I have owned the 888’s for awhile. I drive them with mac tubes.
They are above average in my opinion and a decent deal. The vocals and midrange sound truncated and at times break up even at moderate volumes.
Hmmm, guy who lives near my house has been rocking out with the 888s @100db at least with some big ol’ Levinson amps i sold to him....no "truncation" or whatever ever happened when i heard it.
Erin’s audio corner who has them now apparently cranked it to high heaven on his review as well.... and didn’t hear any "truncation"!!??
Seems to me like you are clipping/ doing something terrible to it with your "mac tubes"/ front end electronics ( and blaming it on the speaker instead).
Get a Schiit Wotan amp or Tyr monoblocks and a Kara preamp with Schiit’s "forkbeard" module/accessory. It will let you live monitor your power state, headroom, etc as you crank the music up and down...i.e., get a good front end dude. The guy who designed those speakers gave you a lot of speaker for minimal cost (didn’t rob you like the rest of them), so you can buy a decent front end.