blowing maggie fuses on Mingus.

I'm not sure about your amp, but I had similar problems with Maggie 3.5s and used several diffent amps from ARC to Bryston to Biamped Acoustat TNT 200s and finally a Levinson 336. The speakers went back to Magnepan several times for not only would the fuses go but so would the tweeter......
The spls were well in the tolerence of the speaker acording to my guage and I did try the subwoofer system and an ARC electronic crossover. Nothing helped.
Magnepans only recommendation (as per Jim Winey's son,Steve, who tried to be helpful) was to buy another pair of 3.6s to play while the orginals went back and forth for service. I finally fixed them one last time and sold the things. The speakers do sound fantastic for the money but in my opinion must be flawed. Maybe some units are defective in some undetactable (at least by Magnepan way), otherwise there would not be all these happy Maggie customers.
I owned the original MG-3s since they first were marketed with most of the same equipment and the same room, and only lost 1 tweeter in 14 odd years. The 3.6s sounded much better but were not reliable in my experience.

Warren: The 7 is a "funny" amp. Take a look at the power ratings if you doubt this.

Other than that, i've commented on the inability of Bryston's to deal with low impedance loads in the past. When comparing the 7 to other amps of lesser power, Stereophile went out of their way to let us know that the 7 was not capable of driving low impedance loads with any type of authority. Not only did the sound deteriorate, but the amps went into clipping sooner than the others. This is true even with amps that were rated for measurably less power. For sake of clarity, i had posted such thoughts on Audio Asylum long before the review of the 7 was printed. That article only helped to confirm my suspicions and experience.

El: By using a powered sub, the bottom end is filled out and the sound becomes much more authorative at lower volumes. As such, one can typically reduce spl levels slightly by achieving greater extension and fuller output with less drive applied to the mains. If you've got tone controls, turning your bass way down and listening to the music will alter your perception of spl to a great degree. This is true even though the upper bass / lower midrange on up go relatively unaffected.

I think that the point that Cytocyle was trying to make was that if the mains are actively crossed over to reduce bass demands, power levels are also reduced. This lowers the potential for clipping i.e. excess midrange and tweeter energy. While it might be hard to believe that such a big amp is clipping, you might be surprised at how different designs respond under duress to various reactive loads. Sean
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Pardon me, but how will a subwoofer reduce tweeter power?

I gently disagree with Sean. My Maggies (Tympani 1Ds) worked wonderfully with my Bryston 4B. Maybe things are different now, but I NEVER blew a fuse. And I used to, really crank those babies. If you're a rocker, however, I don't think the Maggies are the best way to go. You could do the subwoofer route, though. peace, warren

P.S. The Revels (though a bit pricey for you) may be the answer to your prayers. Something to shoot for. This will open up this thread for you. The sky is the limit, now....

Bryston's aren't good with speakers that are lower in impedance and lack sensitivity. Your speakers deserve better, more suitable amplification. Sean
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Add a Rel Sub (or better yet 2) and actively cross it over at 30-40hz.... Then use a sound pressure meter with a test disk to match the volume with an active crossover (bryston 10B or something like that...)

If you have to go to a box for dynamics and you like the quickness and the imaging of maggies, next step is Wilson Sophia's... that's the route I choose over MG20.1 to get that extra in dynamics.