"Blown away by KEF/Hegel combo!!!!"

There’s a reason? The stuff a dealer dude gets the biggest cut on will usually be what he has on display...or stuff he doesn’t have to compete too much with other dealers (he’ll call it ’synergy’ n all...)  Other times, certain brands will get together and have a few ’friendly’ agreements with each other and so on....You will learn a lot when you cut through the ’synergy’ bull.

His ears and your ears will never be the same and his ’synergy’ will never be your ’synergy’. There’s no such thing as he’ll put together some synergistic sht for you because he knows best. That’s the first lie....The second, third, etc are all the above mentioned reasons.

There’s a reason that KEF uses Hegel in many of the shows and dealer events that they do.

@madfloyd 

Thank you.  It was very interesting hearing your take on your KEF/Hegel experience at your local Magnolia at Best Buy.  It seems that we heard pretty much the same musical attributes from this wonderful combo (did they use H600 at your Magnolia?).  Obviously, different locations, rooms and acoustics will effect the sound of the same audio set-up (if they were indeed identical).  With that said, in the room that I heard the system in, I didn't feel that anything was missing in the sound quality from this absolutely incredible speaker/integrated amp combo, including warmth (warmth is subjective), or, especially bass extension.  I was simply amazed by the deep, tight, dimensional bass that was being produced by this incredible audio system, For me, there was just the right amount of warmth for my taste, and to my pleasure.  I lean more to the neutral, natural, detailed and transparent camp for my musical taste, so I was in complete audio nirvana!!!  Thank you for your valued perspective.  Happy listening  

@knownothing 

Yes!!! I agree with you wholeheartedly Lol!!!  In years past, Magnolia was definitely more audiophile oriented, not just because of the audiophile high-end audio equipment they sold, but also because of their far more passionate, knowledgeable and audiophile oriented  staffs.  Those were the good old days.  Over the past 30 years or so in the hobby, I’ve owned and enjoyed various types of speaker/amp combinations, including ribbons and horn speakers, driven by an assortment of tube, SS, and Class-D amplification, and I enjoyed them all immensely.  Through all that, I was able to come to realize of just what sound qualities I value most.  I basically value a more neutral, natural, detailed, transparent, ultra dynamic, ultra bass extension, ultra dynamic sound with just the right amount of warmth, rather than a more euphoric, warm (overtly warm), softer, less bass intense (less chest pounding powerful bass), less extended sound, which I did experienced in the past, especially with tubes.  So, I guess an individual audiophile’s sense of warmth, beauty and nuance are highly subjective.  For me, there was plenty of beauty, nuance, and just the right amount of warmth in the sound that I heard out of that simple, down-sized, phenomenal sounding KEF Blade One Meta/ Hegel H600 audio system (it was my kind of "Sound").  Over the past couple years, I wasn’t nearly as impressed by the same KEF speakers being driven by top McIntosh separates in the same room.  I very much appreciate your valued perspective.  Happy listening.  

My local ListenUp dealer was demonstrating KEF Reference 3 Metas with SimAudio Moon separates.  It was amazing sound quality and sold me back to solid state amplifiers.  New SimAudio products were out of my reach unfortunately. A few weeks later they ran the same KEFs with a full Mac system. It too was impressive and very powerful, but I preferred the clarity of the Moon.  They did not have any Hegel amps at the time to demo, but tried an H20 amp given all the KEF/Hegel relations and the 30-day no questions asked return policy at ListenUp.  As I said in an earlier post, the Hegel was nice, but I couldn’t get the SimAudio amps out of my head.  Ended up returning the Hegel and found a quality used SimAudio amp at TMR so this story has a happy ending. 
 

BTW our local Magnolia/Best Buy shop is a nightmare. A lot of poorly arranged mid-fi stuff with kids that don’t know much. Not likely I’ll be going back.