Another thought are your Maggie's fully broken in, I know mine sounded harsh on the highs until I had about it 300 hours on them.
Integrated amp recommendation for Maggie .7's
As the title states I'm looking for an amp recommendation for my Magnepan .7's.
I'm currently using a Belles Aria Signature pre with a pair of Signature monos.
@jjss49 recently described the Belles sound thusly:
"i have owned the belles aria (twice), along with numerous hegels, ayres, some upper older musical fidelities
david belles’ aria is a nice integrated, powerful, very stoutly built, nice phono stage in it too (the remote control is downright cheap though)
sonically, i found the belles to have a little more of a brash personality - more treble energy, some sizzle, a little grain, compared to the more refined hegel and ayre sound... so it depends if you want that or your speakers benefit from a little more sizzle up top...
the ayre, hegel and top flight retro musical fidelity amps (a308, muvista etc) provide a degree of treble sophistication of even higher tier solid state amplification (ample detail and soundstaging free of attendant electronic harshness)"
This seems to jive with my own feelings as well. I've owned probably a dozen different pairs of speakers and the Belles gear has always been the common denominator.
I'd love to keep my budget to $5k new or used. I don't think I can get an Ayre that will mate well with the Maggies at my budget. It's possible that I can get an Aesthetix Mimas used around the $5k mark.
Hegel is a brand I have absolutely no experience with.
Much appreciated!
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a few points back to you 1) my comments on a bit brightness/brashness/harshness from the belles aria refers to my experience with the aria only -- i have kept in my stable of amps my beloved belles sa30... yes it is a little bright, but silky smooth (zero harshness or grain), utterly refined... not enough power to push maggies though... 2) if you have had great experiences with belles, maybe try the aria signature model? i’ll bet the sonics are a step above the regular aria, more in line with david's better power amps over the years 3) i very much believe the path to happiness with the .7’s is to use the rel sub pair in concert with them, well placed, using high level inputs, crossover around 70 hz - this will make more a sonic difference to any change in amp over a belles aria -- also, do you have the .7's on proper stands (magna risers)? 4) audio research is indeed a lovely lovely match to maggies but one must deal with the expense and the whole ’experience’ of running a high powered tube amp....and i would submit the i-50 may run out of juice even in a modest room if music is played to reasonable volumes (90 db peaks) 5) for 5 grand you have a lot of excellent choices -- ! i would direct you in the direction of pass labs, upper odyssey, hegel h390/h20/590, you can pm me i can provide some other 'sleepers' .... otoh all but the more expensive upper model ayres are a little too relaxed/refined to drive the maggies in experience... good luck and have fun |
@ghdprentice Funny you should suggest that. My big system consists of a CD9, Ref Phono 3, Ref 6SE, and '160S.
It's hard to put a number on it but I really feel the i/50 gets me 80% of the way there or even a little more. No plans to downsize my system but it's got me thinking about diminishing returns more than ever. Your point is valid. I know the maggies are a tough load to drive and I haven't heard the .7s with an i/50. I will say that I've got the i/50 in a fairly large room (17x35) hooked up to a pair of Snell k.5 monitors (same 86dB efficiency as the .7s) and it drives them splendidly. I have gotten close to maxing out the volume control on very quiet recordings but haven't found myself wanting for more power.
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