Another 2,000 Speaker Question

Given your response to Trelja's post, I second Mikec's suggestion of Dunlavy speakers, although for your price range and musical tastes you might want to think of used SC IIIs, which have good bass to 40hz or so, fine for most rock, folk and jazz (I think you'd prefer them to the less-expensive SC IIs, which might sound a little bright or lightweight due to having less bass extension). Dunlavys work well on long walls, and are relatively easy to place and drive. Very neutral, and highly involving as well. Good luck!

I hesitated making Trelja's suggestion earlier, as you are focusing on speakers now, but I was thinking the same thing. The Dunlavy IIIs are, as I said, easy to drive, and my personal view from having listened to them for many years at my dealer's and from having owned John Dunlavy's previous design, Duntechs, is that they come alive with tubes in the midrange, so you can keep them on the list of speakers that will do well with tubes. Since you had asked about them, Maggies are excellent speakers as well, but the 3.5s really need a lot of power and a good deal of room, as noted above, to come alive; not sure about power requirements for the 1.6s, have heard them only with 200 watt solid state amps (I personally like them better than the 3.5s, and they might be a better choice for you as they don't need as much space and you don't really need the extra bass of the bigger Maggies) and they do have a certain magic to them. All of the speakers I've seen mentioned in this thread with which I'm familiar get the midrange right, but they do have different presentations, overall balances and strengths; if there is any way you can hear some of them, you should try, as you may well fall in love with one of them. Perhaps there is an audio society or group in your area with members who have some of these speakers? Good luck!

No need to apologize, some of us are still asking these questions after years in this hobby! As far as Maggies and tubes, I have not heard them with tubes, but there are internet sites of the many extremely happy Maggie owners which may be of assistance to you; perhaps someone here can give the net address. Another alternative is to use a solid state amp but a tubed preamp; I know many Maggie owners who use that combination. If you go all tubes, they will do well with intricate and fast-paced rhythms. They generally may not have the instant-on/instant-off dynamics you can get from solid state, but I feel they have a more natural portrayal of real-life dynamics that you'd hear at an unamplified concert. Keep in mind I'm a tube fan, though! The size of the room and the ceilings won't be a problem, although you may want to look for efficient speakers that don't need a lot of watts to play loud (there are very powerful tube amps out there, though). On subwoofing, we all have our opinions, mine is that most well-designed tube amps will give you good bass down to about 40-50 hz, and the quality of that bass is excellent. If most of the music you listen to does not have substantial bass content below that frequency, go with a speaker like those noted in the above posts which have reasonable bass extension, then get a subwoofer later only if you think you really need it. Integrating a subwoofer is not as easy as we'd like, and you are better off doing it at a lower frequency than a higher one, as a general rule. Hope this helps a little; I'm sure there will be helpful posts from our other members on your questions as well.

Trelja's post is, as usual, on the mark. I'm not the world's most technical guy, but I've had no trouble dealing with my Audio Research and now Jadis tubed equipment since I was weaned from solid state about 12-13 years ago. There is obviously more maintenance involved, as you eventually do have to replace tubes, and you may have to adjust bias (although some tube equipment is self-biasing). The sonic trade-offs with solid state are pretty much as Trelja states; there are also a lot of threads on this topic you could take a look at here, as you will see it is a never-ending debate. To me, tubes just do a better job of conveying the soul of the music, rather than the technical strengths and weaknesses of the recording itself. As far as what speakers I use, that wouldn't help you much, as I have a four-piece system which is not yet, to its designer's chagrin, commercially available, where I use tubed amps for the satellites above 200 hz and solid state amps for below 200hz (I listen to a lot of full scale orchestral and organ music, so I need the last octave of bass). I'd still prefer a tubed amp for below 200hz, but finding one that will handle 20 to 40hz is difficult and expensive. Trelja's also correct in that you should probably focus on the speakers now, just keeping in mind the possibility of tubes for the future. Too many choices at once can lead to audiophilia nervosa, or something like that!

Undertaker4, I was waiting for the electrostat users to show up. You should make a point of listening to your friend's M-L, as the transparency of the midrange may be your cup of tea, and the lack of deep bass may not upset you. Abstract7's cautions are excellent, and you should heed them. As far as the preamp/no preamp debate goes, I think that if you like the tube amps sound, you should consider going with a tubed preamp as well. Going straight into the amps with a CD player will give you better dynamics (I actually tried this with my Jadis tubed preamp, which clearly softened the initial edge of transients but, again, in a way I find more approximates a concert hall) and probably a little more low level detail, but you may lose a little of the tube dimensionality and, all right, I'll say it, pleasing harmonic distortions(!). The main reason, though, would be for the possibility of using other sources, be they a tuner, SACD, DVD-Audio or, most importantly, vinyl. BTW, my brother is a guitarist as well (I am too, but only acoustic these days), and he also prefers using tubed guitar amps for the reasons you mentioned.