Quad Amplifiers vs Bryston 4BSST2 vs AVM Evolution SA3.2 amplifier????

[mresseguie]

Anyone have experience with these three amplifiers, and <specifically> how they might differ?

I've stumbled onto a very interesting audio shop in Taipei that specializes in the British sound, but also has some other gear. I hope to visit the store this weekend to listen to a pair of Spendor Classic 100 speakers. This shop offers a pretty wide selection of amplifiers (more than the above three brands).

Michael

[Nick B]

Heard the Spendors years ago at a dealer and a show with vinyl  gear. Very smooth, luscious and enjoyable. I have no experience with any of those amps. So do let us know how your visit turns out.

As an aside, how do you like Don's 300b mono amps? I am presuming those are the ones he built for Spatial.

[mresseguie]

I'll let you in on a little secret. Thanks to my spending so much time both at home and away from home caring for my grandson, I can safely say I haven't listened to more than ten hours of music on my home system in the last 11 months. My wife and I lived with our son, DIL and our grandson in Atlanta for close to 5 months. My primary music enjoyment came from a portable JBL Charge 3 Bluetooth speaker.

With that in mind, I can't remember how my 300b amps sound. 

I'm going to listen to a pair of field coil speakers that I chanced upon 2 1/2 years ago at the Taipei Audio Show. The sound coming out of those speakers was mesmerizing. Take a gander at these drivers (both electromagnetic and not): http://www.emspeaker.com/ems_products.html

With a little luck, I'll also get to listen to the Spendor speakers today before I hear the EM speakers.

Lastly, for you Chinese food lovers, I'm going to enjoy of bowl of world-class Chinese beef noodle soup either today or tomorrow depending on how much time I have. Without doubt, beef noodle soup has been one of my favorite dishes in Asia for nearly 40 years. 

[Nick B]

I'll let you in on a little secret. Thanks to my spending so much time both at home and away from home caring for my grandson, I've can safely say I haven't listened to more than ten hours of music on my home system in the last 11 months. My wife and I lived with our son, DIL and our grandson in Atlanta for close to 5 months. My primary music enjoyment came from a portable JBL Charge 3 Bluetooth speaker.

With that in mind, I can't remember how my 300b amps sound. 

I'm going to listen to a pair of field coil speakers that I chanced upon 2 1/2 years ago at the Taipei Audio Show. The sound coming out of those speakers was mesmerizing. Take a gander at these drivers (both electromagnetic and not): http://www.emspeaker.com/ems_products.html

With a little luck, I'll also get to listen to the Spendor speakers today before I hear the EM speakers.

Lastly, for you Chinese food lovers, I'm going to enjoy of bowl of world-class Chinese beef noodle soup either today or tomorrow depending on how much time I have. Without doubt, beef noodle soup has been one of my favorite dishes in Asia for nearly 40 years. 

That's rather amazing that you've spent just a few hours on your your system in all those months. But you had access to some music nonetheless and will be able to all the more appreciate getting back to your system when you are able. Thanks for the link. I've not heard of that company and don't know anyone personally who has owned field coil speakers.

I had a friend in an audio club some years ago who was a DIY guy and dabbled in single drivers and made his own cabinets. I can't recall the name of the company, but the guy used to post over at AC. I and another member visited Gary a couple of times and thought his particular single driver set up was thin sounding. But there are other single driver speakers that are supposed to sound excellent. Jason from Hapa demoed his wires with a single driver designer at a recent show and apparently with excellent results.

Whenever you get around to Hearing those 300b amps, do let us know how you like them.

[rollo]

Three different Amps. All have a House sound. Bryston is dry, Quad is really made for Quad speakers. Can be musical but with low power.  Not familiar with other amp. Decision should be based on speaker used.


charles

[mresseguie]

Thanks for your replies, guys.

The visit to the shop that specializes in the British sound was a bit of a disappointment. The Classic 100s are not kept in the store. They're boxed up in whatever passes for the store's warehouse/stoarge space. The owner said no one has shown an interest in that pair, so he doesn't bother to display them. He offered to give me an approximate $500 discount if I buy them. [I wasn't impressed with the offer. He keeps them in storage; no one wants them, so he offered my a ~8% discount.] If he really wanted to get rid of them, he'd offer me a better deal.

That shop is not your average shop. There were something like 25 pairs of every British speaker brand you can think of in his showroom + a couple ProAc pairs + a couple Canadian pairs. There were a dozen brands of amps, preamps, DACs, turntables, CD players, conditioners, and a few thousand LPs and hundreds of CDs.

Rather than letting me listen to the speakers I expressed an interest in, he played music on a pair of Spendor D7.2 speakers the entire time. It's possible he didn't take me terribly seriously. I've run into this bias problem in Taiwan before. Most foreigners in Taiwan can't afford good audio gear. Most foreigners stay here for a couple years, drink a lot of beer; chase women, and leave. Only a tiny minority are crazy enough to spend decades here. Anyway, the owner was pleasant enough and didn't give me negative vibes. He probably assumed I couldn't afford to spend that much money.

I'll return someday because he does have a great selection of gear.

The second shop has the EM speakers. The owner was very friendly, and remembered me from  2.5 years ago when I  sat down to listen to these speakers during the Taipei Audio Show. [A grand total of a half dozen foreigners attend the show, and one or two actually speak more than survival Mandarin, so most presenters remember me - even after a couple years.]  The speakers sounded good, but not amazingly good this time. They're too big for my listening space and my wife would have a fit if I put them in our livingroom. He clearly wants to sell them, and offered to sell them for ~$12k USD (half their retail price). I politely told him I'd consider his offer, but mentioned my wife's dislike of monster speakers. Anything larger than large bookshelf speakers lands in the monster category.

Imported speakers are not cheap here, but I already knew this. If I want bigger speakers than my Fritz loudspeakers, I'll either have to pay a guy to build kit speakers for me, or ship my Daedalus Apollos over. I really like my Fritz speakers, but they only play down to ~43Hz. I know, 'buy a subwoofer'. I may do this.

   

[rollo]

I sell Fritz Speakers. Very familiar with the. YES, dual subs will make you happy. We use Rythmic F-12 Subs. We also have Qln Prestige series. Way better than Fritz. Start at 8K a pair. Check them out.


charle

[mresseguie]

I sell Fritz Speakers. Very familiar with the. YES, dual subs will make you happy. We use Rythmic F-12 Subs. We also have Qln Prestige series. Way better than Fritz. Start at 8K a pair. Check them out.


charles

Hello， Charles。

If only my Fritz speakers played to ~32Hz or below, I likely wouldn't consider buying a different pair of speakers for my flat in Taiwan. I've compensated for their really low efficiency by powering them with a powerful amp. Rythmik is my first choice of subwoofer. It's all the more attractive because the Rythmik warehouse is located in southern Taiwan. As much as I'd love to have two F12/F12G subs here, I very clearly understand my wife's more limited WAF standards - a single sub will have to suffice.

Those QLN speakers are nice looking. Perhaps, one of these days I'll drive to Kaohsiung to listen to them. The current most likely candidates are 1) Keep my Fritz speakers and buy an F12G sub; 2) Ship my Daedalus Audio Apollos over here; 3) Buy Devore Fidelity O/96 speakers; 4) Buy Dutch & Dutch 8C speakers, and 5) hire a cabinet maker here to build a very nice pair of 3WC-15 speakers. [I've already contacted the cabinet maker about this possibility. He specializes in building special order speaker kits, and does great work.]

Of all of the above possibilities, my buying an F12G sub is by far the easiest and least expensive choice - and has the greatest WAF potential.

Michael