[medium jim]

Well get this, I'm using a 20 watt amp with my MMG's and couldn't be happier.  On another thread someone posted a link to an article about a reviewer testing low watt integrateds with Maggies, and started with a NAD 3020i and loved the sound.  Since I had an old 3020B that has been recapped, I thought I'd try it.  The result is glorious, beautiful music, albeit with a limited volume, something below lease breaking levels, but very satisfying and pretty close to the levels I listen to using a much more powerful amp.  It got exponentially better when I bypassed the preamp section and went direct to the power amp, extraordinary detail, imaging, tone, bass.  I've been very, very surprised.  Lower level dynamics are great, however big, macro dynamic swings are a struggle, not terrible, just a limit to what 20 watts can do.  Note that this amp is designed to go into very low impedances with no trouble and has a 4 ohm optimized setting, right in the Maggies wheelhouse, and it will swing up to 55 watts dynamically for short bursts. 

You don't need massive power for Maggies, more accurately one could say you need an amp designed properly to drive Maggies.   

Bingo, we have a winner!

Jim

[Letitroll98]

Bingo, we have a winner!

Jim

I hope that means the Power Ball jackpot.  Or perhaps I've won some lesser prize.......

[ajzepp]

Well get this, I'm using a 20 watt amp with my MMG's and couldn't be happier.  On another thread someone posted a link to an article about a reviewer testing low watt integrateds with Maggies, and started with a NAD 3020i and loved the sound.  Since I had an old 3020B that has been recapped, I thought I'd try it.  The result is glorious, beautiful music, albeit with a limited volume, something below lease breaking levels, but very satisfying and pretty close to the levels I listen to using a much more powerful amp.  It got exponentially better when I bypassed the preamp section and went direct to the power amp, extraordinary detail, imaging, tone, bass.  I've been very, very surprised.  Lower level dynamics are great, however big, macro dynamic swings are a struggle, not terrible, just a limit to what 20 watts can do.  Note that this amp is designed to go into very low impedances with no trouble and has a 4 ohm optimized setting, right in the Maggies wheelhouse, and it will swing up to 55 watts dynamically for short bursts. 

You don't need massive power for Maggies, more accurately one could say you need an amp designed properly to drive Maggies.   

That's so awesome...what are you using for a source?

[tabrink]

EXACTLY JIM
For the same reason the the TBI and Rogue work with AJ's speakers!
It is all about proper current!
Match your current to your load!
 

Bingo, we have a winner!

Jim

[medium jim]

I hope that means the Power Ball jackpot.  Or perhaps I've won some lesser prize.......

You sir have won a firm handshake and a slap on the back.

Jim

[brooklyn]

Very nice review and video. I'm sold on D-Class with my Bel Canto amps, if I hadn't tried them,
I would have never known.

I only have one question, how did the highs sound to you as compared to the other amps you used?

Nice work Steve, another happy audiofile.

I did look at the Peachtree awhile back but didn't know they had the D-Class amp.

Happy listening AJ, and thanks for the info.

[roscoeiii]

I did look at the Peachtree awhile back but didn't know they had the D-Class amp.

Happy listening AJ, and thanks for the info.

IIRC, they were not always Class D. But I am not certain on that...

[ajzepp]

Very nice review and video. I'm sold on D-Class with my Bel Canto amps, if I hadn't tried them,
I would have never known.

I only have one question, how did the highs sound to you as compared to the other amps you used?

Nice work Steve, another happy audiofile.

I did look at the Peachtree awhile back but didn't know they had the D-Class amp.

Happy listening AJ, and thanks for the info.

