Kharma Midi vs. Sonus Faber Stradivari Amati

Fmpnd is right about the Kharma's diamond tweeter. It's not really strident per se, but it definitely needs the right amplification. In his system, it sounded extremely good, but I've heard it other systems--particularly with solid-state amplification--where it did indeed sound strident. As for the Midi, I owned it and sold it pretty quickly. As Fmpnd indicated, it sounded lifeless and closed-in.

"Yes -- but only briefly at a dealer"

Hooper,
Anniversario is a new speaker I don't think your findings are the right ones for now. The speaker needs a burn-in and as a new model some time to integrate with different equipment.IMHO.

Did you listen to old Amati or new Amati Anniversario, and was it in the same room where you heard Stradivari

The new model and the same room. Actually didn't find the Anni particularly fussy to set up. The Strads were a bit more complicated to set up(for me at least). Whenever I got the midbass coupling right, my upper mids-tweet would be out of focus; when I got the tweet + bass units coupling, my midbass was off... etc:^)

Kops: dunno about break/burn in. The spkrs I listened to weren't out of a box -- but as you say, maybe they needed more time? They sounded very good to me, in any case.

Why the Strads: because I often listen to large orchestral pieces and the Strad reproduced these with more ease, i.e. more palpably. But that's just me & my musical tastes.
Cheers

Gregg, Ghanks for that clarification. I had Strads in my room for almost a week, and they were awesome, and I agree with you, on orchestral work they are great. But I find the same thing with integration, it was just a bit out of sync bass vs mid/tweeter. I thought it was just my room. If Anniversario is somewhat close to Strad on orchestral work, plus if they got coherence right, they will be my cup of tea. One poster (Branimir) owns Anniversario andn claims is better sounding than Strad.
I didn't listen to Anniversaio yet, but Strad is aboslutely magical in musical communication.
If you ever have a chance to listen again to those two, I would be curious to hear your further impression.

Actually I've to listened the Strads (alone) on a few occasions lately.

Generally speaking please note that WE have to place/"integrate" the two spkrs correctly, it's not really the spkrs that "integrate" (for well designed products of course).
Now the tricky thing was: I found a reasonable position fm the back wall (just listening to musical bass freq) and used the usual fibonacci to indicate "optimum" distance fm side walls. Fine. THEN the fun started: ONE speaker (left as it happens) remained in place after we tried mono signal and simply decided that left sounded better than right. THEN, I started moving the other spkr closer (by Generally speaking again, since we're dealing with an aural "pyramid" (reference to visual pyramids in renaissance painting; think of viewfinder focus in older cameras), hi-liting a freq on the right channel can make s/thing on the left channel stand out. If your bass is "insufficient" it may be that you need more OR that the upper-mid is TOO prominent...
If your image swerves toward the left channel, touch the right spkrs and of that doesn't work, try corecting the left spkr (amazingly, moving it forward sometimes)...

Coming back to the Strads, it just a matter of getting used to the wider than usual baffle in "marrying" the two spkrs.

Cheers