yashu,
I'm curious if you ever tried tube amplification with your Thiels. That's my preference. I could see Thiels being a bit more relentless with SS amps, especially if one's room isn't very damped. But for me in a well controlled room, with CJ tube amps, the Thiels have proven about the least fatiguing speaker I've owned in decades (and I have very sensitive ears, including Tinnitus that gets aggravated by the slightest brightness/shoutiness/distortion in the upper registers). My reviewer friend always had the "Thiels are bright and fatiguing" bias until he heard my set up, after which he did a 180 degree about face, feeling they were super smooth to listen to.
Back to the Harbeths, I really admired the great sense of balance and control through the whole frequency range. They were powered by my CJ premier 12 monoblocks and sounded great.
I'm curious if you ever tried tube amplification with your Thiels. That's my preference. I could see Thiels being a bit more relentless with SS amps, especially if one's room isn't very damped. But for me in a well controlled room, with CJ tube amps, the Thiels have proven about the least fatiguing speaker I've owned in decades (and I have very sensitive ears, including Tinnitus that gets aggravated by the slightest brightness/shoutiness/distortion in the upper registers). My reviewer friend always had the "Thiels are bright and fatiguing" bias until he heard my set up, after which he did a 180 degree about face, feeling they were super smooth to listen to.
Back to the Harbeths, I really admired the great sense of balance and control through the whole frequency range. They were powered by my CJ premier 12 monoblocks and sounded great.