Gallo 3.1 sounds slow and veiled...why?

I did do a comparison of the gallo's when I auditioned them with the top of the line Quad ESLs, which cost 4 times as much.

They were slow and veiled I suppose in comparison, but many speakers are.

Maybe a good SET amp can fill the bill if lifelike SPLs and a larger room is not in the equation.

I landed on my newer OHM 5s which ended up costing me about the same as the Gallos with sale price and trade-ins using refurbed cabinets.

I pulled the Gallos out into the room and I gave the Unico a day to warm up....it sounds better...especially on treble heavy music like harp (Vollenweider)...the spacial effects gave me goose bumps but the system still sounds veiled in comparison to the Paradigms. I should note that both systems sound a bit thin in my room which is why I was experimenting with speakers to begin with. I don't think the Unico is under powered. It's 80 Watts of high current output and pushed my Monitor Audio GR20 to earth moving levels. I do have one tube (in the pre stage) that is kicking in and out but...don't see how that could cause the problem. One thing I should note...these were dealer demos and have less than 100 hours on them . I understand they take a long time to break in...maybe they will open up. I had planned to sell the Paradigms but I'm going to hold on until I'm satisfied the Gallos will outperform them. I should note the review by Arvind on the 3.1 in TNT audio. He drew the same conclusion as me (so far)...even with a broken in pair; brilliant treble but lack luster mid and bass compared to some others.

Good point about the break-in, Templetech. This is the gruesome
period of Gallo ownership. If I hadn't been forewarned about how bad
they sound during the first 100 hours or so, I would have given up on
mine.

But I wouldn't ignore that tube problem. It can't be helping.

YEs, thanks. I did intend to mention to take break in time into account before passing any final judgement. It may all work out in the end once the system and your ears adjust.

I can't speak to the Paradigm Active 40's but I had Gallos for several years. One of the last amps I used with mine was a Unico Secondo and it was a great match for these speakers so I don't think it is the amp. In fact I liked it better than any other amp I used with the speakers. I had all Acoustic Zen cables when I bought the Gallos. I also had a heavily modded jolida 502b which is 60 watts and I thought it was a bad match too, maybe not enough power. So I started trading amps. A McIntosh 6900, a wyred4sound ST500, Clayton S40, the Unico, and finally ayon Spirit II back to 60 watts a channel and tubes. Somewhere along the way I tried a few other speaker cables including Kimber 8TC which were a better match than the AZ. I ended up with Morrow audio cables. If this had been my first system change I might not have had to go through all those amps. I would try some Morrow cables before anything else. They really opened my system up with the gallos. YMMV. I think you also need at least 400 hours to get them to open up. Good luck.