snell a II

I agree with Ben,the Snell A2's are a classic.But many components make these sound a little slow,little too thick and imprecise.I changed the woofer surrounds for very thin rubber (no foam),all the caps for audiophile grade ones,all cabling for good cabling (i used vanden Hul silver cable around 1984-i'd buy Nordost,Kimber or XLO now)and good set of spikes.Result:enormous improvement.Speakers sound best with very good amplifier and tight sounding(i have a Mark Levinson No.23;but guess sound will be even better with Goldmund Mimises 9-that is the amp i'd like to have next)
For what it's worth,i found the Mirage M1 sound similar (not the same-just a little darker and a little less dynamics).Listened to these around 1989,have the A2 since 1980 -bought them new after listening to 50 speakers.

im still using my type a2 for the past 20 years i agree w/michell about the power requirements.but im currently using high powered tube electronics.audioresearch D79B (2) bi amp w/ audioresearch EC21 electronic crossover 300/385 cutoff 6db slope. i also use audioresearch D250 mk2 servo and audioresearch classic 150 monoblocks. this electronics matches the snells well.

Question: How would the Snell A/II speakers sound with a McIntosh MC-275 amp? Would this not be enough power? If not, what high quality tube amp could I get away with at a price that is not say higher than $5000?

the mac 275 amp might work in a small room. i use to drive my snells type A2 w/ a single ARC D 79B w/c has the same power rating as the mac 275. but when you play orchestral spectaculars you will see the short comings w/c is lack of power.its for this reason i acquired one more ARC D79B and the ARC EC 21 electronic tube crossover.i also purchased both ARC D250 mk2 servo and ARC classic 150 mono blocks and they worked very well W /the snells A2.these units are all high quality tube units. for your budjet i would suggest the ARC D250 mark 2 servo ,ARC classic 150, ARC vt 200, theyre all less than $ 5000.i hope this would answer your querries

I have a pair of Type A IIs that I've had for, let's see, 15 years or so. The Type A has always been one of my favorites, even before I owned a pair, and so years ago when I found a used pair in good physical shape for cheap I jumped at the chance to buy them.

Fortunately, I'm local to the Snell factory so I took them there to be worked on when I needed to replace the tweeters (they were a little wonky when I bought the speakers) and to fix the veneer around the bottom of the woofer cabinet. There was (and probably is still) a guy there named Mark who has been at Snell for years and still knows the Type A inside and out. Later, when I needed to have the woofers re-surrounded, I took them back to Mark as well.

I decided a couple years ago to re-do the crossovers with audiophile-grade caps and such, as a couple other posters have reported doing. I bought the parts, but we moved shortly after that and our new house doesn't really have a room that's the right size and shape to fit the Type As in (they are big). So, they are in storage right now. Yuck. I'm trying to figure out how to make a listening room somewhere...

I agree with the comments that the Type As are power hungry. I have used various amps with them but my modest pair of MC-modded Hafler DH200s running in bi-amp with the Snell active crossover seems to work best for me.

Over the years I've gotten to know people at Snell and they are serious about their product. It's unfortunate that they seem to be getting pigeon-holed into home theatre applications these days but I guess as a company you need to go where the money is to some degree. Nonetheless, I'm starting to think about what my next pair of speakers might be and I'm going to audition Snell C7s sometime in the next month or so.

Vernon Miller
Contoocook, NH