Post AXPONA: You still love your ML system?

[ttocs]

Yes!!

I attended both Saturday and Sunday and was able to experience quite a bit more than I thought I would have. Only a few listenings were very notable for me, and one was quite surprising!

The surprise for me was Krell powering Alta speakers. The Alta model was a 2-way speaker with a great amount of bass! Really nice, accurate sound.

On Saturday the D'Agostino/Wilson demo sounded fabulous! On Sunday, not as much. Don't know what changed but the bass was "slightly" muddy. The very large Focals were very nice. The B&W's have never agreed with me, and the AXPONA demos while good - were not much better than I've heard before. The Magnapans sounded very good with the Parasound amplification, but not with modern rock music, however the bass was surprisingly good.

Large amounts of bass seems to be the theme. Most demos had too much muddy bass. The D'Agostino/Wilson combo had voluminous bass but was very well controlled -- on Saturday. Saturday night I played with the bass settings on my Expressions to try and duplicate the experience but I don't have a pair of triple driver sub-towers in the corners of my room along with 100Amps of current-sucking amplification (2 Relentless amps and 2 Progression amps) costing several hundred thousand dollars more than I can afford. But my system produces a great amount of accurate bass (even though I'm still tweaking) that makes me very happy!

So, in the end, I'm extremely happy with what I've got!

 

[Gordon Gray]

Was the Alta model the Celesta FMR 2?

 

[ttocs]

Tha Alta model was the Rhea. Very, very surprisingly good. I thought there was a subwoofer going, but nooooo.

(my fingers are shading as much outside bright light as possible)

 

[timm]

Tha Alta model was the Rhea. Very, very surprisingly good. I thought there was a subwoofer going, but nooooo.
View attachment 20113
(my fingers are shading as much outside bright light as possible)

So I was there as well. Which mags are you referring to? The LRS (small mmg replacement)... the 3.7 in 5 channel mode ? Or if I miss something? I found the LRS pretty outstanding for 650/pr. Bass was pretty unbelievable given their stature. The 3.7s didn’t sound right to me as they were crammed up against the front wall.

For the first time I heard Wilson’s sound good. I was surprised. It was a smaller model?? Sasha or Alex maybe?

Did you hear the big Sonus Faber off the Mac 1.2kw? Bass was fairly phenomenal

Listened to all 3 Logan’s 11/13/15. Tough to put those in the small rooms - bass seemed a bit big ...but in a bigger room... I could definitely see it. My first time hearing the new lineup.

The carver amazings sounded veeerrryyy good with his cherry monos. I’m not sure how you get what appeared to be an 8’ tall linesource to disappear in the approx 12x14 room.

I also liked the TAD room.

The YG acoustic setup in the auralec room sounded very nice.

The ps audio an3 prototype showed some promise in a complicated room
So much great gear. My first show and it was a hoot.

I’m w you. I’m still loving my setup.

 

[ttocs]

So I was there as well. Which mags are you referring to? The LRS (small mmg replacement)... the 3.7 in 5 channel mode ? Or if I miss something? I found the LRS pretty outstanding for 650/pr. Bass was pretty unbelievable given their stature. The 3.7s didn’t sound right to me as they were crammed up against the front wall.
Unfortunately, I'm unfamiliar with Magnepan models, but it was a 5 channel setup.

For the first time I heard Wilson’s sound good. I was surprised. It was a smaller model?? Sasha or Alex maybe?
It was the Alexx with Wilson Audio Subsonic tower subs in the corners behind the speakers. The Alexx's were powered by the Relentless amps, and the subs by the "dinky" Progression amps. The man running the demo said they had the subs running 20Hz and below.

Did you hear the big Sonus Faber off the Mac 1.2kw? Bass was fairly phenomenal
I'm a Sonus Faber fan, but something wasn't quite right with the setup, but yes - the bass was all there!

Listened to all 3 Logan’s 11/13/15. Tough to put those in the small rooms - bass seemed a bit big ...but in a bigger room... I could definitely see it. My first time hearing the new lineup.

The carver amazings sounded veeerrryyy good with his cherry monos. I’m not sure how you get what appeared to be an 8’ tall linesource to disappear in the approx 12x14 room.
I still have my Carver TFM25. When I get more serious about checking out some tubes, Carver is on the list as well as Conrad Johnson. The Conrad Johnson dealer from Chicago, Superior Audio I think, could not have been more gracious!! He offered to bring amps over to my house when I'm ready!! Very nice man.

I also liked the TAD room.

The YG acoustic setup in the auralec room sounded very nice.

The ps audio an3 prototype showed some promise in a complicated room
So much great gear. My first show and it was a hoot.

I’m w you. I’m still loving my setup.

After I got home Saturday night, I thought about what I might be lacking in my system. Then after hearing some of the same systems on Sunday and how different they sounded, I realized some tweaking had been done and some missed the setup (D'Agostino/Wilson sounded great Saturday, but not Sunday) and some got it right. Bottom line, like I used to say when I was 5 years old - "I'm happy what I got". I am, however, adjusting for more bass after hearing what great bass sounds like, and frankly, I'm noticing how much more dynamic the sound is with increased bass. I'm playing with my dual subs, parametric eq, and the bass controls on the Expressions. It's interesting and fun finding out which music works with each setting change, and what doesn't.

 

[JonFo]

... I am, however, adjusting for more bass after hearing what great bass sounds like, and frankly, I'm noticing how much more dynamic the sound is with increased bass. I'm playing with my dual subs, parametric eq, and the bass controls on the Expressions. It's interesting and fun finding out which music works with each setting change, and what doesn't.

You are right, better bass can really set a system apart. Not raw 'quantity', but quality, and at the right frequencies. For us panel people, we are typically lacking in mid-bass, so I've found that the MidBass Modules I recently added made a significant improvement. But they are a bear to dial in, as delay must be correct to the millisecond. However, the tactile sensation improvement is magical.

Thanks for sharing your impressions of the show.

 

[ttocs]

hmmmmmm, mid-bass, I'll have to check more into that. You're right about the tricky "dialing in", it's very touchy and I've been auditioning various types of music to see which recordings "over-react".

Here's the D'Agostino / Wilson setup. The subs are all the way in the corner with almost no space to the adjoining walls. If you look closely at the meters on the Relentless amps you'll notice they are providing a lot of watts (about 600 watts where the needles are) to the Wilson Alexx speakers!