Equipment does not match

Dereck -

a much better power amp match w/ your ARC pre, would be, Bryston 3B ST /SST or 4B ST/SST.

Only one response about the room,interesting.
I went the upgrade route with gear and (god forbid cables)spent 10's of thousands on the above.
The most immediate and huge improvement was using acoustic panels(especially bass trapping)which give you a tight punchy bottom end and also freeing up the mids and highs,a non muddied clean sound.
Speaker position,seating position and if that doesn't do it,the room,heck you can go to a hardware store and put unopened bags of insulation in your corners to hear what happens and its free as you can take them back as they are unopened.
Haven't heard a cable yet that even touches what acoustic panels will do for sound.
Even put a radio or boom box and play a track in the bathroom and then put it in your room and you'll hear a HUGE difference or even run your speakers to a different room and the sound WILL CHANGE.

Have you tried placing a rug in front of teh speakers at the
main reflection point to where you liten from? Bare marble
floors sound like something that might benefit from a bit of
acoustic treatment. If bare walls also, an acoustic panel
on each side wall at main reflection point to your listening
position might be worth a try.

Also before that, sound like speakers might be too close to
the walls for best results.

The Sereophile reviewers positioned them 5' from the front
wall:

"I positioned the Burmester B25s 5' from the front wall, 6'
apart (measured from the tweeter centers), and toed-in 45°
to focus on my listening chair 7' away."

I'd play with the placement aways from walls a bit for good
soundstage and imaging and then perhaps try floor and/or
wall treatments from there as needed. Maybe try the toe in
as well. definitely get speaker placement optimized
before anything else.

Mapman beat me to it :-) I was composing the following when he submitted the preceding post:

As many of the responses make clear there are numerous possibilities, and chances are that there are multiple factors contributing to the less than optimal sound. However, my instinct is that the two factors that are likely to be the most major contributors are referred to in this excerpt from one of your posts:

I have a marble floor and no rugs. Speakers are placed abt 5-7 inches away from the wall but the left speaker is just next to the open passage at the entrance.

While there are some notable exceptions, the performance of the majority of high end speakers will be severely compromised by close to the wall placement. I see in Stereophile's review of the B25 that they placed the speakers five feet from the wall behind them.

I would urge you to try, at least as an experiment, moving the speakers several feet out from the wall. And then listening from a variety of distances. (The position of the listener relative to all four of the walls in the room can make a significant difference, as well as the distance from the listener to the speakers).

And do consider putting a thick rug on that marble floor!

Good luck,
-- Al

WOW: Where to start....

First have you ever heard the Burmister 25 speakers sound the way you invasion?

Second: Any first rate speaker needs the utmost attention to placement. Away from the rear wall away from the side walls. Six feet to eight +- feet apart. An appropriate sized listening room, not to big not to small.

Once you are sure you have those issues dialed in and still not the sound you know your speakers are capable of. you can move on to cables, amplifier, source etc...

Get back with us........we are here to help......no dealer involve here I am guessing...

best
Jim