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Auditioned Magico A3 - VERY DARK...

So today after waiting for months to try and listen to the Magico A3, I went to Scott Walker audio at Anaheim and listened to the Magico A3, connected to some VAC Tube amp, being fed from a Sony audio streamer, here are my impressions:

- They look fantastic, I wish they made them in silver too, but they are just great in brush black aluminum
- They're quite small and could fit everywhere
- Fit and finish is impecable
- The bass they generated was nothing but amazing for such a small cabinet, you could hear the drums, the down beats and incredible depth of bass at an amazing level
- Imaging was INSANE, you could literally place everyone and everything...
- Sound was VERY VERY DARK!!! This was a bit of a surprise, the top end lacked for my taste to a quite a degree
- I felt like the combo of the Tube amp and Magico lacked resolution, while bass and mid was great, the top end absolutely lacked resolution
- The sound was extremely laid back, again dark
- It does NEED POWER, like he had to crank the volume up, to get good sound out of this, so be aware of that

Overall, I "personally" did NOT like the sound, it lacked details and resolution at the top end, while it was great at the bottom end.  Now, the rep and I think this is mostly due to Tube amp, and connecting it to a solid state amp would bring back resolution, but we simply didn't have time to do that today.  I look forward to listen to these at another time with some decent solid-state amp, but as-is, I was NOT as impressed as I expected and wouldn't have purchased one and I strongly believe Tube and Magico A3 do NOT go well together! 

Anyone else with similar impressions?! Curious to know what others may think, or maybe there was something else in play?

Thoughts?
alexb76
hocheye's avatar
hocheye
38 posts
 
Yes, it may take 25 to 30k in gear to make a 10k speaker sing, The higher the resolution the more you will need to spend.I like dark sounding. Which my speakers are not and nowhere near the price of the magico's.
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pwhinson
97 posts
 
I know this is an old post but I heard the Magico A3 for the first time last week and I absolutely agree with the OP....very very dark tonally,...on an absolute basis way too much bass, although that bass was tuneful actually and articulate it was WAY to high in level, so much so that it pretty much obliterated what might be going on farther up the frequency spectrum. This was on classical music. And yes I attend 2-4 concerts monthly of the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra and even though they play in a relatively dead over damped hall that sound is NOTHING like the A3’s. Amplification was Constellation, pretty highly regarded. Pretty shocked at this actually because I had high hopes. Never was a speaker ruled out so quickly. My reference system at present is pass amplification, Aesthetix preamps, PS Audio Directstream DAC and I’m 61 and over the decades I’ve had ARC gear, Soundlabs(1) (the smallish "Pristines"), Magnepans, Acoustats, BAT amps, etc etc, which is all to say I’ve heard ALOT and this is just tonally DARK, waaaay so.  @haloman, the S5 is a different best altogether, especially the Mk I.  The S5 Mk I (which I havent' heard but I'm depending on the opinion of my dealer who showed me the A3) was the real home run of the S series in particular but at least according to my dealer they shelved down the tweeter level in the Mark II and now, while no where near as dark as the A3, its considerably darker than your Mk I's.  Of course that was in response to some feedback that the Mark I's were too hot on the top apparently.  So I'm well aware that there is a subjective element to all of this but occasionally you get into the realm of differences that are so profound they are beyond "preferences" and I would put this dark, bass heavy characteristic of the A3 on classical music in that category. 

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