It is fairly reflective fabric, but fabric nonetheless. When the fabric was taken down and acoustic treatments were being put on the sheetrock, the room was dramatically more lively. When they recovered it with the fabric, it became more damped than I expected.
You are correct in than it is a synergy issue. The preamp is likely wrong for the Lamm. The tara cables were nearly unlistenable with the Lamm. In the end I may have been able to take a step forward, but it would have taken quite a bit of retooling (At the very least, all Valhalla and a new preamp not to mention power cables, etc, etc.). At this point I don't have the time or money to do that. As you might expect, just to audition this amp took easily 50+ hours over a period of 4 weeks. I will look forward to listening to your system later this year. I hope it doesn't make me want to go down that road:). BTW, I really love the way my system sounds now anyway.

bflowers February 26, 2009 18:25

sorry it didn't work out because you missed out on a match made in heaven for that speaker.
As for your room acoustics you said that it has a fairly "reflective" fabric so I am at a loss for how the room is more to the damped rather than to the live side. That makes no sense. I have a VERY damped room more heavily treated than your own and I have to really crank the volume to make those amps clip but if you are only getting clipping by turning the volume 15% above normal listening volume then who cares. IMO the ability or lack thereof of the amps to perform in your room has little if anything to do with your cables so to rewire the whole room is completely unnecessary. When I talked to Marty about your problems IMHO the unknown factor was not your wire or cables but perhaps lack of synergy with your preamp and the Lamm ML 2.1. Now we need to convince you about a tube preamp as well. This would make the best overall result when used with the ML 2.1 but sounds like you made your mind up. I suggested to Marty that if and when you are in the SF Bay area I would love to host you and let you hear what your speakers can achieve

oneobgyn February 26, 2009 17:17

Had a chance to extensively audition the Lamm ML 2.1 SET amplifier in my system. Many view it as an excellent match for the Wilson Alexandria. I ultimately decided to stay with the Boulder amplifier for a variety of reasons. First of all, my room has a complete acoustic treatment package that we covered with a fairly reflective fabric. Nonetheless, the room is more to the damped side than live side. Secondly, my room (or me) does not like uncontrolled bass. These issues I believe posed challenges to the Lamm. Notably, I like the tube sound in general. Who wouldn't really! I however wouldn't describe the Lamm as tubey. It was pretty neutral overall. In many ways more similar to the Boulder than I would have expected. The problems were that initially I was clipping the amp with the standard Wilson woofer resistor. When I changed that resistor to the one specified for tube amps, I could still clip it, but only by exceeding my normal listening volume by 10-15%. I probably wouldn't do that often, but on an occasional bass track I might want to hear the system thump a little. If the room was more lively, the volume might never get to that level. Secondly, because the bass was slightly "looser" than with the Boulder, there was a tad of overhang that muddied of the image. I would say that there is plenty of bass present, it was just not quite as tight. Everything else about the amp was great, timbre, voices, etc. I also noticed that the amp performed much better with Valhalla than with the Tara. I suppose I could have made the amp work, but I likely would have had to recable my whole system and maybe even change the preamp. I'm just not up for that. I often thought (as many suggest) that if I had gotten my speakers first, then the amp, then matching the rest would have worked out well. Anyway, I love the way my system sounds today (more details on that later) and am glad I got a chance to hear one of the world's finest amplifiers in my system.

bflowers February 26, 2009 14:37

Congratulations on a wonderful system! We must get together sometime for a Fort Worth listening session!

arthursmuck February 23, 2009 22:16

Microstrip

I would love to hear your report. Are the speaker subs active or passive?

oneobgyn February 02, 2009 19:05

I am curious to have a second independent opinion about the Lamm's ML2.1 with very large speakers. I am "hosting" a pair of JmLab Grande Utopia Be and, although they are not as much efficient as the X2, they can be used in bi amplification. The second pair of terminals drives only the big subwoofer speaker, crossed at 50Hz. It seems a good candidate for a ML2.1 / solid state amplifier duo!

microstrip February 02, 2009 15:29

Unoear.

I agree completely. When I had my ARC Ref 600 Mk lll's I used the 4 Ohm tap.

oneobgyn February 01, 2009 17:52

Yep, the 8 ohm tap also worked best for me when matching the Lamm ML 2.1 amps with the Wilson X-2s. However, when listening with ARC amps I preferred the 4 ohm tap.

unoear February 01, 2009 15:45

I use the 8 Ohm tap. I didn't like the 4 ohm tap

oneobgyn February 01, 2009 14:54

OneOBGYN:

What taps are you using on the amp? Wilson recommended the 8 OHM tap. Have you played around with that at all?

bflowers February 01, 2009 14:42

Valhalla throughout my entire system

oneobgyn February 01, 2009 09:38

Spent some quality time with Marty this evening. I am fortunate to have such a resource. Things are still clearly evolving. It is definitely better today vs yesterday, but still not to where I would commit to them. You should give Marty a call to get his impressions. There is some question as to whether we are clipping them. What power cords have you used on them?

bflowers February 01, 2009 01:52

I swear by this tweak. Many are bogus or not as good but this is the real deal. I have used it since his version 1.0 to this most current iteration and it does what he claims and don't ask me how. It opens the soundstage, and lowers the soundfloor and creates an airiness to what you hear

oneobgyn January 31, 2009 16:36

Hi I have to 2nd the Purist burn in disc. It's done wonders for my new maxx 3's.

