What is wrong with my system?

nice stuff, so investigate, patiently, before spending any real money.

my first instinct is to buy all common in-expensive cables, lamp cord for the speakers, change them all. listen, clues?
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no significant difference, it’s the speakers and/or the preamp.

add sub(s), or change preamp?

bring in some other speakers you can borrow or return, see how they compare?

buy a pair of inexpensive Rockville subs you can easily return, just to learn something? two, not over-sized, a ’stereo pair’ of front facing subs adjacent to the mains.
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difference from cables change: then put the cables back one set at a time,

speakers only: differences?

preamp to amp?

primaty source to preamp?

as soon as you hear something you know is non-imaginary, better or worse:

before proceeding, leave that change and go backwards, reverting to in-expensive cable, IOW, just that change, or a change due to the last one and any prior.

I’m exhausted thinking about it.

You will prove things about the cables as you go.

Hello,
I would try some new power cables. I would want a pretty good gauge for your preamp. I like 14awg-12awg. On your amp get 12awg -10awg. You have some hungry equipment but I don’t know what you are feeding it. Their are some great suggestion for preamps on this thread. PS Audio BHK is another great one. It also adds some tubes to the mix. Sometimes we think we should throw Silver cables at everything. If you did this maybe go back to some really good copper cables. I added a silver power cable, speaker jumpers and speaker cables to my system and it got a little too bright. I am just demoing these but now I will pull back each of these one at a time to see if I can find with the sweet spot. I had really good sound. Now I am looking for as close to perfection as possible. Power cables can help a lot with this. Also, IsoAcoustic or Townshend isolation gear. Seriously, next level sound. It doesn’t matter what gear or speakers you have this isolation gear takes your system to a new level. I hope this helps. 

Hello,
Add  JL Audio CR1 crossover and a pair of subs. I use a pair JL Audio F110 subs. It’s not about adding bass. It’s about controlling the bass and dialing it to the room. If you are in the Chicagoland area this store lets you try things in your home before you buy:
https://holmaudio.com/
Your gear is really good. Better than mine is right now. I think this can be solved with cables, isolation, and a subwoofer system. I hope this helped. 

Guys GIVE UP.

The OP is not interested, not one post, I even sent him a PM asking my question on the 7th post, no response at all. Let it die.


Cheers George

Others have already mentioned this but if that were my system the first thing I would do is try a tube preamp, see how that sounds and go from there.