New used pair of Aeon I - PLEASE Your opinions on Amp Selection - McCormack DNA .5

[fsmithjack]

I just picked up a nice, used pair of Aeon i for a good deal. I got them for my other family room. My main living room where my nice new EM-ESL's are always hogged and taken over by my wife and/or kids..Lol. I now have a decent set for the other room where I can sneak off for a listen session or movie and I will use them in a HT all tower 7.1 set up. Super tough load for the AVR to carry. The 4ohm down to 2ohm Aeon i in the Fronts and with a set of 4ohm Motion 12 towers as surrounds and a set of 4ohms Motion 10 small towers as rears. All being 4-ohm rated Tower speakers and the Xstat on the Aein i being the older panel with Bi-wire is a pretty tough load for my receiver which is the strong like bull Pioneer Elite SC-55 with the newer D3 amps but 6 sets 4ohm towers and the Motion 6 4ohm center is just a whole to ask of any receiver even the beastly SC-55 . I want to both take the load of my AVR and improve my 2-channel sound. The McCormick DNA .5 keeps coming us a premium, nice and smooth high end sounding amp that is still reasonable money for a used one. I was thinking EMO XPA but with my Pio as the pre-pro that seems like a little bit of a harsh match. Please I would love some thoughts on this amp selection if anyone can help or if you can tell me the amp you have on your Xstats that you really like that would be helpful as well. i could use the help and feedback.Thanks

 

[Nielsen]

Your Pioneer is a digital amp? I tried a Cary digital amp for my Aeon I, only took me 1 second to decide it didnt work, delivered it back to the shop. The sound was dull, no treble, terrible.
The McCormack might do the trick, most important is your power amps input sensitivity, that MUST match the voltage on the PreOut from your Pioneer. If your Pioneer has 1 volt on the PreOut you are in business. Do not buy an amp with 2 volt sensitivity if your Pioneer only has 1 volt out.....
If you dont play loud the McCormack should be sufficient, I have a 125 watt bryston B-100 SST DA and it just sings with the Aeon I, I have added a small REL subwoofer because of a very difficult open room.
Otherwise, the Emotiva is a good choice (check the input sensitivity), you get decent sound and a lot of grunt for your money, and the Aeon I just gets better with more good quality power. Think I would go for the Emotiva. (look at their new class A monoblocs also)

 

[fsmithjack]

Your Pioneer is a digital amp? I tried a Cary digital amp for my Aeon I, only took me 1 second to decide it didnt work, delivered it back to the shop. The sound was dull, no treble, terrible.
The McCormack might do the trick, most important is your power amps input sensitivity, that MUST match the voltage on the PreOut from your Pioneer. If your Pioneer has 1 volt on the PreOut you are in business. Do not buy an amp with 2 volt sensitivity if your Pioneer only has 1 volt out.....
If you dont play loud the McCormack should be sufficient, I have a 125 watt bryston B-100 SST DA and it just sings with the Aeon I, I have added a small REL subwoofer because of a very difficult open room.
Otherwise, the Emotiva is a good choice (check the input sensitivity), you get decent sound and a lot of grunt for your money, and the Aeon I just gets better with more good quality power. Think I would go for the Emotiva. (look at their new class A monoblocs also)

I just bought a different amp the Vincent SP331 Hybrid Amp. Do you think this will match to my pio sc/57-55 I knew nothing about those preout voltage measurements. Here is a little info on it.

The input stage relies on two 6N16 tubes for liquid, effortless sounding audio. The output stage gets its muscle from six Toshiba transistors per channel. A mighty power amp requires a titan of a power supply, and that's exactly what's on tap with the Vincent. Its precision-designed oversize toroidal core transformer of 1,000-watts x 2 offers energy storage capacity of 80,000 µF per channel. In fact, the power supply will even accommodate speaker loads of two ohms without any difficulty.

