Spatial X5 speakers
Just got mine, with upgraded crossovers, a couple of weeks ago. I now have about 250 hours on them - mostly driven by the Voyager Gan 350 wpc class D amp and most recently by Don Sachs 65 wpc tube amp. Speaker Cables are Griver Huffman Pharoah's and the preamp is Don Sachs tube preamp. They are easy to set up as they come fully assembled. Right out of the box they sound promising but the bass is cardboard like and the tweeter can sound harsh. Nevertheless, after about 175 hours, these babies developed a pleasing midrange liquidity and nice open baffle bass. They throw an expansive soundscape that extends beyond the width of the toed in speakers that is also deep front to back. I mean, these speakers truly disappear as in my listening spot nothing localizes to the speaker itself. Both amps drive these speakers nicely. The Sachs amp defitely sounds better using the 8 not 4 ohm speaker posts. I am now getting air with very nice detail and tonal colors.
These speakers are just awesome. They are worth every penny I paid for them. Clayton warned me about the prolonged break in time and he was dead on the money. I just love the OB box less sound. These speakers are awesome.
I hope this thread does not degenerate into a toxic pussing contest like my Voyager Gan amplifier thread.
Thank you for confirming. I wasn't aware. Do you know the xo for the sub? The midbass/midrange seems to be Eminence Deltalite 2512, spec'ed as 99.9dB (of course not for OB). Depending on where these are xo they may or may not get to real 92dB sensitivity and might explain the experiences with low power amps. |
@ hilde45 I have collected some excess stereo equipment intentionally. I love the Pass Lab amps. To my ear, they do solid state right. I actually have another Pass Lab X250.5 amp that will be returned to me after mods after the first of the year. So, I am just throwing different amps at the Spatials in a grand natural experiment.
@ decooney, I am running a range of amps thru the Spatials because I have a range of amps to run thru them. Hard to really predict how they will sound based on wattage. No reason a 20 wpc tube amp should have trouble driving 97 db sensitive speakers yet some have tried some of these amps, and to their ears, they did not satisfactorily drive the Spatials. So I am going to try a range of moderate to mid high power amps, bot tube and solid state, until my ears reconcile the winners. @ hilde45, I do not think the Spatials need soft presentation tube amp to not sound harsh. I am still in the breakin phase at at 335 hours now. During this phase I have gotten some harsh reproduction with the Sachs amp. However, as time goes by the occasional music that can sound this way is definitely lessening. I think this is significantly, maybe not entirely, a break in issue |
@jaymark Totally on the same page with you about trying different amps and not just looking at wattage alone. The Pass XA-25 and some of the Firstwatt amps have proven that its more about quality than quantity of watts. Select output transistors and quality big iron transformers help. Btw, I like the older .5 amps too. While I’m wrapped up on SS and mostly into tube mono amps any more, I still admire a few select ss amps. Following to learn what tube guys are doing with Spatial now in the mid-power 40-60w range, not into fleawatt tube or high power SS any more. |
For X3's, the XO point to the powered sub is 90hz. "The 12” mid crossover point is 2nd order at 1kHz. The driver runs without a filter on the bottom of its range to preserve performance". (Per Clayton) I'm running X3's with Allnic Audio A-6000 300b monoblocks. 50 watts per channel or 60w with EML XLS tubes. The 50 watts from the Allnic amps feels like more than enough for the X3. I've been through a lot of speakers and these are proving to be among the most difficult to get dialed in properly. I'm sure they'll be fantastic once I get everything right in the room and with cabling. Congrats on your X5's. Rooze
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