Why are these speakers so bright but others not?

Hello,

It looks like your system is a bit bottom heavy....in this I mean that you have focused much attention on the speakers and yet a major upgrade to your phono or CD setups and perhaps even more so, the preamp, would bring far more refinements than trying $4k+ speakers in your system.

I heard the AI Mod 3 years ago and it was not bright at all. In fact, it was a bit too laid back for me compared to the ARC LS5, CJ Premier10, Sonic Frontier SFL2 and CAT preamps I auditioned at the time. I would think the AI is a good fit if your system is typically on the bright side. But the AI is also a subtractive product when it comes to resolution.

Another link in your system that is key is the preamp to amp cable. Something like a Cardas Golden Cross could do wonders for you to bring on more warmth and remove some of the edgy brightness and fatigue.

I understand how Magnepans would be considered bright in many systems. I have always needed to use at least a 1 ohm resistor in the tweeter attentuator for the 3.3s and/or 3.5s and my system was not bright at all. My guess is that Magnepan designed this to have their speakers work in a wide variety of systems. If you still have the 3.6s, you should try 1, 2 and 3 ohm resistors at the attenuator terminals. I use BAT 31SE, AesthetixIo, Manley DAC and Wolcott electronics....none of which are bright at all and yet I use 3 ohm attenuators.

My room is nearly identical to yours so I have the same placement limitations. The 3.5s work incredibly well now that I have focused much attention to upstream components.

From what you have written here, you should check out a great deal on a pair of Vendersteen 2 sigs or the 3A. Each of these are much less than the other speakers you have tried and the extra money spent in other areas would be of far greater benefit. But I think speakers like the Maggies will reveal much of the other "problems" upstream.

Hope I have given you some ideas to consider.

John

Rob: Which Auralex product did you buy for treatment in which areas? What was the price? I know I need to do something. I only have these blackout blinds on one window (fortunately, the one where first reflection point would be) and I can tell a difference with that shade down and only listen with that shade down, but it's no doubt pretty wimpy compared to real acoustic treatment. This is a new room/house for me and I know I have a long way to go down this path for sure.

John: the CD player and the speakers are the updates so far to my 10yr old system. Amp, preamp, and phono would be next. I figured speaker upgrade followed by amp to make sure I have a synergistic match there (OCM was originally bought to go with the PSBs) (I guess this is a bit of a what-order-do-I-upgrade-my-components thread). I definitely wouldn't expect the AI to be causing the brightness (resolution loss is a concern too), but more immediately have been wondering about the amp (have heard in some cases OCM is good bass amp but rough on top end, but I have nothing to compare with at the moment), hence my plans to at least swap to try it out.

Where do I pick up 1-3 ohm attenuators? I'm new to Maggies. I also forgot to mention that to audition the Maggies, I had to borrow some Monster M2.2 speaker cable with bananas since my sigma retro gold has spades and I didn't have spade/banana adapters on hand to audition that way. maybe that was part of the problem there, but I should be able to do a little bit more of an apples to apples comparison with bananas on sigma soon.

I actually had recently toyed with the idea of Vandy 3s (10 years ago, I wish I had gone that route rather than the PSBs). To be frank, I had very good deals on the MLs and Maggies - too good to pass up so it's definitely been worth my trouble to go this route.

Donato,

You can get 10w 1-ohm power resistors at any electronics supply shop or RadioShack. You might even find 2-ohm and 3-ohm resistors. If you can only find 1-ohm resistors, you can always solder 2 in series to have 2 ohms, 3 in series to have 3 ohms, etc. This is not an "audiophile pure technique" here, but it will tame the top end to bring the Maggie sound to a natural state. Start with 1 ohm and go from there until the tonal balance is to your liking. And because these resistors have thick leads, you can bend the leads 1-2 times and just insert these into the attentuator terminals locking them tighly with the hex screws. This process has worked well for me for many years so I have not bothered to find audiophile grade power resistors here.

Concerning speaker cables, this is one area I have tried many different models/brands, and still I have yet to hear significant improvements from swapping like I do in other links of the system. Perhaps with the latest changes in my system, I should try this once again. But my gut feeling is that the Monster cable will be just fine to compare the speakers you have. But of course try to use the same cables. You can get Monster Xterminators which are a double banana with spade lugs on the end. Again, RadioShack has virtually the same product which I think is $4-5. Pickup a couple of these so you can use your spaded speaker cables. Try this and if things start to go in the right direction, then at least with the Maggies, you will be ready to consider an amp upgrade. But first, I still suggest that you borrow a Cardas Golden Cross interconnect and use this between the ModAI and your amp. This will be a huge change in tonality for you.

I find the hybrid Counterpoint NPS400 to be the best value before you pay a lot for Wolcott and VTL amps. High power ARC amps are just too expensive and anything under 200w is simply not going to work with Maggie 3 series speakers. After hearing tube amps with Maggies, there's no going back to solid state. However, I have not heard Plinius nor Pass nor Rowlands which many users claim to have tube-like qualities. But all of these are so expensive too. Just be prepared to pay a lot for an amp if you fall for the Maggies. Somehow I still think Vandys would be a good solution here.

John

John, thanks for the helpful info. I picked up some Xterminators at work and biwired using the Sigma Retro Gold. I TAKE BACK WHAT I SAID ABOUT THE BRIGHTNESS! Even without playing around with placement, they sound good. I think it was due to my not making sure all the bananas were screwed in tight with those little hex screws where the bananas go in (Doh! Maggie rookie move on my part. Never had to futz with bananas much before). Mid bass seems much more prominent than with the Odysseys. A bit of sibilance still, but the Xterminator connectors are undoubtedly a compromised connection in comparison to hardwired and my room is not treated. I can see that these would likely be more finicky about room the placement than the MLs appear to be (although I haven't found optimal positions for either) and in their current placement, they sound constrained, like they're begging for more room to breath.

Now for another question: I get plenty of volume out of my CD player connected through AUX port on the AI Mod 3 (AUX port avoids the resistor in the signal path on the CD port), but definitely seemed to hit the ceiling with my DVD player connected to the DAT port. I'm not sure if this is a I-don't-have-enough-power-for-the-Maggies issue (my OCM supposedly is 225W at 8 and almost double that I believe at 4 ohms) or it's some funky gain issue with the DVD player and the preamp. My Arcam puts out a higher than average 2.3V or so.

i would experiment with the following:

the tubes in the audible illusions
change the ic and speaker cable ( i would suggest cardas neutral speaker cable, they will let you know exactly what is happening upstream)
change out the amp ( can sound bright and a little edgy).

your speakers are very revealing and when you have the right combo, you will know it.

good luck,

mike