 

[fsmithjack]

Your Pioneer is a digital amp? I tried a Cary digital amp for my Aeon I, only took me 1 second to decide it didnt work, delivered it back to the shop. The sound was dull, no treble, terrible.
The McCormack might do the trick, most important is your power amps input sensitivity, that MUST match the voltage on the PreOut from your Pioneer. If your Pioneer has 1 volt on the PreOut you are in business. Do not buy an amp with 2 volt sensitivity if your Pioneer only has 1 volt out.....
If you dont play loud the McCormack should be sufficient, I have a 125 watt bryston B-100 SST DA and it just sings with the Aeon I, I have added a small REL subwoofer because of a very difficult open room.
Otherwise, the Emotiva is a good choice (check the input sensitivity), you get decent sound and a lot of grunt for your money, and the Aeon I just gets better with more good quality power. Think I would go for the Emotiva. (look at their new class A monoblocs also)

Here are some stats i really really hope this amp will work ok with my pio now im kinda worried. Please let me know what you think:
Vincent SP-331
Technical details
Frequency response: 10 Hz - 50 kHz +/- 0.5 dB
Nominal Output Power RMS/8 Ohm: 2x 150W
Nominal Output Power RMS/4 Ohm: 2x 300W
Total harmonic distortion: < 0.1 % (1 kHz, 1 Watt)
Input sensitivity: 1,2V, Signal-Noise ratio: > 90 dB
Input impedance: 47 kOhm, Inputs: 2 x RCA, Outputs: 4 x 2 Speaker Terminal,
Mains supply: 230 V/50 Hz, Colour: black/silver, Weight: 19 kg
Dimensions (WxHxD): 430 x 160 x 450 mm, Tubes: 2 x 6N16

pio sc=57-55
output (level/ impedance)
REC.................. 380m V/2.2 k

 

[Toppgunn]

I am running my Aeon i's with an Emotiva setup - power amp xpa3 (3rd channel for center) - great price and good warranty support.

- Problem with Emotiva is if Treble is up too much it will go into protection when you crank it up really loud.

I have a Sunfire Ultimate II pre and a Sunfire power amp (200x5) running my Vistas. I ran my Aeon i's with the Sunfire setup and to me it sounded MUCH better.

The Sunfire system is way more flexible - balanced outputs, stable down to 2 ohm (have yet to put this system into protection - I used to run my Quet Z's with Sunfire),
option between current/ voltage sound (current sounds more like tube).

- The Sunfire setup has blown away everything else that I have tried so far - Arcam AVR 400, Anthem MRX 700, Emotiva xpa3, Denon AVR 5800, Yamaha, Pioneer Elite SC32?? Arcam then Emotiva then Anthem got somewhat close to the sound of Sunfire. I've seen the Sunfire setup go for around $1500 on Audiogone and it will easily blow away any system in that price point.

The Sunfire pre also has an auto sensing circuit which automatically turns on and switches to the input that has been turned on. I found myself constantly changing settings with all the other receivers to get that perfect sound that Sunfire seemed to produce effortlessly!

Don't know what Bob Carver did when he made this Sunfire but 12 years later this system still sounds better than most of the pre-pro setups that are out today. Pre + Pro weigh under 65 lbs - but puts out (400x5 @ 8ohms - very stable power amp and it runs cool no matter how hard you drive it).

 

[Nielsen]

The reason the amp goes into protection mode is the speakers impedance at 1,3 (or so) ohms at 20.000 hz. Lesser amps will go into protection already after a couple of watts out. Have to admit I thought the Emotiva was more stble, maybe its good with newer ML models.
The amp must be stable, thats all they demand but its scary to me that I see a lot of people using electrostatic speakers with cheap surround receivers. Its like buying a BMW and put bicycle wheels on it....
The Vincent should be very good on the Aeon I, actually one of the best reasonable amps with ML is Vincent SP 991, the Sunfire and the Nakamichi PA7 MK II, but they are quite rare, people dont sell them.

 

[SubSolar]

Also interested in this. Have a new pair of Theos on the way and was thinking of using Emotiva XPR-1 monoblocks, but don't want to worry about them shutting off.

 

[Nielsen]

Just look at the specs for Theos and send a mail to Emotiva and ask them maybe?

 

[Gordon Gray]

Hi Jack,

Good luck with your issue.

Hopefully you know that there is no right answer, only general amp performance characteristics that work with ML's.

Everyone can offer an opinion but only you can decide what works for you.

Best option, audition in your system before buying.

GG

PS: Lots of info on this site regarding amps and ML's. Search is your friend. Make sure you have a comfortable chair.

 

[Dougrc]

Musical Fidelity A300 integrated for 2 channel only driving Quest Z.
150 watts into 8
260 into 4
No specs into a lower load but never clips and plenty of spl