then very gradually raise it back up until it sounds right and stop there. The sub settings can accommodate a lot of rooms/positions when they are set right thats one of the beauties of having adjustable bass, so take full advantage of it. The electronics play a role in the optimal settings, but it is minor compared to the rooms impact.
Contrary to popular belief, tubes are not a requirement with AGs. In fact, one of my favorite amps on my Nanos is a 450W solid-state amplifier. If you do go with tubes and can find an amp that uses the EL84 power tubes, you should definitely give it a try. Lovely tube. Kora of France made a lot of magnificent amps that used it, Manley Labs does too, some older VTL, and of course Tom Evans. The Nanos will tell you very quickly which amps have magic and which dont. There is no other way to predict it. This does not mean they have to be expensive they simply need to be designed by people who truly know what they are doing.
Keep us posted on the evolution!
Arthur
Ok, first thing is that these speakers take FOREVER to fully break-in. If they don't have at least 500 hours on them, imaging will not be perfect. These types of drivers essentially don't move at all. I thought mine were great until I had them a year and suddenly one night, I experienced teleportation. Its been that way ever since. The midrange's excursion is minuscule so it takes tons of play time for it to properly loosen up. I bet most AG dealers have no idea how good they can sound because they don't use them enough before selling them. You basically have to live with them for months to discover their true capabilities.
Now having said that, the main problems you are hearing are not due to lack of break-in. Whart and Duomike are exactly right: you are hearing your electronics. And you don't like them as much as you thought! Hopefully you won't take it personally but your brain will constantly try to trick you in believing this is not true. It has happened to me many times. These speakers are capable of extreme resolution and dynamic range - levels that go beyond the design considerations for most amplifiers/preamps/sources. When this is the case, the flaws in the amps' designs will become apparent for the first time. Once you have tried several combinations of electronics with the Nanos, you will hear how significant the differences are even when you're only changing one component. People who think all amps sound alike have never experienced properly-setup Avantgardes.
Which leads me to my final point, and Whart mentioned this too: You need to experiment with your sub settings. Freq of 9 is definitely too high for your room and it will cause an imbalance, especially with the speakers that close to the back wall. My room is a similar size and I generally use Volume 5.5 and Freq 5. Even one little tiny click will be an audible change. I recommend you turn Freq down to 3 and then very gradually raise it back up until it sounds right and stop there. The sub settings can accommodate a lot of rooms/positions when they are set right thats one of the beauties of having adjustable bass, so take full advantage of it. The electronics play a role in the optimal settings, but it is minor compared to the rooms impact.
Contrary to popular belief, tubes are not a requirement with AGs. In fact, one of my favorite amps on my Nanos is a 450W solid-state amplifier. If you do go with tubes and can find an amp that uses the EL84 power tubes, you should definitely give it a try. Lovely tube. Kora of France made a lot of magnificent amps that used it, Manley Labs does too, some older VTL, and of course Tom Evans. The Nanos will tell you very quickly which amps have magic and which dont. There is no other way to predict it. This does not mean they have to be expensive they simply need to be designed by people who truly know what they are doing.
Keep us posted on the evolution!
Arthur