I probably need to spend more time doing some critical listening to get a better feel for the individual aspects of the sound, in all honesty. From what I heard today, the sound was fuller than I anticipated, whereas I was really fearful the Peachtree would sound very thin on the Maggies. Thankfully it's already evident that isn't the case. I had four good years with my Butler/Maggie combo, though, so I have a pretty good feel for what they SHOULD sound like when given every advantage to sound their best, so it'll be interesting to see how my impressions form with more time. One other hurdle that I was fearful of was slapping the passive crossovers back on them since I sold my active crossover last year. I really didn't spend much time with the stock crossovers at first, cause when I bought the Maggies I was determined to do it "the right way", so I brought in the Butlers, got the Marchand piece to actively bi-amp, got some Mye stands, added a dedicated circuit, etc, etc. So my standard for how these SHOULD sound is very, very high....and when my first listen indicates that the dropoff isn't going to be anywhere near as vast as I anticipated, especially considering the price tags involved, it's a good feeling. I'll definitely be happy to report back every so often as I spend more time with this combo, if that's of interest to anyone. I'm hoping to have a total of three sources, each of differing quality, so it'll be fun to see how it holds up. Thus far, running my PURE iPod dock into the Peachtree and allowing the internal DAC to do it's thing is working really well. Even the lesser quality tracks sound fantastic. Tomorrow I'll play some more of my lossless files to see if I can discern any differences.

[ajzepp]

IIRC, they were not always Class D. But I am not certain on that...

Yep, I'm pretty sure you're exactly right in that.

[roscoeiii]

Very impressive. I too have been a big fan of Butlers for speakers that need some juice (SP Tech Minis in my case).

[geowak]

To AJ- Congratulations on your choice, may the audio gods bless you with many hours of listening enjoyment.

Without getting into the proper amp issue, I will say I have MMG's and love the sound. Thinking about getting twin subs for them as we are shopping for a house now and they will be in a bigger room. Magnepan, in my mind, make a great product. In the last three years, I cannot think of many companies that have come out with really stellar components as often as Magnepan.

Keep us informed about your Peachtree amp. I would think many could benefit from a more detailed review (if or when) you would want to write one...

BTW I have a Parasound A21 driving my MMGs.

[Letitroll98]

That's so awesome...what are you using for a source?

An Oppo something or other (970 or 971) into an Audio GD 2.1 Dac, that's the setup without preamp.  An HW19 Mk III into the preamp section. 

[dflee]

AJ: You haven't mentioned if the butler did a better job with the Maggies.
Have you tried the Peachtree with the Rogers so you could possibly revert
back to the butler or did that option go away?

[ajzepp]

AJ: You haven't mentioned if the butler did a better job with the Maggies.
Have you tried the Peachtree with the Rogers so you could possibly revert
back to the butler or did that option go away?

That's going to be a really tough comparison for a few reasons: First off, with the Butlers, aside from literally only the first three or four days that I had the 3.6s, I've been running them actively biamped with the Marchand crossover. For those first three days I DID have a Butler in use (two channels of the 5150 amp, one per speaker via the stock Maggie crossovers) but at the time I was going very easy on the Maggies per my dealer's suggestion. So literally for like 99% of the past four years that I've had the Maggies, they've had 400+ Butler watts to each bass panel and 225+ Butler watts to each mid/treble panel. The other factor is that even though the Maggies sound surprisingly good in the room they're in currently, it's less space than they had previously and the 3.6s generally like to have some room to spread their wings.

That being said, once I get some more time on this thing I will be more than happy to give a better idea of my opinion on the differences between the current configuration and how they sounded with the Butlers. In my opinion, I had the Maggies in the *ideal* position to perform their best given my budget, and the Butler/Maggie combination is just really, really good. On a scale of 1-10, I'd say I had my rig performing at a 9.5. So if the Peachtree can handle the DAC, preamp, and amp duties and get me to, say, a 7.5/10 or greater, I'll consider this a HUGE success in terms of this purchase decision.

The passive crossovers on the Maggies do a fine job, but it's just not in the same league as the active bi-amping...anyone who has ever had the thought that Maggies aren't dynamic would have simply needed to spend five minutes with that set-up and they'd never feel that way again. I could put on an Eminem track or some dubstep and the house would just be filled with amazing dynamics and lots of crisp THUMP. I can't imagine that the Peachtree could approach that, so I'm not putting that expectation on it. BUT, if yesterday was any indication (I haven't listened today yet lol), the Peachtree delivers a high level of detail, it gets the sound off the panels and gives me nice center fill and a sound stage, the timbre appears to be very natural especially with vocals, and there is some clean low end present. So at a reasonable and sufficient level of listening, so far I'd say we're hitting above that 7.5 mark and heading in the right direction.

