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
You need more efficient speakers or a 1000 watt stove.
With the 86db Vandersteens and 40 watts of continuous power you should be hearing around 101db of continuous SPL at listening position.
It is to my understanding that the Vandersteens are not "high volume" speakers.
If you want some serious "rock out" speakers you may want to try something on the order of 92db+.
THe VSA VR4SR is a very good speaker.
Possibly the high efficency Vandersteen?

Good luck!
No question, here. The VSA VR4JRs. I have them matched with Mac equipment and the combination is musical, magical and dynamic; and, rilly, rilly big! Our musical tastes are very similar. I've had the Vandy 2CEs and IMHO the VR4JRs smoke them; they seem to have more clarity than the Vandys, yet without being at all analytical. I'v been able to crank them up without any compression or distortion whatsoever.
I had the original Vandersteen 2s and found that the Von Schweikert VR4s were more dynamic and provided a larger and more dimensional soundstage.