I love my Vandersteen's but . . . . . . . .


Over the last 35 years I have only owned Four different speaker brands . In the 70”s Radio shack ,In the 80’s ADS L-990's and Vandersteen 2ci , In the 90’s to present , Snell B’s and then back to Vandersteen 2ce sig’s .. You can see my current system here on Audiogon.. Do a search In virtual systems for Stumpies System ..This will give you a lot of info on my system.

Ok ,, Here is my question … I love the sound from my current system but there are times I wish I could get a little more volume out of it . Most of the time when I listen the Meters on the McIntosh amp are bouncing around the 40 watt area with “peaks” around 100 W . But there are times I wish I could turn it up some . If I try to turn the Vandersteen’s up the sound starts to get “compressed” ,, Instruments loose there air around them ,, everything gets thin sounding so I always turn it back down.
Is there a speaker out there that will play “bigger” in my small listening room ?
Speakers I have been considering are B&W N-804’s ,, Von schweikert VR4jr ,,, Green Mountain Audio ,, NHT .
I listen to all kinds of music . Light rock mostly . Eva Cassidy,,James Taylor,,James McMurtury,,Lyle Lovett,,Mark knopfler,,Bob James,,Larry Carlton,,Lee Ritenour ..

What to do ??? Any help would be appreciated ..
stumpie
Stumpie -- It seems that you've found a sound you like with the Paradigms, but I'll offer some comments anyway. Different speakers do different things. I wouldn't get rid of your Vandersteens. They are excellent for small-group jazz, classical string quartets and vocal music. I have a pair of Vandy 1b's. I love their clarity, imaging and subtlety, and they're great for listening into the details of music at moderate volumes.

Vandys would not necessarily be one's first choice for listening to rock at volume, though. Amplification isn't the issue, either. I've got a 120 watt per channel NAD C-270 power amp hooked up to mine through a B&K Pro-10MC preamp, and even with the volume turned well up, the Vandersteens sound well-bred rather than gnarly. That's fine with me, because it matches best what I listen to most these days.

If what you're looking to do, though, is to put on some old Johnny Winter, George Thorogood, Stones or Aerosmith and crank it up to levels that will let you feel the thump of the bass drum, the grunt of the bass, the chunk of the rhythm guitar, and the sinus-clearing snarl of a Les Paul with Seymour Duncan pickups played through a Marshall stack, you might try something else. At the risk of being labeled a heretic, I'll offer a couple of suggestions. Back in the 1970s, I would have steered you in the direction of JBL L-100s, perhaps THE ultimate all-time speaker for listening to rock, but those qualify as vintage equipment and are probably hard to find in anything like good condition. These days, if you want some authentic rock sound without pretension, you might consider JBL 4410A professional studio monitors (available online for roughly $450 per pair, run a Google search for vendors). If you don't want to spend that much money, and don't want to have to hunt around too much, look for a pair of JBL Northridge E50 bookshelf speakers online (available for about $250 a pair), or check out Cerwin-Vega E78s, E710s or E712s at your local Rex or other discount store.

JBLs and Cerwin-Vegas are not audiophile gear by most estimations, but they'll probably be just fine for putting on some rock and cranking up the volume. Let's put it this way -- you sip fine wine from a crystal wineglass, but you pour back beer from a mug, and that's just the way things should be. As with everything else, your mileage may vary, but that's what I'd try if I wanted rock speakers with some bite.
Not sure I agree with 02pete about rock music speakers being like a beer mug to beer and jazz speakers being as a crystal wine glass is to fine wine...

As far as I am concerned, it is all music and a good speaker should do it all well ...as softly as you want and as loudly as you want...whatever type music you like....and all with accuracy and low distortion.

Try auditioning ATC speakers...they are used by Rolling Stones, Pink Floyd, Tom Petty, Mark Knopfler, Lenny Kravitz and many other rockers and their sound engineers. They are also used by Telarc label for classical. They are used by TEC award winning engineer Doug Sax (do a google on Doug Sax Mastering Lab). They were used by Sony for SACD demos at AES conventions. Doug Sax mastered the Aerosmith "Toys in the Attic" SACD from original master tapes on ATC speakers (an SACD which got great reviews). They are used by Disney and Hollywood studios. The list of professional users is large....in all probability about a third of the music you buy (whatever your genre taste) will have either been mixed, mastered or re-mastered on ATC speakers.

You mention compression (a common problem with low cost drivers in competitvely priced speakers) and the fact that you wish you could really crank it up: the larger ATC models play loud enough to easily do permanent hearing damage and even at these levels they play with some of the lowest levels of distortion in the business....just be careful.

[caveat I am a proud owner of various ATC speakers for about ten years but I am not a dealer or a pro and have no affiliation with ATC]
Shardone,

I had the good fortune to hear ATC SCM 100 active monitors at the house of a guy a bought an amp from last year. He played (amongst other things) traditional Chinese drumming tracks that were awe-inspiring. I have never heard such clarity, power, and dynamics from non-horn speakers. The giant kettle drums were "in the room" and rim-strikes "clacked: with the reality of wood against metal.

In the most hectic, swirling, passages of the traditional Chinese music, the ATC's did a fabulous job of keeping instruments and performers distinctly seperate while building enormous sound.

I consider them to be some of the most incredible speakers I have heard in a very long time.
Thanks Darkmoebius for the supporting comments, which help to emphasize that a great speaker should be able to play any kind of music well. It sounds like you were impressed with ATC 100 actives even though the Chinese drums might not be something you are very familiar with or your preference in music.

Some believe that you only benefit from a very loud playing speaker with huge dynamic range if you play rock or, as you mentioned, something akin to those heavily percussive Chinese drums. Some believe that you only need a very loud speaker with huge dynamic range if you have a very large room.

While it is true to say that strenuous rock music can certainly show off a speaker's capabilities to play undistorted at exceptionally high levels, the above beliefs, which are often based on this kind of observation, are in fact quite erroneous.

Greater dynamic range has tremendous impact on any music; it allows your ears to pick up more details by increasing the contrast in various sound levels within the music.