Sashas and MC2301s
 

The wife and I had the great pleasure yesterday to spend a couple hours at the home of Neal, aka Beerdraft, listening to his new Sashas :drool: driven by his 2301s and a BAT preamp (we never did get to the point of discussing the preamp in any detail). Neal's in the midst of completely revamping his system and will have BAT amps real soon.

The sound was terrific, and really open. The Sashas are good looking too, bringing a bit of aesthetics beyond utilitarianism to their lineup. My wife was very excited about the Sashas and if the time comes, I won't have to worry about buy-in from the war department!

Neal was a gracious host, and for you guys in Belgium, he introduced us to a delicious Maredsous blonde to tickle our taste buds while we enjoyed the music. :thumbsup:

Did he say why he replaced an entire Mac system with BAT?

Tommy,
I'll ask him to check out this thread and chime in so I don't misrepresent him. Neal's quite articulate about what he hears, and he can best explain what he's heard, especially since I didn't get to hear it with the C500 in the setup.
Paul

:thumbsup:

Yes, I'm done with the blue lights. The Sasha and the C500 with 2301's powered by EAT kt88's and Siemens ECC801S tubes was a real winner and nearly made me slow down on my efforts to make changes. That said the BAT REX preamp was heavy on my mind. I just couldn't take it so I bought the REX. The REX I had heard was rated by many as one of the top 2 or 3 preamps in the world at any price. I heard it once in Chicago and just knew I had to have one eventually. The REX really brought out more naturalness and detail which I can go into on another thread and I nearly stopped at that because the 2301's sound so good with it. I will not sell my EAT tubes until I'm sure I won't go back to the 2301's. These tubes made my 2301's a different animal all together and trying to buy 16 more of them if I don't like the bat 600 watt mono blocks will be costly. I feel good about the new BAT amps though and I have a pretty large room so figure the extra head room on watts will be good as well.

My system before McIntosh was all BAT. I think the BAT/Wilson Sasha combo will be enjoyable if not a touch dark sounding.

Tell your wife she has excellent ears and taste. :thumbsup:

The Sasha are one incredible speaker. I think its the best speaker I've heard at any price. I was a huge B&W fan but one listen to the Sasha made me sell my entire system. I was also very happy with my Mcintosh pre and amps. One listen to the BAT REX made me put all my Mcintosh gear up for sale to. Its not a huge jump from the C500 to the REX but at this level what is a huge jump? The REX is a $20k pre with no phono and the C500 is a $12k pre with a very good phono, that said the REX should be better although price doesn't always dictate that. What made this decision easy for me is that I'm giving up on phono and had sold my TT.. If I was going to stick with phono I wouldn't have made the switch just because it would cost to much for my budget. The REX isn't as airy and seems much more natural and quick for sure. Its detail in the different layers of the stage are so nice and everything is so dead quite on the stage that you absolutely miss nothing.

Beerdraft,

congratulations on your new system. I am using a scaled down version of your new system: BAT VK-52SE, BAT VK-600SE and Wilson Sophia 2. I couldn't be happier with the results. Excellent synergy. What will you be using for sources and cables?

Congrats on the new gears beerdraft. Be sure to post some pics for us to drool over.

Hey very nice, I like the Sophia to. In fact if I was going to stick with phono I would've gotten the next step down from the REX and gotten there top of the line phono stage to go with it. I think that is the VK52se and it is upgradeable to the REX. I nearly started to get the 600se dual mono but with my power to get rid of the 2301's I wanted to go up not lateral on power. These mono-blocks still require two power cords so that means I need to go buy more power cords. I never heard of a mono amp needing two cords, WOW!!!