Vienna Acoustics vs Revel Studios?

I gotta chime in here. Keep the speakers and replace the cdp and amp. Both are going to make a bigger improvement than replacing the speakers. Don't know what your budget is, but if you like the overall sound of the SimAudio, you should strongly consider going to the W-5 amp, which will be a giant improvement in impact and much less strained at high levels. Sim's cdp is also a big step up from the Ultech. The Bryston 7's are also an excellent choice, maybe even a little better than the W-5 but much bulkier as well.

I think you have an amazing set of speakers in the Vienna Acoustics Beethoven's. It would be unfair to comment on the Revels since I have never heard them before.

I can say that I have spend numerous hours in front of the Beethoven's doing critical listening with my own CD's and found them to be exceptional speakers. Midrange was extremely impressive on these and the bass was more powerful than you would expect from a speaker of it's size.

The source equipment used was a VTL ST-85 tube amplifier and the preamp was SS. I cannot recall the brand of preamp, but the CD player was a Naim.

My listening took place in a room about 14 x 18 and it was fairly well damped. Speakers were about 2 to 3 feet from the back walls and about 7 to 8 feet apart.

I thought the combination of the VTL and beethovens was excellent. It could drive these to surprising levels. The only change I would make is to remove some of the damping materials in the room. I thought the high frequencies were getting absorbed. However, this will most likely not be the problem with your average home listening room.

The beethoven is a 4ohn speaker so I can only imagine that is has a fairly flat impedance curve that does not dip below 4 ohms to be driven with such authority.

I disagree that you need more power. The relationship between power and output levels is logarithmic. It takes double the power to get a 3db increase in volume levels. To the human ear, anything under 3db will go unnoticed. So if you have a 100 watt amp and go to 200, you may get 3db. If you go to 400 you may get another 3db. The reason I say this is that often measurements are skewed in spec sheets and don't reflect real world performance. Also, room size and damping items such as furniture, will absorb some of the sound. Don't waste your money and your electricity bill on a super powerful amp; Unless you live in a cold climate and need additional heat to heat the room up so that it's cozy warm. Remember also that just because you have all this additional power does not mean you are using it. Your amp has capacitors, rather large ones if its SS, and they store power for just that reason.

So what would be the point in having all that power in storage if you had such a big amp? Its because transistors are not very linear. They require huge amounts of storage reserve and negative feedback to make them behave linear. A tube amplifier, provided it is properly designed, is much more linear to begin with. It does not require negative feedback to correct for such problems. Excessive negative feedback robs you of some of your dynamics.

I would recommend that you explore tubes. This is such a musical speaker and I think what you are experiencing will be resolved with Tubes. Try and go with a model that uses little or perferably zero negative feedback. You may also need to replace your preamp as I understand not all tube amplifiers mate well with SS preamps. Most do but you should make sure just to be on the safe side. Its all about synergy.

Just my belief and I am sure someone else will disagree with me on that.

It appears that many people love the Viennas as much as I do. It also appears that I need to consider not only different amplication, but a different source as well. I am intrigued by the thought of trying out tubes and would appreciate suggestions on possible good matches with the Beethovens. Ayre? Sonic Frontiers? What about the pre-amp?Or is there an SS combo (such as Pass) that approximates the "tube sound"? Also, any thoughts on a CD upgrade in the $1-2K range? Meridian, perhaps? I'd love to try the Sim Moon Eclipse, but can't quite feature spending $3K for it. Please offer up suggestions on a significant upgrade from the Ultech.

Thanks again for all the help. Unfortunately, I do not live in an area where I can easily audition all of this stuff. I must therefore rely on the kindness of strangers. I must say, it worked out great for me when I assembled the system I have now.

My top two picks in cdps in this price range would be Meridian 508.24 and Wadia 830, both of which are excellent and can be had for $2k used. I would highly recommend looking into the BAT preamps and amps, any models, they are all excellent. See www.balanced.com. Good luck!

I own the Beethovens and I'm very happy with them. Even though they are efficient, at 70 wpc they may be underpowered. Remember that they are 4 ohm speakers, so the 4 ohm amp rating is more important than the 8 ohm rating. I'm not familiar with the Simaudio integrated your using, I don't know if it doubles into 4 ohms (140 wpc?). I prefer solid state amplification, as tubes can sound kinda mushy with these warm speakers. I also drove them with a Classe CA-200 amp with great results. Currently, I using a Threshold T 400, which sounds even better. It is 150 wpc of Class A power. It does 'rock out' when needed. I would say for more power, I'd go with the seperate amp first, still using your Sim as a preamp. A 'warm' sounding amp, that would sound good would be a Sim, Classe, McCormack, Jeff Rowland or Threshold. They are the best smooth solid state designs that come to mind. I would also recommend a front end upgrade. With smooth speakers and amp, you may want a more aggressive cd player, IMO. Try a Proceed CDP or a Arcam FMJ 23. Both those units seem to have more punch or rock better than similarly priced, smoother operators like the BAT or Classe.