tips for Vandersteen 3A sig

Hi Flying; I also have 3Asigs-- great speakers IMO. I haven't tried a sub in my 14 X22' room, but I have done quite a bit of room treatment and some vibration control of components-- all to good effect. I use five 11" ASC tube traps, one in each corner and three centered between the speakers and up against the wall. I also use three ASC floor standing panel traps to control wall reflections. My 3As are 4 1/2 ft. from the wall behind, and about three ft. from side walls. I think the combination of good speaker placement (I used the Vand. manual), and room treatment has given me very good bass-- tight and articulate. I don't think the 3As are the quickest speakers around, but bass is solid, satisfying, and rhythmic in my room. I use Townshend Seismic Sinks under my tube pre-amp and its power supply-- this tightened up the bass some more, and also cleaned up the midrange. I also think that the amp/speaker combination is really important, and I use a McCormack DNA-2DX, which has excellent bass-- quick, and tight (well as quick as the 3As allow). Happy Listening. Craig.

You could hardly do better than to add one (ideally two) of the Vandersteen 2WQ subwoofers to your system; perfectly matched, phase coherent full range sound, and the functional equivalent of the Vandersteen Model 5, for thousands less. You will get cleaner, faster, deeper sound, and minimize room problems and standing waves in the bass at the same time. These are crossed over at 80 hz, and when the main speakers no longer have to reproduce below 80hz, that's where you get cleaner and faster, with an amazing ease to the sound, and lowered distortion overall. The increase in dynamic range will be very very satisfying as well. IMO, there is nothing else that you can do that will improve a system so much as adding a good sub, and Vandersteen makes one of the best for music. If you want a fatter base for HT, you can adjust the "q" of the subwoofer to taste; you just can't lose with the 2Wq. Good luck

Gasman; even though I didn't start this thread, your post was of great interest to me because I have 3As but no subs, and have actually been considering Vand. 5s. But you make the 3As with subs sound very attractive, ie another option. Thanks. Craig

Thanks Garfish and Gasman. Actually, I had a chance to talk to Richard Vandersteen. He says having 3A sig + 2w's would be 70-80% performance of Vand 5. Reason: Vand 5 is much more "inert" Looking at the sub option...you also have to buy quality wires and cross over. This would cost over $3000.00. Now I am really confused, should I do the subs, or save a little longer to move to Vand 5's ? That is the question.

When I had 3aSigs, I found the following made significant differences:

1) Using a McCormack DNA amp with them really brought out their way powerful bass & helped alleviate some of the slowness.

2) Using biwire speaker cables made a big difference.

3) Following the setup instructions to a T. Use the room mode calculations provided & the forward/rear tip-in charts for listening heights. It seems all vandersteens are sensitive to proper setup/tweeking.