Musician vs. audiophile

We need direction here. My wife, a musician and says my Sophia 3s, powered by BAT 3VK IX tube pre amp and 250w solid state amp sounds flat compared to a freaking Best Buy box store McIntosh/Martin Logan setup... I can't honestly disagree, specifically when our rig is at low volume. It lacks color and punch, even with 2ea. JL 12" subs... Help me with your recommendation, please!!!

 

@OP Repeter
if you live in an area of the US that is at least 15 degrees Celsius at night (right now); I am willing to come there and fix your problem for free, ......but you will need to cover my flight, room and board, and .........."Misc" expenses. 8^0
fwiw -
you need to live south of Nashville. I got invited by my daughter to go listen to country music on New Years Eve. Her fav Keith Urban + others. I checked the weather and (minus) -3 degrees C - no thank u.

Hi All, Well... I appreciate everyone's input, from family counseling to power at my 110v outlets!  I'll take a first crack at delivering technical info so questions are answered;  The Power amp is a solid state VK-250, fed by a VK-3IX with Sovtek tubes and no Bat Pak. Cabling from pre to power amp would be Nordost.  Could these long (2 meter) flat silver (Ag) play into flat/dull performance at low volume?  FYI, I used them to drive my Sophia 3s and Geoff Poor (BAT) recommended the massively improved Audioquest CV-8s.  So.. Could driving my power amp with these be a weakness?  Onward, The speakers are in a decent location each spaced 1 meter away from side walls and 3 meters from a irregular back wall, room in front of them is large and very broken up.  I've dialed in the angle and distances.  When listening anywhere near a central listening perspective and moderately high volume (above 20 on power amp) the presence,sound stage and fidelity is amazing, however, no
punch and bass thickness without the JL's involved.  Thanks for now all, I'll be studying input with more detail and return with specific responses to valued posts.  Happy New Year

Hi crazyeddie,
 I replied to czarivey earlier in this thread that there had to be some musicians out there who happily owned Wilson speakers (law of averages). Thanks for the confirmation 😊
Charles 

charles1dad
Hi crazyeddie,
I replied to czarivey earlier in this thread that there had to be some musicians out there who happily owned Wilson speakers (law of averages).

Musicians own Wilsons? Whoa! That pretty much proves my whole point!

Just kidding 😬

I have a friend who studied music in University and composes classical pieces.  When he hears a classical piece of music, he appreciates how it was composed, the methods used by the composer in writing this piece. When I talk about HiFi he covers his ears, when I explained about PRAT he thought I was utterly mad.  We both like music also classical music, if I like a particular piece of music its purely from the music, if he likes the same piece of music, its because of the music and how it was written. He is not so concerned how the music is presented (HiFi) but much more interested as to the music itself and how it was composed.  Often he would say 'notice how the composer expanded on that one note or theme'  I sometimes think about famous musicians of all genres, apart from the recording equipment used in studios do they posses HiFi at home. Does Paul McCartney have a state of the art Ayre system at home or does Mick Jagger have a Naim statement at home or are musicians not so bothered about HiFi...?