Road trip to demo $10,000 speakers

Skyscraper i apologize for the late reply. To answer your question about how I made difficult speakers sound good well I kept bringing in different components and cables. most amps built to a price which at the time was nad, adcom, nak, B&K, all sounded pretty much alike and I could hear a run of nordost wire sounded a little different than my kimber 4tc, but I really didn’t think it was better! way back in the 90’s it wasn’t until I stepped up my game and drove my kef’s with a krell and bi amped did those speakers sound good, But here’s the thing, I demoed those speakers on a HK receiver and they were amazing because that room was dead acoustically. There’s the camp that claims ’all amps sound the same’ and for casual listening with unfamiliar gear that’s probably true, but I found a relative bargain in amplification when I brought home the hegel h360 $6000 to drive my $22,000 speakers and when you’re listening at home you will need an amp that compliments your speakers and a good b&m dealer can help you there

@skyscraper, if you're going to do Gifted Listener, Deja Vu, Evolution Audio and Command Performance, you'll definitely need to overnight somewhere in the area.  With those four, you get Vienna Acoustics, Vandersteen, Magnepan, Linn, Audio Note, Harbeth, ProAc, Aerial Acoustics, Dynaudio, Focal, Devote, Neat, Magico, and probably others.  That takes time.  Throw in IQ Home Entertainment, and you get a couple more.

Inna. I will take you advice to keep within my budget. This money's coming straight out of my life savings so I have to limit myself. There will be no extra $1000 spent. Thanks

Tomic60, I'll keep your list of integrated amp recommendations for further research. I'll have to take a breather for a while after getting the speakers, before purchasing anything else. My new VPI turntable and now speakers is plenty enough to accomplish in one year without being irresponsible. If I win the lottery that will change immediately.

Steve, thanks for relating your story. I was really wanting to hear back from you because I seriously do not want to replicate your dilemma. I'm glad you finally found your solution. I'll look up whether the Hegel amps are still in production, and if so include them in my next round of research. 

Twoleftears, those locations are exactly my planned stops. I'm going to plan out my route tonight, find a hotel online, and call up each location I haven't yet, to make sure they have suitable equipment and the correct model speakers set up for demoing. You've obviously made the rounds up there. I was thinking about swinging by Richmond on the way home to check out Audio Art. But that's out of the way and probably overkill unless I'm having too much fun. 

Our local dealer in Roanoke, Audiotronics, informed my he  is carrying Monitor Audio now and can set up a demo of their  PL200 II, so maybe I'll check that out. He's looking to carry Focals as well, so maybe we're moving into audio high end territory down here in the boonies. Thanks again

@skyscraper I've never been to Audio Art, but I exchanged emails a while back.  He runs his operation out of his house, and I got the impression that, obviously, he could only stock a fairly limited number of items.

Audio Exchange is the one real store I'm aware of.  Sonus Faber, Paradigm Personas, B&W, some other brands.  Depends on how much time you have and how many miles you want to drive.

Boonies...  All relative.  Where I live the one real store dedicated to audio went over to the dark side a year ago=now doing only custom home theatre install.

Twoleftears, good call. It is Audio Exchange on West Broad St. I was thinking of, not Audio Art. As far as the "boonies go, my next door neighbors are cows, so I'm feeling this locale qualifies for that appellation. I love the countryside though, and wouldn't leave it for the world. I left the New York City suburbs as soon as I hit adulthood, and never looked back. At times like this though, when looking for audio equipment, I do miss the trappings of civilization . 

Mike