[PHC1]

Originally Posted by difficultrun

My next consideration is where to put the new system. We have two choices here: My wife would like to keep it in a smaller room (dimensions are 16’ L x 15.5’ W x 11’ H). We currently use this room as a bar with one wall having cabinets with glass doors. The other walls are plaster. Seating would be about 10’ from the speakers. While I’m not against that, I see another possibility in a much larger room (dimensions are 37’ L x 17’ W x 10’ H). This room is one big room that has our kitchen, family kitchen table and family room. The walls are dry wall and windows/doors to the outside. At the far end of the room in the kitchen area, there is a tile wall with cabinets and a 48” Wolf oven and vent. I don’t know if that will have any adverse impact on the sound. I estimate that seating would be about 10-11’ from the speakers.

After deciding where to put the system, I guess the next step would be to select candidate amps and speakers for audition. I’m wide open for suggestions, although I tend to like McIntosh amps and Sonus Faber speakers — but again, I don’t have any basis for leaning in that direction and have never done an amp and speaker audition.


Gene

Gene, if I may make a few suggestions.

Most important decision is where you want to place your system. That decision makes the selection of speakers easier and more focused on the right speaker for the room.

I would think about where you envision yourself and your wife enjoying the music together the most. Will it be in the bigger room where both of you are comfortable on the couch enjoying a glass of wine and your favorite music?

Will it be more convenient for your wife to have a choice of either actively participating in the musical experience with you on that couch and also having the pleasure of passively enjoying the music as she is preparing a meal in the kitchen?

Or will that dedicated, smaller room be used more often to have a focused, listening session when the mood strikes?

If you discuss this with your wife and both of you come to an agreement, it makes the plan much more concrete.

Having selected the right room for your musical pleasure, I would focus on the appropriate speaker.

You mentioned you like the Sonus Faber brand of speakers. Fantastic choice. Your musical preference and these hand crafted, Italian music makers are a marriage made in heaven for your taste in music and from the aesthetical point of view. Surely your wife will not mind a beautifully hand crafted wood speaker such as Sonus Faber that the both of you can enjoy and be proud of in the bigger room. The Italian craftsmen sure know how to voice these speakers for that type of music, considering the rich history of violin makers in the region and their obvious taste for music, Sonus Faber is a window into the soul of classical music, any stringed instruments particularly come across with an engaging, emotional quality.

You mentioned you like chamber music. Chamber music is a form of classical music that is composed for a small group of instruments—traditionally a group that could fit in a palace chamber or a large room. Here your bigger room is an advantage. While you mentioned you don't listen at high volumes, you can appreciate the scale and realistic reproduction of that type of music in the bigger room.

The smaller room is certainly not too small to enjoy a 2 channel setup but I would approach my choice of speakers differently. In that nearly square, smaller room, I would suggest you look for a high quality pair of monitor speakers and Sonus Faber offers those as well. My suggestion is based on my own decades of experience and I strongly prefer to have control over the bottom octaves in the form of a subwoofer that you can dial in rather than fighting standing waves in the room and problematic bass response of a full range speaker not well suited for smaller acoustical spaces. Trust me on this, if implemented well, you will have a setup that rivals any full range speaker but sounds much better in a smaller, square room.


As to the supporting gear, that will all fall in place and there are many choices out there to compliment the Sonus Faber speakers, McIntosh being a very good choice as well. I've personally enjoyed many years of such combinations myself and highly recommend it.

Let us know what you decide on the room and we can put our collective effort in moving your dream system forward.