Nat Audio - giant killers?

[bonzo75]

There's really no point arguing if you don't address any of my points
Size of room, we can all agree on that
But if you choose not to even acknowledge my contention and counter w black and white statements, I'll move on

What's your contention? You said that I misled saying APogee set up is easy. Never said that. It is challenging. Like Analog. But like Analog, you have the choice to pick up the whole set up. If you go to Henk's and like the Duettas, you get those Duettas with those crossovers. real Estate is much less a challenge for Duettas as compared to Divas, FRs, etc.

Also, don't forget I recommended you horns over Apogees in your room.

Who is skipping the hard bit of analog? This is a WBF. Didn't you yesterday ask Mike if his digital is sounding as good as his analog, and not if he willing to settle with digital over analog? You are bringing in a "difficult to set up issue" that was not part of the discussion and saying I skipped over it. Anyway the conversation is leading to nowhere and we are digressing the point. Am sure this is all to Gary's amusement

If you have 80k EUR and the space and like Henk's Grands, you buy those - not try to buy another Grand and set it up - that will be a disaster - unless you like the other Grands. Same for duettas etc.

 

[morricab]

I haven't heard that system, but kondo and spectral, with kondo cables, might not be the right spectral set up. Also divas might be different from the duetta, FRs, I heard.

My choice for class A at the moment is the symphonic line Kraft, 300w class A, from Germany.

That aside, respect to you, Marc I thought you would be emotionally tied to NATs to say they should work on Apogees. I was wrong.

But this SET for all speakers is a joke. SETs are for certain speakers only. And even there, OTLs like tenor and Berning will embarrass many.

The tone of Apogee works better when driven by a good Class A as opposed to a SET. Ribbons need that current. Doesn't mean all SS will do it

FRs are the second hardest a
Apogee to drive after the Scintilla. I would not recommend SET for and therefore I would not recommend that speaker, period.

 

[morricab]

I haven't heard that system, but kondo and spectral, with kondo cables, might not be the right spectral set up. Also divas might be different from the duetta, FRs, I heard.

My choice for class A at the moment is the symphonic line Kraft, 300w class A, from Germany.

That aside, respect to you, Marc I thought you would be emotionally tied to NATs to say they should work on Apogees. I was wrong.

But this SET for all speakers is a joke. SETs are for certain speakers only. And even there, OTLs like tenor and Berning will embarrass many.

The tone of Apogee works better when driven by a good Class A as opposed to a SET. Ribbons need that current. Doesn't mean all SS will do it

All later Apogees have moderate impedance and average sensitivity. Therefore they draw no more current than a normal speaker of similar impedance and sensitivity...possibly less because of a less reactive load.

 

[bonzo75]

All later Apogees have moderate impedance and average sensitivity. Therefore they draw no more current than a normal speaker of similar impedance and sensitivity...possibly less because of a less reactive load.

Might be on paper. Who knows why, they open up with current. I forget, there is a guy in Amsterdam who owns Divas with NAT magma m, he uses them on other speakers and musical fidelity on Diva, which is his prime system. The magma set 80w are for sale at 6.5k if anyone's interested

 

[morricab]

Brad, you know how the people late to the party are often the loudest...
I just love how Ked declares everything he likes in high end audio is easy and straightforward
Analog better than digital? Sure, we can agree a lot on this, but he's swung by all the uber set up ones, yeah no wonder analog is a no brainer
Try and build a record collection and go thru dozens of hours trying to wrangle good sound out of a fussy tt
I have for three decades and there can be many more downs than ups at times
So yes Ked, no brainer great analog better in our mindset than digital, but just don't skip out the hard bit as if it's a formality
And now the same w ribbons
All I hear from Ked is Apogees are King, all you need to do is buy the best pair that fit in yr room, plop a SS in to fire them, and you're half way there
Well I'm here to tell you that an owner w SERIOUS resources, top Lp set up, uber uber power install, amps off the scale, and a room only me or you could dream of, STILL only got half the picture right ie scale, speed and imaging, the other half badly skewed ie tone, density, humanity of sound
If it was just a case of buying a pair and the rest comes easy, well the evidence seriously points the other way
No criticism intended of your heartfelt enthusiasm for the Apogees, I get that after hearing them
Just don't mislead punters by saying they are an easy choice and setup
The last thing I heard about those Divas was the crossovers needed hours of adjusting
Yep, a real straightfwd choice

I got off the TT merry go round by buy a classic Yamaha GT2000, which was one of the 1980s Japanese superdecks. It far out performs the belt drives I had before.

