Not Thrilled with Vandersteen 2CE Sigs - where is the first place to work on?

I had 2ce with McCormack 0.5 amp and tube preamp. Did the setup according to the Vandersteen manual and talked with John Rutan (thanks John!). Ultimately, to me they were more veiled on the top end than I cared for. Sold them extremely cheaply to help out a young audiophile friend just out of college and he loves them to this day.

I would recommend you take tomic601 up on his offer and pm him. He seems very knowledgeable and a great guy also. 

 I think we could be dealing with two different potential situations here 1) It is not possible to have significant problems in a system and have some recordings sound great especially when they are known great recordings. You could change some of the components in the system and improve the sound but the fact that some great recordings sound great is meaningful. 2) you could be chasing recording quality and the only way to deal with that is to use tone controls on the recordings that need them or dumb the whole system down to the point that everything sound OK by trying a speaker with many drivers that smear themselves, a dip in the mid range, plenty tweeter(s) and up in the bass that play loud as for some audio enthusiasts enough volume cures all. I would sort this out before spending any more money because even though several hundred thousand of these speakers have been sold they are not for everybody. If you decide to keep the 2Ce Sig’s I can help you get the most out of them cost effectively.

 Best, JohnnyR

I had 2CI’s for over 20 years and loved them. A friend sold me his 2CE’s Signature for an extremely cheap price. Replaced the 2CI with the 2CE in the exact same spots, sounded like s**t. Figured it couldn’t be the speakers so replaced all system components right down to all the cables, plus experimented with different positioning. They still sounded like s**t. Stopped listening to system for 6 months. After 6 months, tried it again and still hated them. Stupidly, I gave away the 2CI to a fellow Audiogoner for free and ended up selling the 2CE. For whatever reason, they did not sound good in my system.

I was using a 175wpc Classe’ amp and an AI Modulus 3A pre, VPI HW19mk II turntable, Pioneer PD65 CD Player, AudioQuest cables and speaker wire.  I bought Von Schweikert VR33 speakers which were an even bigger disaster.  

OP’s equipment isn’t up to the task imo. Old, un-revealing gear. 

Tomic knows Vandersteens! tomic601

I had 2CEs for many years (formerly driven by a McCormack DNA-1 deluxe amp and passive linestage) and loved them so much I replaced them with the newest version, the 2CE Sig III. I have heard many great speakers in my 30+ years of hi-fi at shows and dealers, but nothing comes close in terms of value for the dollar, imo. I would have the Treo CT or Quatro CT if I could afford them. But I love the "Vandersteen sound." So do reviewers... the Treo CT is also on AbSound’s "50 Greatest Bargains" list, and there are numerous other glowing reviews. I’ve listened to other touted speakers which had a lot of snap and sizzle initially, but became very fatiguing fairly quickly. I’ve auditioned the highly regarded top $15K Harbeths, and yes they are good, but not even twice as good at my Vandy 2s, much less 5X better. I’d say 15% better, but that’s subjective. I would have multiple systems if I could afford it, with Maggies, maybe Harbeths, maybe Alumines or KEF Blades, or, or, or ...? Chasing perfection can be exhausting and very expensive, and all I really want to do is enjoy the music.

The Vandersteen 2, like many speakers, rewards you with the quality of your upstream gear ("Running an NAD C272 at 150WPC and an original 1979 APT Holman Pre Amp" isn’t going to yield the best results). My dealer says they have paired the 2CE Sig III with $40K of Audio Research gear and they rose to the occasion and sounded great. Their opinion is that the newest 2CE is better than the Vandersteen 3A Signature.

You WILL be rewarded by upgrading your amp/preamp/sources. CAREFUL setup and speaker placement is important too (not too close to the wall!). I follow the Vandersteen owner manual setup guide and fine-tune. My current room is 12x15 with speakers on the long wall and an 8’ throw to my ears and it works. I have had them in a bigger room (and may again) and that worked too.

I have a modest system, but am very happy with the results. Odyssey Audio Khartago/Kismet amp, Audio Alchemy DAC/preamp, Rega Apollo II CD player, and streaming Tidal/Roon via a Small Green Computer server/streamer. Good but not over the top cabling, but BI-WIRED as Richard V recommends. I have an AQ Dragonfly Cobalt too, for playback from the laptop and phone and it sounds good, but not as good as the rack DAC.

System synergy is so important, and why I don’t make major changes in my system often. I am sure I could find speakers I like as well or even better than my Vandys, at 2-5 times the price, but it may require changing amps and preamps etc. As we know, to solve an equation you use one variable at a time and in hifi those variables can get expensive. I would suggest visiting a great Vandersteen dealer and listening to a well set up system and you may be pleasantly surprised.

50 Greatest Bargains in High-End Audio (Absolute Sound)
https://www.theabsolutesound.com/articles/50-greatest-bargains-in-high-end-audio-3

MID-PRICED

Bowers & Wilkins 705 S2 loudspeaker, $2500
Monitor Audio Silver 300 loudspeaker, $1999
>>> Vandersteen Audio Model 2Ce Signature III loudspeaker, $3279
REL Acoustics T/7i subwoofer, $999
NAD M10 BluOS streaming amplifier, $2749
Schiit Audio Yggdrasil DAC, $2449
MoFi Electronics UltraDeck+ turntable with UltraTracker cartridge, $1999
Hana SL phono cartridge, $750

FWIW