Snell B-Minors: What works best?


My friend upgraded his Snell Ds to B-Minors and is now looking to upgrade his amp, pre-amp, and CD player.

Our initial attempts to audition gear left us feeling that the bass from the B-minor's was loose and tubby. We tried an all Ayre system (CX-7, K-5X, and V-5X) and did not feel that it was a good match to the Snells. This same set-up sounded outstanding with the store's Thiel 2.4s so we were surprised that it seemed to lack power/control for the Snells since the Thiels are notorious for needing power.

What associated gear have you found to work or not work with Snell B-Minor's?
bundy

Showing 2 responses by ncarv

I did experience the same issue with my B-Minors when I was driving them with Levinson amps (27 and 333). I also tried the Thiel 3.6's and the bass was much tighter, though at the expense of too much glare at the top end, at volume.
You can check out my current system. I'm using VTL pre and monos, and a CEC transport with AL DAC. I tried the newer VTL MB-450 Signature monos and the bass was amazingly tight, but I found the sound stage a bit focused for my taste. The older Deluxe 500 monos give a larger sound stage with slightly less tightness in the bass, though recently upgrading the driver tubes in the amps and the tubes in the pre-amp seems to have improved it significantly.
It was hard to decide between the Thiels and the Snells and I kept them both for awhile. I ultimately chose the Snells because the do better with more types of music. The Thiels were great with small jazz combos, folk, and other small group acoustic music, but I couldn't listen for long with big orchestral stuff and loud rock. For those, the Snells really shine and they do a real good job with everything else. Ultimately, I would have liked to keep both sets of speakers, but I'm trying to maintain a glimmer of sanity and not have my house look like a retail audio showroom.
Hope this helps.
--Neil
It's not that the Levinsons didn't work well with the Snells, I just didn't get the tight bass that Bundy is asking about. This is interesting, as I would expect tighter bass with good solid state equipment, rather than tube.
I will say that the 27 is a real sweet amp and a lot more musical than the 333 (also interesting considering the power difference (100w vs. 300w), but neither matches the VTL stuff.
--Neil