In the end I went away from Apogees, preferring the low level resolution and better bass integration from big Acoustats

Of course now I have horns and SETs. It is not better in all ways but in some important ways they are better.

 

[gareneau]

Might be on paper. Who knows why, they open up with current. I forget, there is a guy in Amsterdam who owns Divas with NAT magma m, he uses them on other speakers and musical fidelity on Diva, which is his prime system. The magma set 80w are for sale at 6.5k if anyone's interested

Thanks everyone for the dialogue. Bonzo75, you referred to San Diego - that's my birthplace. Who should I see there?

 

[morricab]

You are incorrect. Of course, knowing the way you extrapolate, "most OTLs" would come from the fact that you owned Silvawelds, and heard Tenors somewhere, and decided all OTLs are the same, without having done a proper compare of Tenors and SETs ever. Tenors actually rock at tone. Either way, people reading the forum can choose whether to take your word or Mike Lavigne's and jtinn's for it, and likewise, they can choose whether to go the way you do with Apogees or the way Graz and Henk (and ddk, who is a fan of SETs and owned Apogees but does not recommend the combo). Or of course, they can listen for themselves. Gian was there with me too when we compared Airtight 211 to Tenor

I am not saying TRLs are great either, I wouldn't know, but they are way better than SETs in driving Apogees.

I also have heard Atmasphere several times, a older ones and newer ones. Finally I built and owned Transcendent Sound Beast monoblocks, so, I dare say I have a lot more hands on experience with OTLs than you and I have tried them with many combinations of gear and speakers.

So, you haven't heard TRLs but you "know" they are better than any SET?? Please enlighten us on your prescient visions that you know such things.
i could care less what Henk and Graz think about getting good sound. They are good speaker engineers...

 

[microstrip]

(...) I disagree about Tenors, if you care about tone. It is like most OTLs in that the clarity is breathtaking but once you acclimate to that you realize the tone is a bit on the thin side of reality.

I have direct experience with several OTLs - Futterman, Technics 20A, Graaf and Atmasphere. IMHO OTLs can sound thin with the wrong loudspeakers. We can expect it - OTLs are not able to supply high current and have typical output impedance between 2 and 5 ohm. But with proper speakers, such as the ESL63, SoundLab's or some large Tannoy models they sounded full bodied.

At some time in the past SoundLab modified their crossovers to make them more adequate with solid state amplifiers. It was a disaster to OTL lovers - the pairing become thin sounding. Fortunately they soon developed a modification for OTL owners.

 

[bonzo75]

I also have heard Atmasphere several times, a older ones and newer ones. Finally I built and owned Transcendent Sound Beast monoblocks, so, I dare say I have a lot more hands on experience with OTLs than you and I have tried them with many combinations of gear and speakers.

So, you haven't heard TRLs but you "know" they are better than any SET?? Please enlighten us on your prescient visions that you know such things.
i could care less what Henk and Graz think about getting good sound. They are good speaker engineers...

I have heard TRL - on apogees. I haven't compared with uber SS amps.

 

[bonzo75]

I got off the TT merry go round by buy a classic Yamaha GT2000, which was one of the 1980s Japanese superdecks. It far out performs the belt drives I had before.

In the end I went away from Apogees, preferring the low level resolution and better bass integration from big Acoustats

Of course now I have horns and SETs. It is not better in all ways but in some important ways they are better.

What is better for our room in our budget is quite a different question from what's better. I would expect that with your love of SETs, any reasonably sensitive speaker would sound better in your place than an Apogee, and it's not that you have the room size either.

 

[microstrip]

I also have heard Atmasphere several times, a older ones and newer ones. Finally I built and owned Transcendent Sound Beast monoblocks, so, I dare say I have a lot more hands on experience with OTLs than you and I have tried them with many combinations of gear and speakers.(...)

As far as I remember the Transcendent Sound Beast had a lot of negative feedback to reduce the output impedance. Long ago I was also interested on building it, but discarded the possibility when I discovered about the feedback.

The Atmasphere's have switchable no or low negative feedback, but I always used them without it.

 

[morricab]

As far as I remember the Transcendent Sound Beast had a lot of negative feedback to reduce the output impedance. Long ago I was also interested on building it, but discarded the possibility when I discovered about the feedback.

The Atmasphere's have switchable no or low negative feedback, but I always used them without it.

