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I love my Vandersteen's but . . . . . . . .

Over the last 35 years I have only owned Four different speaker brands . In the 70”s Radio shack ,In the 80’s ADS L-990's and Vandersteen 2ci , In the 90’s to present , Snell B’s and then back to Vandersteen 2ce sig’s .. You can see my current system here on Audiogon.. Do a search In virtual systems for Stumpies System ..This will give you a lot of info on my system.

Ok ,, Here is my question … I love the sound from my current system but there are times I wish I could get a little more volume out of it . Most of the time when I listen the Meters on the McIntosh amp are bouncing around the 40 watt area with “peaks” around 100 W . But there are times I wish I could turn it up some . If I try to turn the Vandersteen’s up the sound starts to get “compressed” ,, Instruments loose there air around them ,, everything gets thin sounding so I always turn it back down.
Is there a speaker out there that will play “bigger” in my small listening room ?
Speakers I have been considering are B&W N-804’s ,, Von schweikert VR4jr ,,, Green Mountain Audio ,, NHT .
I listen to all kinds of music . Light rock mostly . Eva Cassidy,,James Taylor,,James McMurtury,,Lyle Lovett,,Mark knopfler,,Bob James,,Larry Carlton,,Lee Ritenour ..

What to do ??? Any help would be appreciated ..
stumpie

Showing 2 responses by darkmoebius

darkmoebius
900 posts
 
Whooeeee!!!

A small, completly empty, room with bare walls. Gotta be some nasty reflections, peaks, and nulls going on. No wonder things get congested at higher volumes!

Before you switch speakers, amps, or whatever, try some acoustic room treatments. They will do more for your overall sound than any component at this point.

Bass traps, Wall panels, diffusers, all will do you some good, I bet.

BTW, I had my bother's old 2Ce's for about a year before I started my own system. He upgraded to the 3A Sigs with an Audio Research 100.2 solid state amp and LS-16 preamp. Anyway, I pushed those 2Ce's pretty hard with his Adcom GFA-555 amp. Can't say it sounded great, but did get pretty loud.
darkmoebius
900 posts
 
Shardone,

I had the good fortune to hear ATC SCM 100 active monitors at the house of a guy a bought an amp from last year. He played (amongst other things) traditional Chinese drumming tracks that were awe-inspiring. I have never heard such clarity, power, and dynamics from non-horn speakers. The giant kettle drums were "in the room" and rim-strikes "clacked: with the reality of wood against metal.

In the most hectic, swirling, passages of the traditional Chinese music, the ATC's did a fabulous job of keeping instruments and performers distinctly seperate while building enormous sound.

I consider them to be some of the most incredible speakers I have heard in a very long time.
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