Magnepan .7 Alternatives

rnl997

 What part of this do you not understend?

 With his system, the way it is tube preamp running into a 10 K load kills the extremes.

The same issue will; happen even with different speakers. 

that's why I told him to expose the issue by taking the Bluesound node directly into the amp bypassing the tube preamp.

Cheers

JohnnyR

OP was asking for Maggie alternative. Obviously, building a great system means everything works synergistically—being an audiophile beginning on my journey into this hobby—I’ll trust what you say about preamp impedance matching. I was trying to offer an alternative loudspeaker design option that would work in his room. I believe the loudspeakers are the most critical piece in the puzzle in creating a great system…

There is no alternative.

@flasd

my condolences on your loss

music, good music, has been very important to my own coping with many of the pressures and vagaries of living life -- hope it offers the same essential solace for you

back to the hifi question you posed... please do what johnny rutan suggests -- much of your sonic issues may well stem from the preamp impedance mismatch

stay well, stay level, and enjoy the music

I have always liked the planar or ribbon sound. I hadn't tried the Magnepans so a few years ago, I found someone selling the LRS speakers nearby and went for a listen and really liked them. I loved them but also felt a loss in the bass and dynamic area so I sold them and found a used set of .7s which I thought were better in all respects. I had a guy listen and he asked if I had a subwoofer going. They were in a large room that is my office so they are out from the wall about three feet but there are open shelves of boxes and files behind them. My office not a good set up for listening because I have a half wall in the middle. My computer and chair where I do a lot of my listening is about 12 feet away and is semi-blocked by some partial walls but that is where I am working which is what I do a lot when I am listening.  

After listening for a while, the nagging feeling of missing dynamics and bass kept creeping in. I kept looking at forums and found discussions on open baffle speakers. The main thing that jumped out was the description of the sound to be similar to Magnepans but with the dynamics and bass. I followed trails and finally honed in on Spatial Audio Labs as a source. I saw some sound demos from a dedicated buyer on YouTube and the sound quality came through even on that format. 

I lucked into finding someone selling their X5s about 100 miles away. I drove there and listened and got a great deal and brought them home. Again, since I don't really have things set up to really set up the room, I just plopped them down and plugged them in and it was everything I wanted. The price I got was in the low $5k for the almost new speakers but it is definitely my endgame speaker so there's that. The other problem is that it made me acutely aware of my electronics so I've spent money switching to tubes and fine tuning a DAC and then spending stupid money (for me -- I buy almost everything used and try to keep it reasonable) on cables and connects. That is because you can hear everything. 

The neat thing is that it sounds great from my normal work listening position but the magic happens if I sit about 2 or 3 feet away from these speakers. Depending on the quality of the recording, you cannot tell that sound is coming from the speakers and there is an image projected in front of you. 

The different speakers they have also influence the amp. The X5s and the X3s have a powered woofer so they are extremely easy to drive and you can use a very low powered SET amp or a higher powered amp. The X4s have a passive woofer that still are fairly efficient but need more power to bring it out. There's also an M4 which has a different tweeter but is far less expensive. I've seen some of Spatial Audio Lab speakers being sold used from time to time so you can check the used markets if you have any interest. 

So that's my deal. Having said that, let me also second much of what others have told you. The quality of the recordings are going to really impact how well the sound is. Also, since the sound is bouncing off the back wall, you are going to have deal with the out of phase, bass canceling bounce back and room treatments or just moving the speakers may help a lot. The Maggies are power hungry animals and the electronics may really bring out more of that sweet sound and even give you significantly more bass.