Amplifier for Tannoy Turnberry GR

The Tannoys have been very tube-friendly. We have a lot of customers using them with our amplifiers (which also use 6AS7Gs).

The speaker is rated at 93 db and is 8 ohms. Unless you have a very small room you will want some power to drive this speaker- a good 60 watts in most rooms, perhaps even more.

To really hear what an SET does, its best to have the speaker be efficient enough such that the amp does not need to play more than about 20% of full power to play the loudest portions of the music. Otherwise the higher ordered harmonics come into play and you really don't hear what the amp is about.

This BTW is not about playing loud, its about playing clean.

I too own the recent Limited Edition of Tannoy Turnberry GR and tried it with a Japanese 300b SET. I do not think these
SET amps can exploit the full potential of Tannoy. The minimum recommended power is 20W as per manual. Some of the KT66/88 amps or the new KT150 tubes may be the right choice. Any suggestions.

I am also interested in 845 and let us have more feedback on 845 amps from tannoy users. Some of the parallel design offer more wattage. 2 X 845 per channel can heat up the room considerably.

Mattam:
Do your LE Turnberry's use the pepperpot tweeters and are the speakers any more efficient than the normal Turnberry's?

Would love to hear other Tannoy Turnberry GR or Stirling GR owners chime in here.

Mmarshall:

Yes, it has Alnico magnets and the pepperpot design similar to Kensington. It will sound better than the normal Turnberry, but efficiency is same. Only 150 pairs were ever made.

Super speakers these Tannoys are. After hearing many many speakers and owning a good number of them I found ultimate solace in a pair of Tannoy Turnberry SE. I know the Kensigtons are better but it doesnt bother me because music sounds so satisfying on a Turnberry.

Regarding amps, it is a tricky one. Tricky because this speaker can be used with a huge variety of amps. At the same time it will also reveal the power limitations of the amp if driven harder. A 211 based SET would do well. A Kt88 or Kt120 based push-pull would do well. Even high powered OTLs would do well. But solid state amps also sound fantastic with these speakers. In fact Tannoy has designed these speakers to be paired with SS amps. I currently use a Tenor OTL75 and FM Acoustics F10 amplifiers. Both around 70 watts per channel. Both sound fabulous in their own ways and both can run out of juice when I play large orchestral music loud. If you dont mind exploring solid state amps I would strongly recommend you try a Naim amplifier with your Tannoy. You will be amazed with the combination. Look at either the Nait 5i or their entry level pre-power combination. You will hear these speakers breathing with great dynamic range and ease.

The other option would be to go with a Pass Labs (First Watt) F6. It is a lot closer to tube amplification by design and has a healthy 30 watts to boot.

By the way I had a McIntosh MC275 for demo at home and I realized that these speakers sound so clean and dynamic that any amount of power can be consumed unknowingly. A friend of mine who has owned almost every Tannoy suggested that they need a minimum of 100 watts per channel to sing unconditionally. At the same time if you choose to feed it with only 10 watts of SET power, it will not dissapoint you. So its tricky!