Tannoy anyone? Cheviot Legacy vs. Stirling GR

I had Cheviot recently and returned them. In part because they were too large for my space. In part because the definition was muddled to my ear. I’m used to Revels with berilium tweeters which give silky smooth very articulate. Was using PrimaLuna Dialogue Premium HP Integrated and Pass Int -25. Loved the tone from the Cheviot. Bass was wonderful. But any music that was very complex seemed kind of muddled. Think is has to do with the crossover at 1200 (if I remember correctly). It’s asking this 12” driver to go too high and the tweeter to go too low is how I was guessing at it.  They asked me to give it some break in which I did maybe 100 hrs and it did improve. Still on some music seemed less than optimal, but on other music particularly acoustic was wonderful. I miss those speakers now. Still, bottom line they were just too big for my space.  

Checking back in. I found some of the same. The Stirlings sound MUCH improved at 150-175 hrs. They started to change for the better around 100hr. What a relief!

My Leben CS600 at 30wpc is underpowered. It's an amazing sounding piece of gear, but won't suffice. It's hard to judge with the underpowered dynamic compression and it does still fall apart with complex passages. I imagine the class A Primaluna and Pass would take care of that and, to my ear, that's the case with them driven by my friends Primaluna EVO.

The Tannoy are super engaging with whatever that indefinable draw of involvement is that I just call 'musical' for want of a different term. So, I'm thinking of (GULP) selling my Leben....

Pass seems like a good match - I'm consider the INT 60 or a First Watt J2 with a Supratek pre...if the impedances match well. I haven't finished my research there and am open to suggestions!

The INT 60 might be enough. I found that a Pass XA30.5 was too underpowered for my Tannoy Turnberrys. They are sounding wonderful with a Benchmark AHB2.

@leotis I was (pleasantly) surprised at the improvement after 100hours. The falling apart continues to come back together, even after 150-175 hours. It's a crazy torture for sure. The low crossover also felt like a potential contributor, so Robert Lee at Acoustic Zen was kind enough to chat me up and send a pair of Hologram II biwires designed for lower crossover speakers. They made an immediate difference, smoothing things out and make the spectrum more coherent. I'd recommend them (and him!) very highly for the speakers!

Yeah. I was expecting continued improvement based on how the tweeter smoothed out over the first maybe 100 hours. Best speaker I have had in that 17' x 25' room in terms of filling the space and sounding great from everywhere in the room. I would have given  it more time except Upscale return policy; I wanted to send back before my housekeeper dinged them up. Bottom line being physically too large for the spot I could place them. Feng Sui issue. Half the reason I picked Tannoy is that Pass Labs uses Tannoy to voice their amps and I figured it would be a good match for the Pass INT-25. Which turned out to be correct, an exceptional match IMO. I still miss those things.