The Wilson Benesch Act Two's are easily among the finest speakers in the world - but then again so are the Parsifal's. I own Wilson Benesch and have enjoyed them tremendously. But that enjoyment hasn't made me forget about the Verity's. Prior to my purchasing the WB's I narrowed the field down to three world class speakers from, Kharma, Verity and Wilson Benesch. Ultimately I selected the WB's mostly because I thought they looked the best. They are all great speakers nonetheless.
I have never heard the Cremona but I have heard the Amati and the Wilson Benesch by far the better speaker. I don't know why because they seem to use similar drivers. I do however prefer the looks of the Amati to the WB - and its a good thing because every time I've listend to the Amati, I found myself gazing right into the speaker searching for the music. Perhaps it was the various setups and dealer showrooms but I have never heard the Amati's sound good.
The WB's are totally holographic and completely disappear in your room. They produce a fantastic image - marvelous in fact. The sound is very pure clean and most definitely without any apparent color. What I find ingriguing about the WB's is they change completely with each component change in your system. They pass all the character of your components and cables without touching the sound.
Back to the imaging. The WB's are very easy to place in your room. While they sound best with room to breath, I can push my WB's right next to the wall behind them with a stereo rack and a television in-between and sit at about 8' away and still have a detailed, crisp center image. Spectacular and very flexible.
A key strong point of the WB is its seamless midrange through the highs. It almost sounds like a pannel speaker in this regard.
I have used the WBs with various amps ranging from 50 to 600 Watts. They like power and I think that 200/250 watts is optimal to control the drivers - anything more is overkill and anything less becomes questionable. By questionable I mean, it depends on the amp in question. Cary 805's at 50 watts had a tough time driving my speakers but Accuphase A50V's at 50 watts were much better. Currently I am using a pair of LAMMs as well as a Mcintosh MC2000. I am trying to decide between the two amps and they both work very well with the WBs. I have also used Solid State from Electrocompaniet, GamuT, Krell, Chord, Pass, Rowland and even an Outlaw Audio 1050 home theater receiver to drive the WBs with good results.
With the higher power amps, bass becomes frighteningly tight and powerful. In fact, with a pair of Nemo Monoblocks, I could hear wires inside the speakers buzzing against the inside of the cabinet from all the bass. I pulled off the drivers and sure enough there was a wire resting against the inside of the enclosure. I repositioned the wire and have never heard a buzz again.
The WBs are TRI-WIRE.... This can be VERY annoying! I have tried many cables and cable combos. It offers a lot of flexibility if you have money and patience but can drive you insane since changing speaker cables pretty much requires you pick up the speaker and lay it on its side (on pillows of course) to access the binding posts which are underneath the cabinet.
Chuffing! At certain bass frequencies and with more than 200 watts of power, you can hear chuffing from the rear port during bassy passages or todays R&B Favorites.. :)
There is more to know about the WB since it is a very rare speaker in the US with few (real) dealers who keep them in stock and very few known owners. If you have any other questions about WB, please let me know.
One thing to note about the Verity which is pretty important is the bass cabinet and its proximity to the rear wall. Of course the cabinet can be rotated for optimal results but it is still very sensitive compared to the WB. This sensitivity can be a problem in certain setups. For me, my wife is always making me move my listening room to other areas in the house. Right now, my listening room is the living room/home theater and the WB's function flawlessly there. I doubt the Verity's would.
The Veritys have a tremendous midrange character and are to my ears a warmer (not in a negative way) speaker. Nice to listen to.
Either way you cannot go wrong. But.. once you own one of these world class speakers, you will gravitate toward new front end components and amplification, feeling happy all the way!
