Amplifier for Volti Lucerna Speakers

A lot of interesting ideas to think through here. Thanks everyone!

@knotscott I have thought about biamping. It gets into logistics of additional amps and WAF. It also gets into my lack of understanding of how to do it. The main thing that escapes me is how you adjust for loudness differences between, say my DS Kooteney for the minds and highs and a SS amp for the bass. 

@doyle3433 I remember reading your posts a couple of years ago when I was researching speakers. Greg is an interesting guy to speak with although I never have met him. He really likes people to visit and hear his speakers but he felt that I had gone through a lot of different speakers and knew what I what I liked and what I was getting with the Voltis. I have thought about Luxman and need to hear one somewhere to get a sense of the house sound.  

@larryi My room is about 15 x 30 with 9 foot ceilings so it is large. My setup is on one of the long ends with the listening spot 10 feet from there....so several feet behind me. My opinion is solid state is the only way to really here what a large woofer can do...maybe I am all wet!

@trivema It seems more than a few folks like Kt88's. That is what is in my Don Sachs Kooteney. I thought the bass was really good until I heard a couple of SS amps with the Lucernas. The SS was definitely better; perhaps, ultimately, I do not like Kt88's, who knows. 

@78sman I do not pay too much attention to my interconnects but stick to copper. My speaker wire is copper, multistranded, and thicker than lamp cord. My experience is that my equipment changes (Pres, Amps, Dacs. Transports) are all very noticeable and I tend to weed out what I do not like to hear. The differences in equipment seems large to me and fine tuning with cable changes is not something I think is worth the time and effort at this point. I have gone through the tube change merrygoround with preamps and have dozens of aXX tubes that I will never use. I could hear the differences between different manufacturers of the same tubes but once I heard 6ns7's my preamp selection got a lot simpler. I also think that I may be to the point where I have to spend more than $5000 on an amp... it may be time to spend for an Accuphase or Luxman to get into better internals that should result in better sound.... 

Dsper, I pay attention to cables, and I've found that cables often make as much of a difference as components.  Even jumpers make a difference.  I recently upgraded the jumpers on my B&W 80r speakers, and they made a significant difference.

@dsper 

I have thought about biamping. It gets into logistics of additional amps and WAF. It also gets into my lack of understanding of how to do it. The main thing that escapes me is how you adjust for loudness differences between, say my DS Kooteney for the minds and highs and a SS amp for the bass. 

There are several ways to bi-amp, from simple to elaborate with pros and cons for every option. (passive/active, horizontal/vertical, or hyrid).  Adding a powered subwoofer is essentially bi-amping 101, and many subs have a gain level adjustment, and some form of an active crossover.  

My first attempt was to add an integrated amp to the woofers, and use the tube amps for midbass/treble.  (I split the preamp output, but some preamps have two outputs).   I used the volume knob on the integrated to balance the woofer levels with the tube amps and midbass/tweeters.  I left the passive crossovers in place at that time.  Later on I added an active low pass crossover for the woofers, replaced the integrated with a power amp, and bypassed my woofer’s passive crossover...the active crossover had it’s own gain level adjustment, so I used that for level control.  I’ve since added an inline high pass filter before the tube amps...some day I may add more active crossovers, but for now I’m quite happy with things, and it wasn’t expensive or overly complicated. 
 

I made my life very simple, got rid of all my dacs and streamers, took the Pass Labs preamp out went back and forth with the Pass Labs XA-25 and First Watt Sit-4 …so in the end and so much happier, Meitner MA3i dac, streamer,volume control all in one glorious box, hooked directly to the Sit-4 amplifier,to the Lucera….so much better in every way…less cables, simple and sweet sounding…

I've only heard my Rivals with 1 amp + Voltis at the Tampa show for the past 3 years.

My amp is a lowly Primaluna Evo 300 integrated with the following tubes:

Power: 2 KT-150 & 2 GE 6L6's - amp switch on high bias.

Pre: Up front: 1950s CBS Hytrons flanked by a set of Radiotechnique on one side and a pair of Mullards on the other.

The 2 150s give the low end some wallop and the 6L6s have a very well defined midrange. 

The CBS Hytron's gave more midrange definition and a bit more 3D.

I've had some "hifi friends" over with more listening experience and all of them are impressed with one stating it is the closest he has heard to live music.

I do have my Rivals on Townshend Podiums as well as some other good components (not super high end) in the chain which of course help.

On paper, the Primaluna is the weak spot of my system but it sounds so damn good I just don't see a reason to upgrade. 

I also just move my speakers from about a third into the room to stuffed back in the corners (wider) which made a significant improvement to the bass and enlarged the soundstage - which is now huge, but not fake sounding. Pinpoint imaging suffered from that change but the improved bass and SS are worth the tradoff IMO.