GoodSoundClub - Romy the Cat's Audio Site

In the Forum: Audio Discussions
In the Thread: A quest for a better monitor.

Post Subject: Druid's & FrankensteinPosted by montepilot on: 11/10/2009

I have the Zu Druid's which Romy has referred to. I purchased the speaker's based on the presumption that their high sensitivity and impedance would be perfect to run SET amps. After having read the great success Arthur Salvatore had running the Frankenstein 8W SET amps with Israel Blume's full range speakers I thought it would be an excellent match. Initially the combination worked out well. When playing music that was not dynamically challenging the combination was quite satisfying. However when I played large scale symphonic music the underpinnings of the orchestra was missing and I felt the amps were struggling to perform.

I was curious how more power would affect the performance. An opportunity became available for me to purchase David Bernings EA-230 stereo amplifier at a modest price. It is rated as a 30W triode amp. A friend who is very familiar with David Bernings amps provided a box of NOS tubes to roll in place of the stock Yugoslavian tubes. The new tubes provided a quite audible improvement in all parameters.

The extra power from the Berning made a noticeable difference in performance. What was surprising was that this push/pull amp was not very far behind the SET in transparency actually they were very close. This was extremely puzzling to me. I expected that the extra power would allow large scale orchestral music from clipping or distorting but I did not expect that a amplifier made and designed in the early 1980's would perform this well in comparison to the 8W SET. This seems to run against the "established" way of thinking.

Currently I have both amps set up in my system which allows easy switching between the two. I have not been able to settle on one amp over the other. On certain music I like the Frankenstein amps on other music I like the Berning. Switching between the two amps provides me quite satisfying musical enjoyment that I have not experienced in a long time. However I would like to have an amplifier that provides the best characteristics of both amps to completely eliminate switching between the two.

My opinion is that the Zu Druids can be quite satisfying speakers if they are given the proper amplification. I agree with Romy that the specifications and hubbub that the speakers are SET friendly is stretching things a bit. I will be interested in pursuing the suggestion to "heavily highpass" the speakers. If this makes them more compatible with my current amps it would be a win win situation.

Rgs,

montepilot

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