How make my Ayre system "warmer"?

Yes, I agree the room can be the single most dominant factor in terms of system-sound, particularly tone. What are your dimensions? Are there a lot of continuous flat, reflective surfaces? If so, you might consider treating them.

After that, I'd look at a speaker change. Ayre SS equipment is well-known for quality and neutrality, but combined with ceramic drivers, the system doesn't seem optimized for warmth. Have you considered Sonus Faber? The new Cremona M or the original, Serblin-designed Cremona? Or Verity speakers? Rienzi, Fidelio, or Parsifal? These are on the warm side.

A controversial measure might be to consider replacing your Shunyata speaker cables with Cardas Golden Cross (after audition, that is). That should warm the system, but many would argue this would also be using cables as "tone controls" and not favor the approach for that reason. An inexpensive way to try a set of warmer cables out, short of auditioning Cardas GC, is to get a pair of Audioquest Midnight 2 or 3 speaker cables. These are good, on the warm side, and cheap.

But, I'd start by looking at your room first.

Good luck.

I would go with what Mrtennis said. If you want more warmth, go with valve amplification.

I do not deny that the above posters who are urging you to fix your room have a point, but fixing the room will not change the harmonic structure of your amp-speaker combo. Fixing the room (in my experience) does not give a sterile sounding system warmth. Rather, fixing the room improves imaging, gives you a more consistent frequency response (provided you did it right!), and gets rid of ringing. If you want warmth, which I take to mean a predominance of even order harmonics, you either get an amp or speaker that does this.

Well, tell us about your room and speaker placement. Do female vocalists often seem "shouty" leading you to turn the volume down. If so, that's a symtem of poor speaker placement, with lots of intermodulation distortion in the room. Search for Sumiko Master Set for some ideas about properly setting your speakers. This is a highly likely problem.

Also, do you hear a lot of glare and edge? That would likely be coming from you CDP. Unfortunately fixing that costs dollars. Tubes won't clear this up. Great tubes and great SS sound pretty much alike. Unfortunately the bad SS, which you don't have, sounds harsh and bad tubes can sound euphonically warm. The best of both are very, very close to each other, and expensive.

So, tell us about your room and start looking around for a superior CDP.

Dave

Have you listened to Vandersteens with your current set up?
I am running the K5xe, v5xe, and Cx7e ....I've run this set up with 2ce, 3A sigs (current), and Quatro Vandersteens. All have been very "un SS like" I used to have the K1X, but with the current E upgrade on the pre amp, cd, and amp....I'm really not missing it that much...
system is run fully balanced with Audioquest Colorado ic's and alpha Core Goertz MI II speaker cables (flat copper super low impedence)
It's anything but lean!
For as cheaply as you can pick up a pair of used, current 2ce's it might be worth a listen. I thnk you'd be really surprised.
Greg