Your path to Sonus Faber
 

I'm a relatively new SF Amati Futura owner. They replaced Wilson Sasha 1's about 8 months ago and are my first SF speakers. I was evaluating Magico S5 against the Amati Futuras. At the end of the day, I appreciated the Magico's technical prowess but didn't love them. The AF's just made me smile and relax into the music...my left brain went quiet and the right brain just took over!

Over a period of 15 years, my speakers have included:

NHT 2.5i
Audio Physic Virgo III
Quad 2805
Martin Logan Spire
Wilson Sasha

As I reflect back on my speaker choices, it's clear that I was driven to speakers with transparency (lack of coloration) and detail. The Amati Futuras represent a departure for me, and one that I have found both rewarding in terms of musical enjoyment and relaxing in that I am no longer chasing unachievable goals. Now its just about enjoying the music.

It would be interesting to hear from current and prior SF owners. How did you come to choose SF speakers, and where you are on your path towards musical enjoyment.

Thanks,

Dave

My path is similar to yours. I have to admit that their good looks attracted me first. IMO, the best looking speaker on the planet.

The sound is very gentlemanly, very easy to listen to and simply enjoy the music for hours. Non-fatiguing is a major factor. Great bass that had to be tamed with dsp in my room. No big deal.

What I found, however, is that with a substantial portion of my musical tastes, they were too polite. Metal, hard rock, even fusion had a "bite" taken out of it. The SF were great for jazz, classical, classic rock but anything that requires what I can only describe as bite and rocking, they were lacking.

Ultimately, I tired of the stacks and racks of equipment, the cable rats nest and overall look of my system. The Avantgardes offered me everything I desired in a small footprint with a sound signature that better suits my preferences. I also think that digital active crossovers and dsp for timing and phase alignment, built in to the avantgarde zero, is the future of hifi.

I agree with your characterization of being polite and gentlemanly. Martin Colloms described them as rocking in a rather grown up manner. There are times that I do miss the bite, but overall my listening preferences are consistent with the strengths of the AF's: singer songwriter, acoustic rock, and jazz.

I totally get what you are saying about simplicity though. I recently went to a full function preamp and eliminated a line preamp and a 3 box phono preamp.

Dave

Your musical preferences are perfect, then. Also, like your avatar, the AF play the dead very well. Their bootlegs could use the help the AF's give a lot of recordings.

Your path to Sonus Faber
 

I have never moved quickly with my speaker choices through the years - other than my most recent change which occurred in less than 3 years.

Marantz in the '70's
Bose in the '80's
Infinity in the '90's to 2015
--- RSIIa until 2012
--- IRS Beta until 2015

SF Stradivari since. I see these staying a looooong time!

"Also, like your avatar, the AF play the dead very well."

Agreed. And some of my favorite Dead is their acoustic music including Reckoning, Workingman's Dead, Bear's Choice, Garcia/Grisman. To me, it all sounds very good on this system.

I've had my Amati Futuras less than 4 months.

My path has been shaped by my music collection (for a given price point, what speakers make the greatest percentage of my cds sound enjoyable). Stellar sound for a few well recorded titles is not what I'm looking for. That said, my preference changes from time to time back-and-forth between rock, classic jazz, and classical music. Therefore, the speakers I've owned vary in their musical presentation.

First mostly pop/rock started me on horns (Cerwin Vegas turned into Klipsch). Then a lot of jazz and vocal lead to planar speakers (Apogee). Back to mostly rock, and not wanting to give up transparency or neutrality, ushered in the "jack of all trades" Infinity Prelude MTSs, GoldenEar Tritons, and JBLs. Long story shortened, somewhat... I wanted speakers that could do a lot of things right, make most of my music collection sound from good to awesome, and be aesthetically pleasing (WAF) in our great room. Enter the Sonus Faber AF.

Initially, I too found them a bit too polite for a number of cds (not helping matters, my Plinius power amp is sweet, and the room is on the dead side). So, I added a McIntosh C50 preamp to the mix and bumped the 2.5k and 10k knobs up 1-2 dB. Mission accomplished... after repositioning them 4,750 times. They sound so sweet, have the "bite" or "jump" restored , and make my toes tap and move about. :music:

Kirk

binaural... Welcome to AA! :wave:

Thanks Masterlu!

Our Amati Futuras are about three months old. When we got back into the hobby in '08 (having had Infinity RS4s since late 1983), I couldn't find a SF dealer here. We went back and forth over the B&W 802Ds and Wilson Sophia back then, and settled on the B&W, but liking both for different reasons. A bit after buying our B&W 802Ds, a dealer in town had SF briefly, and we did really enjoy the Cremonas, but were not really in the market.

When we were looking at the McIntosh C2500 preamp last fall, the dealer had a pair of AFs to demo with the C2500. We listened and fell in love with the combination of "sweetness" and detail, and pretty much made up our minds in the course of an afternoon.

So this time around, we didn't demo a whole gamut of speakers, but fell in love with the AFs, and admire their elegant lines as well, which for me adds to the experience.

As I write this, I'm cranking Sweet Emotion at advanced volumes, and don't feel they lack with rock, but that said, they do get magical with classical pieces like Serenade for Strings or Violin Concerto in D by Tchaikovsky, and jazz: Midnight Sugar by Tsuyoshi Yamamoto on 45 RPM LP is like having that ensemble in the room, to cite just a few tracks that hit home.