I'm really enjoying this long thread guys. Thanks for letting it meander a bit.
I just read about 'why' Vandersteen subs. Being a Vandersteen owner (I still love other speakers too and have owned more than a few, but rarely change my main speakers (average over 15 yrs of owning my main speakers since 1969 before moving on).
Vandy subs are special in the way they mate with the main amps. You don't ever lose the 'voice' of your main amps. If you are using an NAD integrated amp, your sub will morph into the NAD sound. If you are using the largest 70k amp, it will do the same thing. You don't lose that house sound that you paid so much money for. I never understood buying a sub and the amp doesn't match the main system. It may seem small, but as you move up in a system you certainly hear the difference.
The room correction is done in the analog domain too. I have yet to hear anything done in the digital domain that you don't hear. I've heard some exotic gear that uses DSP etc.. and It's never sounded as good to my ear than analog. I do miss the ease of using the digital for correction, but I still can hear it. Just my two cents and the Sub 3 is an affordable sub by most accounts. Their Sub 9 is the best sub I've ever heard and I've heard it in a couple of systems that weren't Vandersteen speakers.
IRT cables back in the day, I too owned the original Monster cables, but only AFTER I was using the Polk speaker cables. They were my first. I owned Polk 10's which were an amazing speaker back in the day and their speaker cable made a positive difference (Moscode and Roberson amps with a Conrad Johnson preamp and Rotel turntable with a top Grade cartridge as well as the top AT cart).
Bruce Brisson (started MIT) was the brains behind the original Monster stuff. It was as good as anything on the market in the beginning for many reasons (little competition). Noel Lee who owned it was like Mark Levinson. Both men are sales men. They knew what branding meant, before folks in audio even thought about branding per say (my ex is/was?? Mark's lawyer so I do have a spec of insight). Colangilo was the engineer behind Levinson as most know. I any case, when Bruce had his issues with Noel, he left to start MIT. That's when I met Bruce and started using his top cables at teh time (the MH 770 wire used for the Spectral gear, not the 750 wire used on the majority of his top cables. I also used the top 350 shotgun interconnects. He tuned the cables for my Quicksilver tube gear and it sounded better than the Kimber I was using. When he and Karen Sumner has their split and she started Transparent, I used both of them, but the MIT sounded better in my system. I think part of that was because my Quick preamp and monos were rewired with MIT's wire. When we (dealer and Bruce) did the rewire (brand new units) it made a HUGE difference. I never expected that type of difference. Then they tube rolled and upgraded the sockets to ceramic and then upgraded the caps to the Supercaps or whatever the top ones at the time was and it kept getting better adn better.
I know this is too long and im' sorry, but the point is that wire/cable changes teh sound, but not always for the best. It's why we see so much cable on the used market. I now only use AQ cables. I have had much of the uber expensive ones in and out of the system and the AQ cables constantly perform more neutral in my system than the others. If I wanted to tune my system, I'd just purchase different components. I want what I paid for. Again, just my opinion and it takes nothing away from others. (using AQ Niagara 3000 with Dragon power cord into the AQ Edison outlet on dedicated, separate earth ground, Hurricane power cords for everything else, including the subs on the Vandersteen Quatro's, balance Fire interconnect from analog out of The Memory Player server/streamer/dac (bespoke) to Vandersteen MH5-HPA amps, William Tell Silver true bi wire with the Zero and Bass cables).
I've been learning a bit on the Vandersteen forums (we have some Thiel lovers there too :) ) on peoples preferences for true time domain and phase correct speakers and how you need proper cables that are capable of delivering all that you paid for from your designer. Hope all are well. Pete
