Lloydelee21, Jman, Egidius...thanks for responding. As for what seems missing in the sound to wifey and I, of course there is the "small speaker" factor as we are used to floor-standers with 12-inch woofers, but that's to be expected. I don't mean to offend, but I'm at a loss of words to for this. The overall sound quality to us sounds "smooth" and "refined" in a way that seems maybe suitable for well-dressed lounge lizards sipping fancy cocktails and discussing the outcome of a polo game, rather than "real" in a way that would appeal to people like us who often travel rough and listen to a wide range of music from around the world for music's sake.
It's hard for me to describe, but I'll try. It seems as though the GHs sort of bundle the sounds together such that the overall presentation is flattened out, as if the musicians are far away, rather than up-close and personal. They sweeten and soften all the sounds and take the "edge" out of them, with an overall "mushy" effect. It seems this way with each of the amps I've tried them with, although all are SS amps only. Jman, yes I would add a tad bit "thin" to that description, and also a bit "dry" with one of my SS amps, but not the McIntosh.
I'm in a mid-sized city in Japan and limited in budget to used gear, so I can't easily find some of the brands and model names thrown around in the 'Gon here. I took home the MA6800 to try the GHs with because the similar MA6900 was recommended more than once on this thread, and the GHs seem very underpowered with my old Luxmans. The Luxman L-550 class A produces lovely sweet sounds that have "oomph" to them through my other speakers, but it sounds somewhat more harsh, dry, and "mushy" through the GHs. The GHs sound less "mushy" with the McIntosh, though there is obviously a loss of detail with that amp.
My wife thinks the problem is just the "style" of their sound not being suitable for our taste, while I still feel they should greatly show-up my old Yamaha NS-100Xs with the right source and amplification, but unfortunately I'm running out of time on my (expensive) trial period on these. In the meantime, while the GHs are obviously smoother with classical strings and woodwinds, overall we still prefer the slightly rougher but much fuller and "open" sounds of the Yamahas for most genres we've compared, and we've been comparing back and forth for two weeks now (unfortunately of course only with my mid-fy equipment).
I greatly appreciate all of your input, and hope this unaudiophilish description might mean something to you ppl, such that maybe you can imagine what I'm hearing and might recognize it as possibly either the actual character of the GHs or the fault of my equipment and/or room acoustics.