I still think they are changing some ever after 60 day now...I run the burn in disc via the procedure, low volume, play it once then 4 times in a row. I do this about once every two weeks. Things are really easing out and the bass more fluid. Resolution seems a bit better also.

jfrech January 31, 2009 15:20

Leave the amps on and just run a signal through them non stop for several days OR use a burn in disk. I use the System Enhancer from Jim Auld at Purist Audio Design. You should have something like this to use in your system on a monthly basis for maintenance or to use whenever you add a different piece of equipment. Ity is worth the $150.

http://www.puristaudiodesign.com/products/accessories/sysenh.htm

oneobgyn January 31, 2009 14:36

They are obviously not completely broken in yet. I expected them to be much more "different" than they are compared to the Boulder. I would describe them as pretty neutral. I expected a bit more "lushness" than they are producing at the moment. That is not a criticism, just an observation. There is still a bit of congestion to the sound, thus the soundstaging is not correct as yet. Marty is coming over tonight, so we can bias the amps. I also will have him bring some Valhalla over as I expect that to be a better match with this amp. I did solve the ground loop issue. My theater stuff is on it's own circuit and goes to a different subpanel, versus the three circuits that serve the 2 channel. I tried cheater plugs first, which helped, but did not solve the problem. When I unplugged the interconnects from the preamp that come from my prepro and serve the right and left channel on unity gain, the hum went away. I have left them unplugged for the moment, but will have to figure out a long term solution for that.

bflowers January 31, 2009 14:07

You have to be kidding right??? There is simply no comparison in any way between those two amps especially with those X-2's. You're right...the ML 2.1 is indeed a match made in heaven. I will be surprised for you to find otherwise. Did you eliminate the ground loop hum?

oneobgyn January 31, 2009 11:12

Just put the Lamm ML 2.1 SET in play 48hrs ago. Many believe these and the Alexandrias are a match made in heaven. I am anxious to find out. So far I am surprised at how similar (not the same!) it sounds to the Boulder 2060. I guess they are both just good amps. Stay tuned.

bflowers January 31, 2009 10:50

Rugyboogie,
Thanks for you comments. They are really starting to lock in now. They are truly wonderful speakers. Delicate, yet powerful. Compared to the Maxx's, the most notable differences are the top end is smoother and the bass is improved. I've admired your system on many occasions. I even tried the ASR Emitter which I thought was a very nice amp.

bflowers January 12, 2009 12:27

Congrats on your new Wilson's.
They must be sounding great just about now.
Very nice room and well thought out. I bet you are going to love the new set up.
Take care,

rugyboogie January 11, 2009 11:07

The distance from tweeter to tweeter is 116 in and to listening chair 140 in. BTW, sounding better every day.

bflowers January 03, 2009 18:53

Brian

Just curious as to the distance from tweeter to tweeter as well as distance from speaker to the listening position.

oneobgyn January 01, 2009 11:39

System edited: New pics

bflowers January 01, 2009 11:29

It only gets better. I promise. IMHO it is one of the three top speakers made.

oneobgyn December 23, 2008 14:54

I may not have the language to express things properly, but here is what I noticed. I initially moved the speakers further back, then slowly moved them more and more forward until they ended up about 3-5 inches further forward than the initial placement. Bass loading, in the L corner especially, was a problem. There was a zone where I would also get a "warbling" or "ringing" with female and some male voices. Generally timbre was not right. Things sounded flat, congested, and less detailed. Also soundstage depth was non existant. All of these problems were worse the further back the speakers were, except for the warbling voices which would disappear, reappear, and then disappear again as I moved the speaker out from the corner. We were very meticulous about getting the speakers the EXACT same distance to the listening chair. I think this paid more dividends than I would have expected. The whole process took about 4 hours. We found after spiking initially that one speaker was off by an inch, so we had to jack it up, put the wheels back on, move it, and respike it. As you know, no simple task on this behemoth of a speaker. Would be worse if Wilson didn't provide such an excellent tool set. Marty still feels like there is some more break in to go. At this point it is orders of magnitude better than with the Maxx's.

bflowers December 23, 2008 13:51