Sound Lab vs Magnepan 20.7

Yep, the mating of an ESL panel and a cone woofer is definitely the Achilles heal of hybrids. Sanders uses a transmission line loading of the woofer, which is a good sign. I didn't hear a problem in the transition area, but show conditions don't allow for extended listening. I myself use Open Baffle Dipole woofers (GR Research/Rythmik) with my planars, really the best choice with panels. The 175Kz x/o of the Sanders allows for substituting subs of your own choosing if you wish. While $20,000 isn't chicken feed, it's a lot less than Wilsons/Vandersteen 7's/etc., and includes Sanders' power amps.

Not intentionally trying to go off topic, but given the OP's comment about transparency, as an ESL owner, I was wondering if someone can talk about experiencing loss of transparency with ESLs due to their use of transformers.

Roger Modjeski (Music Reference) is making an ESL speaker with a direct coupled tube power amp. He claims a substantial increase in transparency in comparison to a transformer coupled version.

Clio09, you should know by now that getting rid of the transformer gets you greater transparency :)

However direct-driving ESLs has its own set of problems- chief amongst them is how the amplifier can be safely connected to the speaker such that it does not represent a danger to the user. This usually means the amp is built into the speaker, and *that* usually means if you want to upgrade to a better speaker or more powerful amp, you have to start over...

True Ralph, but most serious junkies use a specific amp with a specific speaker anyway. Change one and you most likely will have to change the other. When an engineer designs a speaker/amplifier combination, he can tailor each to the other.