As far as the RSLs, it'll be very easy for me to swap them out of the HT and into the Peachtree rig, so I'll certainly play around with that, as well. I probably wouldn't move the Butler back to the Maggies only because the only Butler I have left is the 5150, which is a 5 channel amp....so it's used fully in the RSL HT room since I have an RSL center and surrounds, whereas three of the channels would remain idle if I used it on the Maggies. I also tend to spend more time with HT than I do music, so it's nice having my best amp handling those duties. I started off my evaluation of the RSLs on a little 50 wpc Onkyo receiver, so they can sound quite good even with a budget amp section...but there's definitely some scaling there with the Butlers. The RSLs have really surprised me along the way...for an inexpensive speaker, they seem to enjoy having a nice quality front end to play with.

[ajzepp]

An Oppo something or other (970 or 971) into an Audio GD 2.1 Dac, that's the setup without preamp.  An HW19 Mk III into the preamp section.

That Audio-GD company is very interesting...I forget his name...King something...but apparently he's a mad genius who designs some amazing gear.

[ajzepp]

Very impressive. I too have been a big fan of Butlers for speakers that need some juice (SP Tech Minis in my case).

Oh man, I bet that is a great combo...I think Lonewolf runs a Butler/SP Tech set up too, IIRC....I've had a few conversations with Mr Butler and he's convinced me that there's not much out there his amps can't handle. I have a ton of respect for that guy....real straight shooter. I once asked him when he plans to have a new line of amps out and he said, "well, I guess as soon as I figure out what I could possibly do to make them any better" lol.

[ajzepp]

To AJ- Congratulations on your choice, may the audio gods bless you with many hours of listening enjoyment.

Without getting into the proper amp issue, I will say I have MMG's and love the sound. Thinking about getting twin subs for them as we are shopping for a house now and they will be in a bigger room. Magnepan, in my mind, make a great product. In the last three years, I cannot think of many companies that have come out with really stellar components as often as Magnepan.

Keep us informed about your Peachtree amp. I would think many could benefit from a more detailed review (if or when) you would want to write one...

BTW I have a Parasound A21 driving my MMGs.

I was really close to buying a used Parasound HCA-1000a for the Maggies. I used to have an HCA-855 or something like that....can't recall the model number...but it was a little 5 channel amp that just sounded great with my Paradigm Studio speakers about ten years ago. I've always been a fan of Richard Curl.

Totally agree about the Maggies...I remember the first listen of my MMGs like it was yesterday. By the way, if you want a nice budget option for subs that would blend really well with the MMGs, check out a pair of the Outlaw M8s. It's one of the best kept secrets in audio, even though there are a couple stellar reviews around now. I have had one for the last few years and I was pairing it with my 3.6s for HT use prior to separating out my systems. My frame of reference was an SVS PB13 Ultra, which I sold when I moved back into an apartment (didnt' want to get evicted within the first week lol), so I had zero expectations for this little M8....but in a medium sized room or smaller, it will kick you in the nuts. A pair of them would be even nicer

[medium jim]

I had a Parasound HCA1500a that had no problem driving a pair 1.6's if that helps.

Jim

[ltr317]

Hi AJ,

Congrats on the Peachtree Nova125.  My main concern for the earlier iNova which I reviewed for Stereo Times was the power section of that model which I felt was not enough to drive planar or electrostatic speakers in terms of dynamics.  But that model only had about 60 wpc in 8 ohms of solid state amplification.  It's good you waited until Peachtree increase the "balls factor."

Cheers,
Paul Mah

[Mike Nomad]

Congratulations AJ. You found a working combination. Except for the absolute cr@p tube that came with it, I have been quite happy with my 1.0 version of the Nova (I replaced it with a vintage 6DJ8 from GE).

Been thinking about upgrading to the latest Nova, I just don't know what I would do with the extra grunt. However, it sounds like they made enough improvements overall, where I might hear the difference. Thanks for your write-up & video.