Driving ALON V with CJ Premier 11: Can I improve?

By the way the Alon V are triwired and I've heard several people commenting that they do benefit from separate wires for the mids and highs. I also played with a pair of Kimber 8TC but in the end couldn't hear much difference with the Black Orpheus.

I recently changed my amplification of alon v mk ii's from solid state monoblocs(simaudio) to cary v12's upgraded to r. I have horizontally bi-amped them ( one stereo amp driving the woofers and the other the midrange /tweeters.)I thought there was a vast improvement which my disinterested spouse confirmed when she wandered into my listening room a few days later and after lsitening for a few minutes commented that " for some reason the music sounded much better "

I had the Alon Vs for years. I do think you need to upgrade the amps to make your Alons sing, as I'm familiar with what you're using and you're not getting the bass (or the bang for the buck) you could be. If you like the CJ sound the Premier 12 Monos would be a step in the right direction.

I drove my Vs with Herron M150 monos, solid state amps which Keith Herron partially voiced using his Alons Circes (not too different from my Alon V Mk IIIs). I also used the Herron tubed preamp, and tri-wired with Coincident. TG Audio SLVR cords and Quattro Fil ICs. It was heaven. I got it all used :-)

If you're on a budget I'd stick with high current SS amps that will give you at least 200 watts into 4 ohms. The Herrons, either the M150s or the new ones are great with Alons/Nolas if you can find them used.

If you like your Alons (and I sure liked mine for what I spent on them)and your CJ pre, I say first match amps to those speakers. Then upgrade your front end. Then work on your cabling.

I strongly recommend tri-wiring Vs BTW, and I'd probably dump the Monster power conditioner. You can do better than the Black Orpheus, but whatever you do be sure you have separate wires for the mids and treble. You can shotgun the mids and bass if you get in a pinch.

I used the Maestros long ago and would also upgrade them. You can go lots of directions and improve upon them.

Your Vs are good enough that you will hear all the upgrades too.

I own the cj Premier 17LS but the consensus is with Downunder concerning the superiority of the 16LS. That said, the 16LS is considerably more expensive and harder to find. I auditioned the PV14 before choosing the 17LS which I thought was, far and away, the better preamp. I'm sure that it would be a nice improvement for you.

Regarding the cj Premier 11, I had similar thoughts about mine and went with the cj Premier V mono-blocks for more drive.

Talk about being a day late and a dollar short - I can't believe that I didn't look at the OP date.