need amp advice for B&W nautilus 805

[koven]

just an update.. i got my mc7100 recently and it sounds about 100x better than the upa-2.. okay, that's an exaggeration but you get the picture, lol.

long story short, this was the sound i was looking for... it's seriously a night and day difference from the upa-2. the bass is cleaner/tighter.. the vocals are much more natural and sounds very realistic.. the timbre/tone is just right. sound is smoother overall, less sibilant and just very rich. after all the reading about mcintosh + b&w, i'm a believer now, no actually, i'm a big fan now. even thinking about ditching the decco for a DAC + mcintosh preamp. or i might get another mc7100 for mono. but we'll see, dont want to get ahead of myself, im very satisified right now and will likely keep this combo for a while.

as for cables, i won some zu cables (wylde/birth/wax) off ebay for good prices.. im going to try that for now and if i'm not satisfied, morrow audio will likely be my next set

i also have many 2" ats acoustic panels on the way.. i will try to take some pictures when everything is done

[harley .guy07]

Yeah I have allways liked the way that McIntosh and B&W worked together. the McIntosh amp is in a different league than the Emotiva so it is to be expected to sound better and the fact that the McIntosh and B&W synergy has allready been established over the years this does not surprise me. I am glad you are happy with your setup and I figured you would be. you can look for other ways to improve things but if I were you I would just sit back and enjoy for a while and let that McIntosh give you the audio bliss you have been craving.

[harley .guy07]

hey Koven if you would not have said the bottom end was so much better with the mac then I would say just to try it and if your preamp has duel outputs try to biamp the B&W's with the Emo on the bottom end and the McIntosh on the top end and see how it sounds. I would probably say it won't be what you want but since you have the amp there you might as well see what it sounds like. Sometimes when you take an amp off of full range duty and put it just for bass use it will tighten up because it is not trying to drive the rest of the speaker. This would be just an experiment and it will probably just prove the McIntosh as a better component even more but hell you have them both there you might as well play with your options. Its just an idea. But most likely in your small room this will not yield any real performance gain at anything but the highest volumes and if your like me your not trying to have a concert your just trying to enjoy some quality music. Just an idea more for the fun of it more than anything.