Your experience with Thiel 3.6

I owned a pair, loved them, and was sad to sell them. What they do well, they do as well as any speaker I've heard under $5000, and many over. Small jazz combos, solo and chamber classical, acoustic, female voices can't be beat. With the right equipment, they are absolutely amazing. The feeling of live music is recreated beyond belief. You can close your eyes . . .
However, for loud electric rock and orchestral music, they can be a bit harsh, or bright at higher volumes.
I have a pair of Snell B Minors I kept because they do everything very well, especially loud rock, but they don't come close to the 3.6's for the smaller, acoustic stuff.
I was tempted to keep both pair, but, though I like my gear, I really don't want to be dragging 150 pound speakers in and out of the room. I actually had them both set up at the same time and would just switch my speaker cable, but they took up too much room, especially with my other stuff.
I'm not a big fan of Martin Logans, but many other people seem to like them.
An audiogoner wanted to buy the Snells from me. He said the only speaker better was Coincident Technology, which is designed very much like the Snells.
http://www.coincidentspeaker.com/speakers.htm
Good luck on searching. Don't trust anyone (even me!). Trust your own ears.
--Neil

I love mine! The only thing I wish is that I had a pair of 7.2's. I am currently using Conrad Johnson electronics (16ls II tubed pre / MF2500A ss amp) with a Sony SCD-1 front end and audioquest cables. I was driving them with a CJ Premier 11a (70W/Ch Tubed amp) I was amazed at how well that amp drove those speakers. The MF2500 does,however, deliver more bass. But the midrange detail that the 11a produced was simply sublime. Has me searching for a pair of 8a's.

Chuck

post script....Thiel has been great with support for both speakers and I've basically had a 17 year relationship with the company. Warranty repairs on the CS2s went well. Questions over the years have all been answered within 48 hours. Excellent support AFTER the sale is the phrase that comes to mind. Hales, Avalon and Alon are three other brands you might check out too.

Not only a step up, IMO, it is one of the best speakers out there for the money. Search the threads, you will find many opinions, mostly positive. The only caveats is that (1) your source components will make or break the Thiels and (2) all the action happens between the speakers. They do not throw an image outside the speakers, so you will need about 9 feet between them and in front of them for proper imaging and soundstage. From my experience, they lose a lot when spaced closer than 8 feet together and within 3 feet of the side and back walls. They definitely need breathing room.

Other than that - their design hasn't changed in ten years, are built like a tank, and will last a good long time with Thiel's support. When I purchased mine, I was looking between them and the Avalon Radian HC (fifteen grand difference!). I still have mine and will never get rid of them; I let some good pieces go only to want them again but are now hard to find. These stay.

I love mine too, I'm using cj prem 14 with nos tubes, classe amp, meridian front end - all on the softer side of neutral. Over the past year I have upgraded cables to MIT 350 ref and evo ic's and most recently Oracle V3 speaker cables and they made a gigantic difference from top to bottom. Good advice above - they need spacing and room to breath on the sides to make them truely transparent and non-boxey sounding which I think is the best attribute of the 3.6's.