Tubes with Thiel CS-3.6's? has anyone had success?

Zaikesman: I am not having anyone on... I would never do that, especially here. I purchased the 2A3 amps to use with my DIY single-driver speakers I'm building. In the meantime, I hooked them up to my Thiels - yes, they do make more than enough SPL levels for classical/jazz for my ears in my room. But, the CAT preamp has a signal gain of 24 db which goes a long way in making them work the way they do for me. Granted, they cannot handle orchestras, rock, choral, pipe organs, etc., but string quartets and the such come through loud and clear. Heck, even symphonies are handled for the most part satisfactorily. I'll dust off my Radio Shack sound level meter and post back what I get at my normal listening levels.

My mainstay amps that I currently use with the Thiels are a pair of Mark Levinson 20.6 monoblocks (100W ea). I'm not saying that all SET's work for everybody's setup the same, but don't outright dismiss low power, high dynamic headroom SET's with 86 db/2.83V/4 ohm speakers - especially that most listening levels in a lot of living rooms are produced by far less power than one would think. But if you're tastes lean towards shaking the walls... and, to recall, this thread stated that "... volumes are kept very low..."

Gs5556, I didn't really doubt you, I was just ribbing you. I don't dismiss low power - I've just never been set up to exploit it, as I like to listen to all kinds of material, and at higher levels than your amps would drive my Thiels. You are an explorer, and diverse too - hope your SET's and homemades work out well.

Bryhifi, despite Elevick's misgivings, you will not be in danger of damaging a tube amp by presenting it with a lower-than-optimal-impedance load, due to the self-limiting nature of the beast, but you won't get the power you paid for either. So I wouldn't worry about "failures", just sound that might not be up to what you've been used to in certain respects. But since you say you just want to get your feet wet before jumping in, who am I to say that you're risking not being persuaded by the results? When I ran my 2.2's from the MV-55, the combo did sound better than my previous SS amps, but those weren't even in the same county as what you normally use. Best of luck!

i have thiel 3.6. i used them with a krell 200c (now up for sale on audiogon) until about a year ago, when i moved to a bat 75se (75 watts per channel).

i chose the bat partly because it's one of the few tube amps that can easily go to low impedence levels, which the thiels need. (and it doesn't hurt that at lower impedences, an amp gives up a more power.) i chose the bat also because i wanted an amp that didn't get too tubey. i've never felt that i had too little power with the bat, but then, i don't listen to music very loud.

the differences i hear between the krell and the bat with my speakers are essentially those fundamental differences between solid state and tube amps. for example, joni mitchell's voice is more sensual and fleshy with the bat amp - yeah, sounds more real! - but the drum kit playing in the background has more punch with the krell amp - whoa, that defnitely sounds more real! (maybe the "kick" in the drums is an issue of power?) i also like the broader soundstage i sense with the bat, but on the other hand the krell enlivens the images within that soundtage (the bass, man!).

at least with these two amps, you're always trading off realism in one area to get realism in another. ultimately i've come to see it as a zero sum gain between these two amps. for me, however, i value listening to, say, miles davis in glorious hi-fi much more than, say, keith moon. that is, i'm okay listening to the who on a boom box, but less so miles. now the difference between these two amps is all in the nuances, not boom box versus hi-fi, but at this point it's those nuances that we chase after. so i've stayed with the bat because it's the more appropriate amp for what i most like listening to in hi-fi.

i think the choices available to you in tubes with the thiel 3.6s are very limited. if i had fallen in love with another tube amp at the time - one that wouldn't have worked as well with the thiels - i might not have gone tube because bulky speakers like the thiel 3.6 are hard to sell.

today, if i could very easily sell my speakers and get new ones, i would give it serious thought - not because i don't like the 3.6s, but because now that i've committed to a tube set-up, i suspect that another speaker might be a 100% match instead of 90% (am making up numbers here). but then again, maybe not - i really don't know, but i would appreciate hearing feedback from people on this point.

Turnaround, maybe you've noticed that Thiel lately seems to be paying more attention to making their speakers a bit easier to drive than sometimes in the past. I do not think this is specifically in response to demand by tube amp users, but more for the home theater market, where one multi-channel amp may be called upon to drive several speakers and do it well. So it may be interesting to wait for the introduction of the long-anticipated replacement 3-series model, which could well improve on the 3.6's sonics while not being quite as much of a pig to drive. Mere speculation, but it does seem to be the trend around there.

Zaikesman, with the the 1.6's it seems that Thiel is making their speakers more efficient/sensitive (I still don't know which term is technically correct). I can't help but feel that their efforts may be a bit misplaced. I think keeping the impedance load over 4 Ohms would have a greater appeal.