I was running a pair of Hawks with an Audio Research VS110. Life was good, but I was still craving something more. Enter the Bel Canto ref1000, and the Hawks jumped to life.
After discussing my situation with Vince from Totem, I upgraded the speakers to Mani-2 Signatures. Wow, another massive jump. I tried the VS110 with them for a few minutes before realizing that it was not a good match at all.
After a year with the Bel Cantos I had an opportunity to buy a pair of barely used Nagra PMA monoblocks and I jumped on it. They were better in nearly every way than the ref1000, but it was only a matter of degree and not the huge overall shift that I had from the tube VS110 to the ref1000.
Funnily enough, the person I bought the ref1000 from was also using Mani-2 Signatures and he upgraded to the top-end Pass monoblocks.
The Mani-2's can take a lot of amplifier and still keep giving back. From my experience, I think the 14b SST would make you very very happy. If you want to save money, the 4b SST also looks like it would work well.
After discussing my situation with Vince from Totem, I upgraded the speakers to Mani-2 Signatures. Wow, another massive jump. I tried the VS110 with them for a few minutes before realizing that it was not a good match at all.
After a year with the Bel Cantos I had an opportunity to buy a pair of barely used Nagra PMA monoblocks and I jumped on it. They were better in nearly every way than the ref1000, but it was only a matter of degree and not the huge overall shift that I had from the tube VS110 to the ref1000.
Funnily enough, the person I bought the ref1000 from was also using Mani-2 Signatures and he upgraded to the top-end Pass monoblocks.
The Mani-2's can take a lot of amplifier and still keep giving back. From my experience, I think the 14b SST would make you very very happy. If you want to save money, the 4b SST also looks like it would work well.