How make my Ayre system "warmer"?

I am pretty much in agreement with the preceding comments about warmth. But I would add that lack of "warmth" (or what the original poster describes as sound that is a bit too "lean" or "clean), could also be thought of as lacking in what I would call "richness."

Which in turn suggests addressing the harmonic structure of the system's response, not just the frequency response. Meaning, very conceivably, increasing the amount of even-order harmonic distortion. Just what adding a tube-based cd player or other tube component would do, as several of us have suggested.

Regards,
-- Al

thank you all for your comments and suggestions.

My room is 4,2m x 9m. Speakers standing more than 1 meter from the rear wall and 90 cm from both sides. Moving the speakers was the first thing I have tried. Of course the imaging and holography changed but it wasn´t "warmer" or "richer". I had done some acoustic room treatments. The sound of my system is not hard or lean or "analytical" but a LITTLE BID RICHER would be great.

My speakers goes in the direction of the Lumen White or Avalon Opus Ceramic. I think the Lumen or the Avalon are better known in the US. I would change a lot in the system but the speakers would be the last thing. IMO they are really great, same developer and same chassis than Lumen White. If I sell them (new round about 30.000 USD) I will loose too much.

I have tried a tube preamp with the V-5xe but I think the system lost some "magic" or synergy of the k-5xe and V-5xe. Warmer would be good but not for the price of loosing dynamics, resolution and tonality. I always miss bass qualities with tubes. Yes, a lot recordings sound "sweeter" and "richer" but not as wright and natural as with the Ayres.

I have also tried tube integreated like Ayon Crossfire, a Pathos Inpol, a Einstein The Tune but I liked the Ayres more. On the side of SS I tried Pass, Musical Fidelity, Symphonic Line and others. Some do some thinks better then the Ayres but in total the Ayres are the most musical with great dynamics, resolution and tonality. A lot of stuff sounds like "Hifi" with big soundstages and deep bass but the Ayres bring me more in the music than the other amps I´ve tried. Really great was the stuff from Nagra but they are outside of my budget.

The Shunyata speaker cables was a big step forward from the Magan Signature. A bigger step than I believed before.

Tom

Well, as you have found out, you have gotten many different pieces of advice on how to accomplish your goal of introducing some warmth to you system.

The easiest way to do this, (and probably the best), is that you could add tubes to either your preamp, power amp or source, or any combination of those three pieces of equipment. (The easiest being to add tubes to the preamp, as preamp tubes tend to be cheaper and last much longer than power amp tubes.)

However, if I were in your shoes, and since you have the Ayre pieces for both your preamp and power amp, and since they do have a synergy together, I think I'd opt for putting tubes in your source unit. The Audio Aero Capitole II SE cdp is in somewhat the same price category as your Linn Unidisk 1.1. (The prices for them used are about the same, so you should be able to sell one and buy the other for the same price.) The Capitole II SE has a nice touch of warmth to the sound, at the expensive of giving up a very small touch of resolution, IMHO anyway. (I like the Capitole II myself, and would probably go for it over my Resolution Audio Opus 21, but I'll be honest and state that it was only slightly better than the Opus 21, and I did not like the top loading aspect of the Capitole II, nor did I like having to use the puck. But, I am an analog fan first and foremost, and so I only use my cdp occasionally, so it does not matter all that much to me which unit I have, and since the Opus 21 is cheaper than the Capitole II, it made sense for me to not upgrade. However, from an absolute sonic standpoint, it is difficult to fault the Capitole II SE.)

So, I would recommend that you buy one, and compare it to your Linn to see which you prefer. (And if it were me, I would listen to the Capitole II for at least a solid week or more, and then swap back to the Linn. At that point, you will then have a good idea of the sound of each unit over the long term. A/B swapping can sometimes lead you to the wrong conclusion, as you'll sometimes pick one over the other just because it is new and different, rather than actually better.)

One more word of advice: Don't try to swap out cables to make the sound warmer. That is a band-aid approach that leads down the wrong road, IMHO.

Al suggested:
"Which in turn suggests addressing the harmonic structure of the system's response, not just the frequency response. Meaning, very conceivably, increasing the amount of even-order harmonic distortion. Just what adding a tube-based cd player or other tube component would do, as several of us have suggested"

Many people take Al's route, but adding even-order harmonics smear and obscure any true richness in the recording itself. Some of us strive to clear up the midrange with careful selection of components that don't add glare and edge. Vibration control, IC selection, PC selection and speaker cable are all integral to achieve a stress free, open system that passes along all the openness of the best recordings.

This is true of the very best tube and SS system. Some lesser systems take the "cover up" route. The clarity route IS expensive and harder to achieve than the "cover up" route, unfortunately.

Dave

No one has mentioned this, but I found it to make a huge difference when I placed my power amp on it. I had a rack with glass shelves and when I replaced them with 2" hard rock maple platforms, it sounded like I had replaced the preamp and the amp. System became more relaxed, mids opened up and overall a more organic and analog sound to the system. The most bang for the buck I have ever experienced.