Sonus Faber Amati Homage versus Vandersteen 5A

Good point. We are here to help each other and many of us feel Amati reproduces music in a very special way regardless what the current industrial measurements indicate. When you measure a real Guarneri vs. a $500 violin, there will not be much of a difference. I have talked with several big name amplifier engineers and they openly admitted measurements were for reference only, not absolute final design which were done by ears. I knew because I had to send in my amps for service (lack of bass) and they said measurement were fine, but they also heard lack of bass!

Bottom line is I have owned too many speakers and settled on a pair of Amati (along with two other pairs of SF for "backup") for one reason, they reproduce music with greater emotion which is what most of us try to recreate at home. I was a big fan of Dynaudio and owned several fine Dynaudio speakers in the past including the fame C5 several times, but their latest offering (C4 in particular) lost my business due to "fat" bass and weird styling. Otherwise, Dynaudio is another fine choice among other elite speakers.

I am not a big fan of MTM design, let along MTTM in newer Dynaudio. One can usually hear the smearing effect of critical midrange with MTM, whether it's adding or subtracting. At least in this department, SF, Thiel, and Vandersteen all chose the right approach.

Nothing against Vandersteen 5, but they don't have that "jump" factor you often get when listening to live music. Randy of Optimal Enchantment (Santa Monica, Ca) is a big Vandersteen fan and I have heard V5 there seveal times with very fine front end (ARC Ref 2 Mk II, ARC Ref Phono, Oracle V, Graham 2.2, ARC VTM-200, AQ something). Bass extension is quite a bit better than Amati as expected, but for lack of words, they still sound like other Vandersteen except more refined.

Bruce (forgot his user name) had a V5 for sale on Audiogon a couple years back, I introduced him to Dynaudio C5 and he never looked back and have gone thru several pairs of Dynaudio since. Not saying Dynaudio is better, but I am not alone in thinking V5 is a little soul-less.

Good luck with your search. Buy whatever that please your ears, you are the one who is spending the money.

I agree with Stevecham, the Sonus Faber web site was not a bit useful to me, I can't believe I could not find anything about their products!

Stevecham says he belives that Krell is being used, I belive otherwise. Dont say stuff you cant back up.

With all the Outstanding amps made in Italy in Europe , a Krell is not lickly the voicing source, but thats my take , its just as valid as the speculation the Fool Stevecham made.

Dont make claims you cant back up.

I agree Sonus Faber site can use some improvement. Afterall, they are selling electronics.

But Italian thinks differently, they think of their creations as art and can't be captioned with spec or description. They want people to judge their products based on how they sound, not spec. Maybe they are right, maybe not?

Like Rolls Royce, they don't quote their HP.

Stevecham, guess you are a F1 fan as well :)

I have met and hung out with France Serblin and a few Sonus Faber reps on a few occasions when the Amati's were introduced a few years back. For the record he doesnt use Krell for anything, he uses a pair of home made triode amplifiers he built himself. More bogus info from a jackass..........