My room is 25wx33dx9h. I tend to bump the volume up a bit for serious sessions. Nothing ridiculous though.
I am lucky in that my wife and daughter are major music consumers and LOVE the big ugly speakers. We consume a lot of music. Recent purchases: Jessica Hoop, Feist, A Fine Frienzy, Zero 7, The Shins, Iron & Wine, you know KCRW Morning Becomes Eclectic stuff. In addition I listen to anything live: piano (Eric Satie), quartet (Kronos Quartet), tango (Astor Piazzola) and of course classical symphony. Also a big fan of Talking Heads, This Mortal Coil, Sarah McLachlan, Tori Amos, old Bowie, yada, yada, yada. Mostly anything with great voice and/or instruments and an edge to it. I am lucky because my daughter (11) does not like rock, rap, hip hop or pop.
Price range is dyi to $6,000.
Nice! A very open budget and open ear to such great variety in music, and a big ol' room to listen in!
When I had Maggie MMGs, I had a helluva time getting away from them. I was bound and determined to get the best speaker for $5 that I could find, and I kept coming back to the Maggie 3.6 time and time again. I listened to JM Labs, Von Schweikert, B&W, Totem, etc, and all of them fell short. The only speaker line I fell in love with, and that ultimately took me away from the Maggies, was the DeVore Super 8. I've had them for a little over a year now and plan to have them in my system a long time. In fact, I'm anxiously awaiting the arrival of Vinnie's preamp, since that's one of the last pieces I need to have a nice, clean 2-channel signal path. I spend more time with home theater, but 2-channel audio is of greater importance to me.
My DeVores
Hi ajzepp,
I am a proud owner of the new DeVore Nines and I know I will be for a very long time... they continue to amaze me every time I listen. Both the DeVore Super 8s and the Nines work beautifully with the Signature 30.2 or Signature 70.2s.
I believe the DeVore Nines retail for $6,500, so it sounds like this is a little over glaesemann's budget, but the Super 8's are a couple grand less ($4500?). For glaesemann's room, I think the Nines would more ideal than the Super 8's.
For more info, see:
www.devorefidelity.comAlwayswantmore's suggestion of looking to Omegas is also a fine one! A pair of MaxHemps and a pair of DeepHemp active subs would be most impressive, especially in a larger room!
Louis of Omega mentioned that he is going to toy with the idea of making a DeepHemp sub in the shape of the pedistal used for the MaxHemps. Having the ability to fine-tune each DeepHemp to your room, the MaxHemp, and your listening tastes will be useful!
See:
www.omegaloudspeakers.comAnother speaker that many Red Wine Audio customers really like, and in your budget, are the Zu Audio Druids, and they also have a mating sub called the Method or the smaller Mini Method, and they are coming out with a model called the Presence, which appears to be a pair of Druids in a larger enclosure that each houses a Mini-Method sub! See:
http://www.6moons.com/audioreviews/zu12/presence.html and
www.zuaudio.comBetween the three brands listed above, you'll most likely find something that will have the ability to pull you away from those Maggies (I think!), but there are so many other options out there.
By including the three brands above, I do NOT mean to exclude others in any way. I have customers running all sorts of different speakers from various horns, Harbeths, Quads, vintage speakers, and even DIY efforts such as the open-baffle speakers that Richard mentioned above. There are so many possibilities and it comes down to how much time and effort you want to make in auditioning before buying.
The Mac digital front end is what started the rethinking of the whole system. I sold my ARC CD3 and am REALLY enjoying the unmodded stock MacBook to USB/SPDIF conv. to DAC set-up. I can't wait to start tweaking the conversion aspect (ie. no USB and no SPDIF).
Which brings me to a DAC wish list. Please indulge me...
- Ethernet in (ala Squeeze Box).
- I2S - directly fed to the dac chip. No SPDIF in the path!
- Clock out for sources with clock in.
The Isabella will feature a built-in dac that has a USB input. The digital signal will be converted from USB direct to I2S (no intermediate conversion from USB to SPDIF like some other USB dacs do).
There will also be two SPDIF inputs: 75-ohm coax as well as optical (Toslink).
I am not looking to get involved with Ethernet, nor clock out and other complexities... with the Isabella, I am confident that you'll be strongly connected with the music and not thinking about such complexities (especially when paired with a Signature 30.2 or 70.2s)!
I hope you get the time to listen to at least a few different models of speakers. Of course if you love those Magnepans, you might not ever need to change them.
Best regards,
Vinnie
