Which Amp for Magnepan MG 3.6/R?


Many have asked which amp works best with the Magnepan MG 3.6/R, but I haven't seen a good response yet. Can anyone assist me?

My current short list includes the Classe CAM 350, Nelson Pass X250, Belles 350A, and Theta Dreadnaught II. Which one would you choose?

My system includes: Musical Fidelity NuVista 3D CD player, Klyne 7LX3.5 solid state preamp, a pair of Cambridge SoundWorks Newton P-1000 subwoofers, and Analysis Plus Crystal Oval 8 cabling. I listen to classical music and jazz.

Any help you can give would be greatly appreciated. Thanks.
artar1

Showing 1 response by ral

I've had my MG3.6 for about 2.5 years now and have tried quite a few amps, though nothing super expensive (>$10K). I've never been completey happy with pure-tube or pure-SS driving them. You need either a very powerful tube amp with high damping factor (to control the bass), or a highly refined SS amp to avoid transistor harshness which WILL be revealed by these speakers. Among the tube amps already suggested above I'd add Wolcott monoblocks, which sound pretty good on the 3.6. As for Pass-X amps, IMO they sound too lean and cool, though very refined (I like Aleph better). I think panel speakers tend to sound lean anyway and need some "body" in the midrange. I've tried Belles 350A: it sounds tube-like (full midrange) but not as liquid in the upper mids.
In the end, the best strategy for MG3.6 is active biamping (bypassing the external passive xover box). This has allowed me to experiment with different amps for bass and mid/hi. The speakers really open up and dynamics improve. Bit of a hassle to match amps though, and you need to introduce an active crossover between preamp and amps. (There are a lot of threads on Audio Asylum about this.) I'm using a Marchand 3-way xover, since I send the lowest frequencies to a sub, which greatly relieves the Maggies of trying to reproduce <40Hz.
I've tried many amp combos for driving the bass (40-250Hz) and the mid/hi (250Hz-up) sections of the MG3.6, and among my favorite have been Bryston 4Bst on bottom with Belles 350A on top (nearly equal gain amps); also two Llano Design Trinity hybrid tube/SS amps, using a tube-type in each amp that is best suited for that freq. range. (The Llano's are my current setup.)
Again, I'd suggest wandering through the AA planar speaker archives, where many opinions on driving MG3.6 can be found. Good luck!