ICE Amps for classical music?

Eldartford: The best illustration of what my set of large subwoofer drivers can do is to play pipe organ music. Not all organ music has loud bass, but when it does you should FEEL it in your stomach, and my system does achieve this. Also, when the SPL is moderate, the large drivers are loafing compared with small drivers that would be generating large excursion, with attendant distortion.

Obviously I could not enjoy such a system if my nearest neighbor were not about 600 feet away with woods in between the houses.

I would be more concerned with the structural integrity of my house than with the neighbors!

My closest neighbors are about 200 feet away, through the woods. However, iirc I have only played my 1978 direct-to-disk recording of "The Power and the Glory," on M&K Realtime, once. During which playing the windows in the room were set into easily audible vibration, and after which I found a couple of paint chips on the floor that had formerly been part of the ceiling! :)

Best regards,
-- Al

Guidocorona, I have 3 different Dvorak 9th. The CDR someone sent me is the best by far. That was a long time ago. I wouldn't be the least surprise it is the Chesky version.

My hair on the back of my neck stands up when a effervescent violin is played sounding like a cowering shiver, bookended between two emphatic passages.

Thank you Al and Vince, I will look up the Horenstein and Slatkin performances. one of my 'standard candles' used to gage the ability of a system to yield highly emotional music without suffering from electronic aneurysms is the Bernstein performance with the Israel Phil on DGG--tape his, audience coughs, drop bows, Lenny's 'sound effects' of podium rain-dances and thumps and singing under his breath and all included. . . 2nd movement is the most intensely lyrical I have experienced this far. . . just the opposite of Fritz Reiner's strangeley famous read-through.

It may be worth pointing out that the Bernstein other recording, with the NY Philharmonic I believe, available on SACD is a rather sleepy affair instead.

Apologies for minor thread derailment. G.

Almarg... My house has been standing for about 180 years, and is not apt to fall down due to the 1812 overture ! After I built the subwoofer system I did have problens with rattling windows, but it was easy to find what was loose and fix it.

200 feet is too close. Where do you keep your horses :-)

Kijanki... The Maggies don't have to reproduce the subwoofer frequencies. Keeping up is simply a matter of balancing the gains. I have actually tested my system for compression at high SPL and find none up to the maximum my ears will tolerate.

Also please note that I also play quiet music, and believe that the large cones, with their minimal excursion (like a Maggie diaphram by the way) are beneficial. My large drivers have appropriately large magnetic systems, and give away nothing in the way of transient response to 7 or 8 inch woofers.

Evidently you don't like pipe organ music. That's OK. I can't stand pop.

I never thought about it before but a truly state of the art system should be able to knock a house down (I suppose)!

Oh, well, back to the drawing board....