L/R upgrade and a new amp, not convinced...

[r3zon8]

My existing setup is a 4-5 yr old Pio elite recv (110wx7 i believe) with DefTech 1000 for L/C/R. Recently, I was fortunate to come across an open item set of MartinLogan Preface tower speakers at a blowout price so i couldnt pass up the chance to own towers.

So new setup is same Pio elite as pre/pro, Emotiva XPA-3 separate, ML Preface L/R, DefTech 1000 Center

I have 25 days left with the Emotiva's in-home trial period, and frankly I'm not too blown away from the improvement in sound by stepping up from the Pio+ML's to the Emotiva+ML's. The Pio+ML's sounded 'great'. And Emo+ML's do sound 'better', but I was expecting 'amazing' considering the power of the new amp. IMHO I was expecting a much more pronounced upgrade considering what I had read.

That brings up the question of the center speaker; is the DefTech 1000 center too small for the separate Emotiva?? I would assume at normal/low listening levels the speaker would benefit from the additional power, cranking it up and the speaker might hurt. But given all my listening (mostly movies) is done at medium/low volumes i didnt think it would be a problem to keep the DefTech center in the mix. Any thoughts?

I've gone through the Pio MCACC(mic calibration) wizard a few times just to make sure, but I'm at a loss as to why I'm not feeling this was such a great upgrade.

any ideas? should i look at a new center? I dont want to keep throwing money at the problem but what started as a small upgrade has grown out of control...

 

[saeyedoc]

Unless you were driving the amps in your AVR to clipping or there was something wrong with them, there's no reason to expect an external amp to change the sound.

 

[j_garcia]

Unless you were driving the amps in your AVR to clipping or there was something wrong with them, there's no reason to expect an external amp to change the sound.

Highly likely this is the exact reason. An amp won't change your sound in dramatic fashion, it will just give you more of it.

 

[Irvrobinson]

I wouldn't expect to hear a dramatic performance difference from the Emotiva, given that your main speakers are relatively small and relatively sensitive (92db/2.83v/m). Those they are rated nominally at 4 ohms, which presents a challenge to some receivers, ML claims they are compatible with 8 ohm rated amps. The differences between properly functionally amplifiers are subtle at best (and some argue mostly non-existent).

As for the DefTech, as long as you're not abusive, in home environments overly powerful amps really aren't a problem.

 

[BoredSysAdmin]

At Low/Medium volumes I think you'd benefit more from new matching center - My guestimate it should be this one : Amazon.com: MartinLogan Encore TF Center Channel (Black): Electronics

But don't hold me on this one - I'm not ML expert

Pio Elite had always had a decent amp sections, and while ML's are 4ohm, they have very high sensitivity so I don't think you need emotiva for these.
For true electrostats - yes - additional amps would be highly recommended

edit: Damn, several people beat me to the punch

 

[r3zon8]

Highly likely this is the exact reason. An amp won't change your sound in dramatic fashion, it will just give you more of it.

Got it. Could it be I was reading too much between the lines when I would read how alive, opened soundstage, clarity, accurate bass a separate high quality amp would give to a set of speakers like the ML Prefaces considering how power hungry they are?

The Pio elite is only 8ohm and would heat up quicker when I upgraded to the ML's and cranked it up a bit.

Again, I do hear details like footsteps, echoes, etc in better detail with the Emo but again, is it just me since I'm testing it and we all tend to crank up the vol when we're 'testing'.

 

[r3zon8]

I wouldn't expect to hear a dramatic performance difference from the Emotiva, given that your main speakers are relatively small and relatively sensitive (92db/2.83v/m). Those they are rated nominally at 4 ohms, which presents a challenge to some receivers, ML claims they are compatible with 8 ohm rated amps. The differences between properly functionally amplifiers are subtle at best (and some argue mostly non-existent).

As for the DefTech, as long as you're not abusive, in home environments overly powerful amps really aren't a problem.

Agreed, my approach was misguided a bit then. I was convinced the large ML towers(considering I was coming DefTech 1000 Bookshelfs) absolutely needed more power and would then sound better.

Guess I'll be packing up the XPA-3 shortly..

At Low/Medium volumes I think you'd benefit more from new matching center - My guestimate it should be this one : Amazon.com: MartinLogan Encore TF Center Channel (Black): Electronics

But don't hold me on this one - I'm not ML expert

Pio Elite had always had a decent amp sections, and while ML's are 4ohm, they have very high sensitivity so I don't think you need emotiva for these.
For true electrostats - yes - additional amps would be highly recommended

edit: Damn, several people beat me to the punch

Thats exactly the center i was looking at.

 

[j_garcia]

My receiver is rated at 120W and my speakers are also 4 Ohm and decent sensitivity @ 91.5dB, but my rooms have been quite large, so there tends to be more demand. I definitely notice the XPA-3s benefits, even over the previous Marantz MA500 Monoblocks I had these speakers on.

With other bookshelf speakers I've owned, I had tried different amps with them and didn't hear much of a difference with any of them, but they were 8 ohms, easy to drive and in smaller rooms.

 

[zieglj01]

Thats exactly the center i was looking at.

Encore TF center
I use to own that speaker, it is a good one - no extra amp was needed.

My Pioneer Elite, can drive speakers lower than 8ohms

Also, take a look here
http://www.ebay.com/itm/MartinLogan-Encore-TF-Center-Speaker-New-Box-/221044958012?pt=Speakers_Subwoofers&hash=item33774e633c

 

[GranteedEV]

The biggest bottlenecks in any system are always the room and the speakers, assuming the source content is good. You're experiencing "reality", something a lot of audiophiles like to disqualify.