SEEKING AN AMPLIFIER THAT MATES WELL WITH MARTIN LOGAN 11 A IMPRESSIONS


Room is 18' long by 11 foot wide with 8 foot ceilings and light drapes on order for rear wall. I sit about 10 feet from the speakers.

Current Equipment: 1. Martin Logan 11A 4 feet from rear wall and 16 inches from side wall. Set up by dealer using Anthem to maximize the internal woofers.

2. Cary Audio 306/200 as a transport with Chord Qutest DAC

3. Conrad Johnson tube power amp classic 62   65 watts per channel

which replaced Rogue Audio Atlas Magnum II 100 watts/channel-CJ sounds better.

4. Rogue Audio Preamp RP-1

Not happy with the sound, speakers sound anemic to me. I was thinking that a more powerful amp would bring the speakers to life. I realize that the woofers have a built in 375 watt amp.  In short, what amp would work better than my current set up? I'm assuming a better match of amplifier would improve the overall sound. 

Thank you. 

 

 

 

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Showing 1 response by donquichotte

I own the same speakers, driven by an Accuphase E470 integrated (a good match IMO), and the sound I'm experimenting is definitely not anemic either, despite the fact that Accuphase is not a brand renowned for stunning dynamics. So:

1. I have the PKB kit (microphone for Anthem ARC room correction) and don't like what it does to the music. Bass gets too light, rounded and lacking punch, even the midrange seems to inexplicably lose some of the wonderful immediacy of the electrostatics. Tinkering with the software  made for some improvements, but not enough. I'd skip the built in room correction and play a bit with the deep pass potentiometers in the back of the speakers. The +/- 2dB at 150 (200?) Hz switch was also better left untouched in my case.

2. I'm also using the speakers close to the back wall (back of the speakers is at the minimum manufacturer approved distance to the back wall, i.e. 20 cm), but that is the long wall in my case.

3. Do experiment with those drapes! You want that some of that back wave absorbed and some of it dispersed. This is hugely important! In fact, the whole room acoustics is always important but it is essential with the electrostatics IME. What I'm about to say will raise some eyebrows but trust me, I'm not making this claim lightly: the room treatments / acoustics are in this case much more important than the amplifier used! I've spent countless hours tinkering with the room. The back firing bass driver should aim at the bare wall while the panel should "see" thick absorbing material, but NOT covering the whole back wall etc. Experimenting is the way.

4. These are picky and revealing speakers. All the other components of your system should have good synergy with them, not only the amplifiers - the cables and power outlets (I'd avoid anything with silver or with rhodium plating), the source (I'm using a rich sounding Accuphase CD/SACD player / DAC, I'm not sure your CChord isn't too clinical for the Logans...) etc. My dealer repeatedly said that a matching source is even more important that a matching amplifier for these speakers.

Good luck and keep us posted!