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Rega/Totem combo wow!

Was out of town for work last week and managed to stop into a hifi shop downtown after work one evening.  I forget the name of the place but it was right in Cincinnati (audible elegance i believe).  I had always wanted to hear a rega/naim amplifier.  Long story short, they had a rega brio and elex r hooked up to a pair of Totem Rainmakers (which is a nice compact speaker for my space) and I have to say that I was really impressed by the speakers even through the lower powered brio.  The gentleman switched from the Brio to the Elex to hear the difference.  And yes, there was a difference. The Elex provided more bass and a little smoother sound to my ears but both amps sounded superb and although the Totems are 4ohms, I was more impressed with the little Brio handling them quite well.  I haven't really heard many people talk about totem speakers on too many threads but like I said, there seemed to be a really good match there between the regas and the totems.  Has anyone else had a similar experience with these two brands playing together and if so what were your thoughts?
mgrec42
reubent
6,973 posts
 
@mgrec42,

Thanks for the post. Yep, that's Audible Elegance in Montgomery (suburb of Cincinnati). I saw the Regas and the Totems last time i was in there, but didn't take a listen. I happen to own the the Rega Elicit-R (bigger brother to the Elex-R) and I own the Rega Saturn-R CD player/transport/DAC. I find them to be fantastic sounding pieces.

Just curious, what were they using as a source? Was it a music streamer of some type? I know they carry Antipodes and Blue Sound and stream Deezer and also have a Roon Core and various Roon End Point Devices. Do you know what they were playing? Or was it vinyl?

mgrec42 OP
12 posts
 
They had both vinyl and the matching rega cd player. Not much streaming but I based all my listening through the cd player and elex r since I don't have vinyl at home. Something just seemed to blend really well with all the sources and speakers. Something i haven't experienced before. It was probably the first time I understood what the whole PrAT thing was about. I didn't get a chance to listen to the naim but the elex r is going to be my next purchase since that's what I went to demo. Just a great piece and it just sounded like music of that makes sense. 
kalali's avatar
kalali
1,977 posts
 
I heard the Elicit-R and Rainmaker combo a few months back in NYC with a friend.who was looking for a system for his relatively small apartment. They did sound great but he ultimately picked the Arro. To our ears, the Arro just sounded so much fuller with a lot more weight, almost uncanny of it diminutive size.
reubent
6,973 posts
 
@kalali - I had always heard that the Totem Arro had a big, full sound, especially for it's size. However, I had never seen them in person until recently. They are TINY! I was really surprised at the relative small size of all of the Totems. Really cool if they work for you. One of these days I'll have to sit down at my local dealers showroom for a listen.
kalali's avatar
kalali
1,977 posts
 
They really do sound big. If you have the room to leave a couple of feet of space behind them, they can create a nicely believable soundstage much bigger than you'd expect from their tiny size cabinets. Part of it is the element of expectation where the size vs. sound combination gets a bit distorted and somehow doesn't quite add up. We also heard the larger Forest model which was very musical but the Arros made a more profound impression on me just because I didn't expect as much. I think most owners agree that Totems in general do require good clean and moderately high power despite their size.
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