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***Going Insane***End Game Speakers***Harbeth Verity or Living Voice***

Had been enjoying the LSA Monitor 1’s driven by the wonderful little Quad VA-One tube amp for the last 6 months when a nice Christmas Bonus was turned into a gently used pair of Fritz Carbon 7SE’s just this week...Within 24 hours of setting them up I hit the slots for a neat chunk o change and if I moved the Carbon 7’s out I could afford either the Harbeth M30.2 Anniversary or the Living Voice Avatar R3 or a pair of Demo Verity Audio Finn’s...No way to demo either the Verity or the Living Voice...Amp likely will not change as I REALLY love the sound the little Quad amp makes so it’s 15wpc. would be absolute minimum power on the Harbeths,not to bad into the 8ohm/91 db.Finns & would probably rock the Living Voice at 94db.sensitivity..If I ever do change amps it would be for a SimAudio Moon 240i...
Room size is apx.12’x14’x8’,well treated and I value an organic,natural sound with good timbre,soundstaging & imaging..What do you guys think?
freediver
dodgealum's avatar
dodgealum
1,404 posts
 
In my experience, your amp will not have enough drive for the Harbeth's. See if you can find a used pair of Daedalus Audio speakers--maybe the Athena or call Lou and see what he can do on a pair of Muse Studio's. Either will rival the 30.1 in the midrange and better them elsewhere AND they will love your 20 watt Quad. 
audiotroy's avatar
audiotroy
3,779 posts
 
freediver, we sell the little Quad amp and it is really fantastic howerver, you will definatly have some problems pushing less efficient speakers, however with that said the room size if pretty small and if you are close to the speakers you should be able to get to a decent volume level.

The Harbeths are a safe bet as they are very musical, the Living Voice speakers are very efficient we have heard them at shows and they didn't impress us. 

Verity speakers are excellent they image very well and are very well balanced they will sound in our opinion the best with the little Quad amp which may make the sound a bit too tubey with the Harbeths. 

Hope this helps.


Dave and Troy
Audio Doctor NJ
akg_ca's avatar
akg_ca
2,237 posts
 
I auditioned the LIVING VOICE AVATARS at a dealer

They were driven by CROFT separates [tubes], a  DENSEN cdp, and cabled with an all top LFD cable array.

Lovely..... engaging ......full stop.

caution ...... the LVAs are finicky and perform at their best with a careful matching of associated equipment.


(1) The CROFT, DENSEN and LFD were a very significant step up upstream with a large multiple step up in both cost and build with an implied performance upgrade in lockstep, when compared to your QUAD

(2) I wouldn’t get influenced by their higher efficiency alone.

(3) If you can’t audition them personally then it’s a BIG roll of the dice (emphasis added ) with your current QUAD and your unspecified source and listening room acoustic warts.
FWIW .... I would not buy them blind .
tpreaves's avatar
tpreaves
2,686 posts
 
Enjoy what you have and invest your windfall for the future.
sbank's avatar
sbank
3,378 posts
 
"End Game" and "can't audition" don't belong in the post, especially if your are tied to a 15w amp. If you change the equation to "best guess" and "for a while or longer" then you are in a different situation. If you can't audition, buy used so you can think of it as an extended home demo, with option to flip at minimal loss if you decide to.

Speaker and amp pairings are critical, with 15w I wouldn't suggest risking it on anything tougher to drive than near 8ohms across the spectrum and >93db sensitivity. I agree, although the Harbeths are lovely, your amp is not a good match. Cheers,
Spencer
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