High Efficiency Dynamic Speaker Suggestions Please

Hi, Phil, haven't seen you at one of our meetings lately...

Your listening position being about 10' away is ideal, and having 7' between looks to be OK even if I try to spread them a little bit farther than that. In a good sized room such as yours, they will reveal their true, relaxed character, and will work best with a more open and engaging, yet full-bodied type amplifier.

In all honesty, I think there are better amplification matches for the Opera Audio Barque & Consonance M12 horns than a Class D amplifier. The reason being both tend to blunt low level transients a bit, and in tandem, there may be too much of that going on. However, I also feel the conventional wisdom of partnering them with lower power tube (2A3, 300B, 211, 845) amplification is even more wrong. To my ear, these loudspeakers mate best with moderate to higher power tube and Class A or Class AB solid state amplification.

Finally, as far as imaging goes, this is one of the weaker points of this line of loudspeakers. They don't image poorly, per se, but nor would I want to put them up against too many slim profile modern loudspeakers, either.

By the way, I want to personally thank Duke for the kindness and friendship he shown me in this thread.

DISCLAIMER: I am the importer/distributor for all Opera Audio and Consonance high-end audio components in the USA and Canada

Hi Phil, thanks for the additional room information.

To answer your question, I tried to design my speakers in anticipation of a wide variety of amps - but specifically, they work best with low damping factor tube amps (assuming the port tuning is adjusted accordingly). I used Atma-Sphere's 30-watt stereo OTL amplifier in the design stage. My speakers also work well with SET amps; the smallest amp I've heard of a customer getting good results with was a 3.5 watt SET. They'd work with push-pull tube amps as well, especially those with low global feedback (which implies a low damping factor). Actually they'll work with other amps (I use a Nuforce sometimes), but with high-damping-factor amps they like a bit of boundary reinforcement in most rooms, or else they like to be tuned a bit higher than normal to give more energy around 40 Hz. The only amp I've heard them not work well with was a First Watt by Nelson Pass, presumably because the extremely low damping factor of those amps was too low for my design (which frankly surprised and disappointed me a bit - I was hoping that would be a nice combination, as I like Nelson Pass's designs).

Duke

Jaybo, any amp suggestions? The hypex class d sound very good to me and I thought my speakers were voiced with them. Phil Brady

phil...i had a friend who was a VS nut, and had a shop in minnesota for a few years. his amps of choice for VS speakers were electrocompaniet, and naim. i am more old school with amps, but i've been awfully impressed with the new bel canto class D's....i also have found that reasonably powerful mosfet designs make the bigger box speakers sound more transparent, and don't necc sacrifice anything on the bottom. the VS should rise to the occasion

horns are ACTUALLY just that...they allow you to imagine you are at a live performance! i personally consider that accuracy not coloration...but yes, as with all loudspeakers, its interpretation. :)