It’s not that the atma-spheres are bad amps, it’s just that they were not designed to power speakers like MLs. They are designed for easy to drive speakers and many people find they do very well in that situation. This has been discussed many times on these forums.
Atma-Sphere M60 monoblocks + ML ESL 11 = Inferior combo
Hi guys,
Today I borrowed home a pair of pure OTL-Tube M60 mononblocks to combine with my ML ESL 11s (which base are partially driven by a Class-D amplifer of 275 watts) with very poor results. Unfortunately, although the M60s where only to cater for the diaphragm panels (at least in theory), when combined with the speakers, the soundstage collapsed, vocals felt muffled and absent deep into the sound picture, almost hidden away, and the base went out of control (got larger and louder in a negative way). I also lost details. The Monos are a pair of brand new demos and shined this morning together with a pair of smaller Vivid monitors.
My current SS - a Bryston 4B3 delivers so much better combined with the ML ESL 11s. Someone that can explain what I did just experience? I thought that OTL tubes and High sensitive Martin Logans of todays generation where to be a marriage in heaven.
Kind regards
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I wonder why you didn't call Ralph (atmasphere) and discuss this with him? He often answers the phone. He is very open and provides honest information with regard to his equipment. Atmashphere amps can work with difficult loads, but you can overtax them- to the detriment of sound quality. Perhaps his new Class D amps would be a better fit. Bob |
Zero-autoformers: https://www.zeroimpedance.com |
The M60 OTL's are very load sensitive! They function best with a flat high impedance speaker - of which few exist. The solution is to use an autoformer between the OTL amp and the speakers. That's what I have on my Futterman H3 - a pair of Altec autoformers. The original owner had Julius Futterman add a pair of them to the H3 chassis so he could drive his low impedance (below 4 ohms) speakers. An autoformer presents a uniform higher impedance load to an OTL tube amp without compromising sound quality! |
Yeah, I don’t think I would mix the two …. Those speakers need solid state bruisers to extract all they can deliver
Years ago at Goodwin’s High End in Waltham MA I listened to ML Statement system driven by Boulder Amplification and it was pretty impressive. I can not imagine panels working well with any 60 watt tube amp especially one with no OPT |
- 35 posts total