Nearly all OTLs have negative feedback: Tenor? Yes, Silvaweld? Yes, Graaf? Yes, Einstein? Yes, Atmasphere? Up to the MA-1 yes (S30 and M-60 both have negative feedback), Transcendent Sound? Yes, Futterman? Yes, Counterpoint? Yes, Acoutstat and Beveridge direct drive OTLs? Yes, Nearly all DIY designs on the internet? Yes? Joule Electra? adjustable...probably to zero, Fourier components? Yep.

Feedback is the nature of the beast for OTLs.

 

[bonzo75]

Einsteins are nowhere as good as Tenors and Bernings, and I will choose many SS amps over them. They have the negatives of valves - fake bloom and bloatedness, they do make some things pretty, but roll of violins, don't sound real to me at all.

 

[morricab]

Einsteins are nowhere as good as Tenors and Bernings, and I will choose many SS amps over them. They have the negatives of valves - fake bloom and bloatedness, they do make some things pretty, but roll of violins, don't sound real to me at all.

I don't think Einstein gear sounds rolled off at all. We can debate about tone and timbre but rolled off? Not that I heard.

Bernings are not true OTLs.

 

[bonzo75]

I don't think Einstein gear sounds rolled off at all. We can debate about tone and timbre but rolled off? Not that I heard.

Bernings are not true OTLs.

Very easy to compare Berning and Einstein here in Essex. Einstein has roll off and bloat. It was audible to me even without the compare, but the compare confirmed

 

[morricab]

Very easy to compare Berning and Einstein here in Essex. Einstein has roll off and bloat. It was audible to me even without the compare, but the compare confirmed

What speakers? I have heard the Einsteins many times, with Odeon 32, with two or three different Acapellas and I never heard bloat or rolled off highs with neither their preamp (really not this preamp) nor their OTLs. Are your referring to the hybrids? Those do sound a bit closed-in but not the OTLs. I have never heard Berning amps so I cannot comment on what they sound like but they are not really OTLs so it is not exactly the same comparison.

 

[bonzo75]

What speakers? I have heard the Einsteins many times, with Odeon 32, with two or three different Acapellas and I never heard bloat or rolled off highs with neither their preamp (really not this preamp) nor their OTLs. Are your referring to the hybrids? Those do sound a bit closed-in but not the OTLs. I have never heard Berning amps so I cannot comment on what they sound like but they are not really OTLs so it is not exactly the same comparison.

You can compare them on 115 db open baffle bastanis.

I too have heard them on Odeon 28, and Acapellas. Not the hybrids. The ones on Bastanis are the top OTLs and the top pre. I think the Acapella was the Hybrid. Which actually wasn't closed in. I know Bernings is ZOTL and not OTL but point is it is better.

Btw, you were mentioned on Audioshark when people were discussing what amps to drive the WAMM with
http://www.audioshark.org/showthread.php?t=11081&page=2&p=194310&viewfull=1#post194310

 

[morricab]

You can compare them on 115 db open baffle bastanis.

I too have heard them on Odeon 28, and Acapellas. Not the hybrids. The ones on Bastanis are the top OTLs and the top pre. I think the Acapella was the Hybrid. Which actually wasn't closed in. I know Bernings is ZOTL and not OTL but point is it is better.

Btw, you were mentioned on Audioshark when people were discussing what amps to drive the WAMM with
http://www.audioshark.org/showthread.php?t=11081&page=2&p=194310&viewfull=1#post194310

Interesting...if the WAMMs really have nominal 3 ohm down to 1.7 ohm then I probably wouldn't recommend that speaker at all...let alone using a SET with it. There are other big Wilsons that are SET friendly, so why bother with a WAMM??

 

[Barry2013]

What speakers? I have heard the Einsteins many times, with Odeon 32, with two or three different Acapellas and I never heard bloat or rolled off highs with neither their preamp (really not this preamp) nor their OTLs. Are your referring to the hybrids? Those do sound a bit closed-in but not the OTLs. I have never heard Berning amps so I cannot comment on what they sound like but they are not really OTLs so it is not exactly the same comparison.

I've known bonzo for a couple of years and have always found his ears and judgement to be spot on.
So IME if he heard bloat and rolled off highs on the Einstein that is what he heard.

 

[morricab]

I've known bonzo for a couple of years and have always found his ears and judgement to be spot on.
So IME if he heard bloat and rolled off highs on the Einstein that is what he heard.

If you say so...