My speakers are set. Magnepan Tympani IVs


A year ago I acquired a pair of restored Tympani IVs (not IVa). I have been driving them with an Adcom  GFA - 555 that I have had for decades.  The matching pre-amp died and has been replaced with a Schiit SYS Passive pre.

The primary source was CD but has transitioned to a Bluesound Node 2 running TIDAL. I will be playing the MQAs whenever possible. My musical tastes are eclectic, with a pronounced preference for female vocalists, piano and acoustic guitar. Genres include rock of the 60s, jazz, folk, world, Celtic and classical.

The Tympanis do not suffer from the lower register issues to the same degree as some of the other Magnepans, but are still prone to occasionally overwhelming highs.  New components should tend towards the warm to mitigate this issue.

It is time to upgrade the amp.  The consensus judgement of people whom I respect and whom own these speakers are that they should be bi-amped.  Options include separate amps for highs and lows and an electronic crossover (Horizontal ?) or monoblocks (Vertical ?)   

I am only into the Tympanis for $1000, but have budgeted $2000 for amplification. One thing I have come to learn is that the traditional percentages of investment don’t always apply when Magnepans are involved as they offer such a high sound quality/cost ratio.

Cables and room treatments are on the to-do list. As always, I am here to draw upon the experience of the Audiogon community.  Please share your thoughts.  If you see something for sale here, please call it out as I am having trouble sorting through the plethora of options.
kythyn

@kythyn, great price on the T-IV’s! They’re worth about twice what you paid for them. I have a pair of T-IVa’s (I sold my IV’s a year ago, but not for $1k ;-), and if at all possible, yes, bi-amp them. But to do so well will cost you more than $2,000.

First, you’ll need an electronic x/o to provide the 1st-order high-pass and 3rd-order low-pass filtering. The First Watt B4 and Marchand’s are popular with Tympani owners, but the old Dahlquist DQ-LP1 provides that exact filtering, and can be picked up for around $300 (sorry, I sold mine just a couple of weeks ago).

As you have discovered, that great T-IV ribbon tweeter really tells you what the high end of an amp sounds like, so you may want to consider tubes. But the speaker is a 4 ohm load, which tubes don’t like. That is less true of the Music Reference RM-200 Mk.2, however, a great amp for the T-IV (if bi-amping).

For the bass panels, there is no such thing as too much power. Tympani aficionado Satie over at The Planar Speaker Asylum (a great source for all things Maggie) uses a Crown Macro Reference (2000w/ch @ 4 ohms).

If the above is out of reach, look into finding a used Sanders Magtech amp, and forget about bi-amping.

 bdp24,

Thanks for the response. I tried to go with Satie’s approach. Bought a Crown 5002 amp, located the only servicer for Crown in south Florida and left it with him.  That was a year ago, and now he and the amp have disappeared.

What other options would you suggest for the bass panels?
Get two Crown XLS1502's ($400 each) and a Crown x - over! This combination will get the job done!