Avantgarde Trios, SETs, and Impedance Curves

I was using my Trios with Audio Note Kageki (really beatiful combination) then with EAR 834T, not as smooth as the Kageki, but no shrill and dynamic like hell then I am using an Altmann BYOB amp with the Trio and my REL Stentor II sub. The most musical combination I have ever heard, period. The battery driven Altmann amp is perfectly quiet absolutely no noise through the speakers at all, which makes all kind of music detailed, rythmic, smooth and flowing, quiteness is an important aspect when the speaker sensitivity is above 108 dB/W/m.

Hi Theloveman,

sorry for the slow answer.

I am using only one REL sub and yes it can go up enough, the REL Studio III can not do this but the Stentor can. My room is only twentysomething square meter with some tricky furnitures. My listening level is not too high, so I never felt I need more sub. The only amp which was as good to my music listening habit as the Altmann, is the EAR-Yoshino 834T integrated, which I was using between the Altmann and the Kageki for few months.

I just got a DEQX digital crossover/room corrector and planning to try a multi-amp, digitally crossed system where one amp (Altmann BYOB with Altmann Attraction DAC from the digitalout of the DEQX) drives the Trio less sub and the other, sub way is driven by the DEQX as well through another Altmann DAC to the line level input of the REL. This way an almost perfectly timed integration is possible between the Trio and the REL sub. I hope so :-)

Hi Theloveman,

actually you are quite right regarding the active multiamp setup. I was thinking of it a lot, but I definitely would like to use the digital output of DEQX to drive 3 Altmann Attraction DACs plus 3 Altmann BYOB amps and the active sub. However in the meantime I realized that soon we will have to move to a new home and in the new home there will be not enough room to take the Trio over so I probably will be forced anyway to change (sell) it, and I am looking for the Zu Definition Pro as an ideal replacement candidate. In case of the Zu two ways for the active driving would be enough, one for the sub section and one for the rest, as a kind of compromise.

Regarding the Altmann BYOB amp, it is very difficult to compare it to any tube or SS amp. It just sounds right and to be honest I can not explain what is the reason. It does not have a real signature on the sound just let the music flows. Since I own the Attraction DAC/BYOB amp I am just spending my money buying all the different music on different media like CD, DVD and LP. If there is anything in the music to entertain you and grab your attention, this combination will give you the best part of the music. It shows the quality difference between recordings, but does not require your attention to deal with it, you have to deal with the music content only. To be really honest after owning $100k plus amp and CD for some 6 years I can not imagine to find anything which suits me better. On ANY price and I am talking about $2k for the amp and the DAC plus a Macbook against $100k plus amp and CD. I am hooked.