ProAC 2.5 users please share experience on amp

Hi,Gunbei

Currently, SLI-80 is doing well with small scale music: like solo cello, violine, string quartet. The sound is charm and muscial~~ (which is much better than my old CAV50
at this point)

however, for the large scale music, symphonie, opera, the thing is totally changed. The sound is no any layer and
the soundstage is a bit flat. even the sound of violins now become very bad~, seems totally messed up. Overall , i can not keep listening to these type of music for 5 minutes and want to leave~~.

By the way, when I hook the Cary SLP80 to spendor, the sound is warmer, darker than what my CAV50 did.

Tom and Golden ear, there is no glare at all when I listened to solo violin and string quarte. however, the sound of violins in the symphonie is not so pleasure and i am not sure if it is what "glare" you are talking about~~...it would not hurt your ear anyway

Thanks for the inputs and welcome for more discussions

Derick, it sounds like you're experiencing the bad sounding violins when the music becomes louder and more complex. Solo instruments or chamber music settings are more forgiving, but when you get 10 or more violins going full bore, things can get strident.

This is something I exprienced a few years ago when I first started the hobby. I don't have a real explanation for how I was able to overcome much of this. Better equipment? Adding tubes to the system? But I know I've seen this mentioned in the forums before, so maybe a more experienced person can comment on this.

I currently own both the ProAc 2.5s and the 1SC. The ProAc 1SCs tweeters are anything but hard and glary. I like a warm sounding speaker and after much auditioning settled on these. I also had a pair of Totem 1s which were very good and much brighter than the1SC (at lease in my room), in a head to head match up the 1SC sounded better so the Totems after holding the spot in my system were sold. Matching a tube preamp with a SS power amp seems to work best in my system and with many others using the 2.5s or 1SCs. I use an Pass Aleph 3 with a VTL 2.5 preamp with the 2.5s with excellent results in a modest size room. In any event both a great speakers, I find the 2.5 similar to the 1SCs but with much better bass and a fuller sound. Just a note good stand are essential with the 1SCs.

Gjrad

Pass Lab alph 3 has only 30W/channel, you think it will drive 2.5 well? What type of music you mostly listen to?

As Gunbei said, the problem I experienced now is the difficluty to let proAC/cary present the complex music (like symphonie). I don't need kick bass, but just need a well balanced, positioned,layered sound which is some kind
of missing in my current combination.

Any suggestion?

Derick,

The Aleph 3 is great sounding amp. I borrowed one from Viggen a couple summers ago and really loved the way it did guitars. Better than any amp I've had in my system. The Aleph 3's soundstage was deeper than the other amps I tried, but I felt the width was constrained to the speakers. The BAT VK200 on the other hand threw a soundstage that easily extended outside the speakers.

It was really difficult for me to choose between the BAT and the Aleph, but what tipped the contest in favor of the VK200 was Aleph 3's low input impedance of 23Kohms. My Blue Circle BC21 had a hard time driving it, and when I wanted to crank it there wasn't enough juice.

Careful preamp matching is a must with this amp. It seems Gjrad's VTL works well with it. I've also read that many people like the solid state Aleph L or Aleph P with it. I know I've read other threads about tube preamps that matched well with it, but I can't remember them.