How does Berning ZH270 compare to Cary Cad211 AE ?

Merlin told me the following:

The Berning like a very fine digital photo. Joule Electra amps are like a walk in a beautiful forest that you just don't want to leave. Me, personally, I like the EAR 890 sitting my listening room right now.

I concur with the accessments of the 811. It is a rather soft and seductive amp with a bit of a soft top and bottom end. However, the VSM-MX is a rather lean and transparent speaker and Merlin told me (it wasn't Bobbie but was another guy there who said this was "Our opinion") they respect and like the Berning but love the Joule. However, the cheapest Joule stereo is $10,000.00 to $12,000.00.

I seem to be rambling a little but you may want to consider an amp that would "meaty up" those speakers a bit.

The Air Tight and EAR are two very different designs, the first being SET 300B and the second P/P EL34. One with 8wts and the other 70. I had to sell the Air Tight because it wouldn't properly drive my Harbeth C7-ES2s. They like and need some power.

The Air Tight was a superb SET and I wish I'd found speakers that were easy to drive and would work in my small room. However, I have to say that I have not for one minute missed the SET "sound" as the EAR is also superb and I get beautiful music making from it. It's also a little quieter than the Air Tight and also has dual mono gain control. That is a great feature on the Air Tight. If the Harbeth was 90db, 8 ohms flat, and had a simple and easy crossover, I'd have not gone looking for a new amp and would have kept the Air Tight. I don't miss it one bit though - the EAR is that good. I bought Stereophile reviewer Art Dudley's unit as he bought the sample he reviewed. He had to buy $20,000.00 Lamms to beat it.

I also found the Audience a bit lean in my system and with a slight upper end hash. I use Cardas Gold Refs for ICs and TG Audio speaker cables.

Tubegroover,

You're exactly right. When I had a large listening room (16 years ago) I used larger speakers being bi-amped with tubes an d could get big dynamic swings. But since being in my small room (11 x 13.5 x 8) I have taken to a different type of listening. I still play symphonies and big band jazz (and rock) but just not anywhere as loud as it tends to really overload the room. I've learned to appreciated medium level reproduction of "big pieces".

By the way, I don't listen to many female vocals. You know, this reminds me of something I read in Automobile magazine about 10 or more years ago. The editor said that a small sports car (like the Mazda Miata) driven at its limits can be as much fun as a larger sports sedan like the BMW 5 series. "It's not how fast the car goes, it's how it goes fast." Besides small good handling cars feel like they're going faster. Just check out the Mazda RX8.