Best possible separates for Thiel CS 3.7

Hi pgastone nice to meet another Thiel CS 3.7 enthusiast!I have been a Thiel fan for the past 22 years starting with the CS 1.5 and working my way up to the 3.7s in 2014.For the past 4 years i have been working and searching for my crazy project : building the most high end Thiel system that has ever been built.People might think i'm crazy but hey when you know you will have the budget why not try it, when you are an enthusiast you want to push things to the limits.If you want tube amps that can really drive the 3.7s to their max unfortunately you will not find anythink in the 5K price range.To max them out you need Aries Cerat Concero 65 monos, KR Audio Kronzilla DX monos or VAC Signature 200iq monos.But if you listen at moderate volume you should look at VAC Renaissance 30/30 or PureSound A30 both very musical with the 3.7s and within your budget.BHK 300, Aesthetix Atlas monos, Modwright KWA 150 Sig monos and Hegel H30 are all great choices for the 3.7s but more expensive.If you can find a used Hegel H30 paired with tube preamp you wouldn't be disappointed
Hope this helps.

@pgastone i forgot one other great combo to drive the CS 3.7s is Nagra Classic preamp paired with Luxman M-900u if ever you have the bugdet one day.

Hi Thieliste,
You have a very interesting thread that has generated very good replies and comments from well informed posters. From literally everything I have read or heard about Thiel speakers it is generally acepted that they are best driven by high current powerful solid-state amplifiers.

Both George and Unsound respectively make a strong case for this recommendation. The 3.7 speaker in particular has challenging speaker load impedance characteristics. This would suggest that tube amplifiers and especially SET are non-starters and should be avoided.

You on the other hand make the case that you must actually listen to a combination ( audio components ) in order to judge its performance. I happen to agree with this stance ( within reason ) as I have heard combinations of components that on paper should not work well at all. Test bench measurements and specifications versus actual listening experience.

How on earth can a 65 W SET amplifier sound superb matched to the Thiel 3.7? It certainly defies conventional wisdom. Yet you did hear this exact combination and found it to be fantastic in performance and sound quality.

What type of music genre did you use during the audition and at what listening volumes? I do know that Aries Cerat (AC) it’s far from a typical tube amplifier and that they have massive power supplies and exceptionally stout design. These are big and very heavy products for a good reason.

1 Were there any issues interns of bass performance and control?
2 how was the quality of the all important mid range? I know you are strongly considering the CH Precision which in many ways is the polar opposite of the Aries Cerat I give you much credit for actually listening to thie Thiel/AC combination as opposed to relying exclusively on numbers on paper.

The Ac products are really in my opinion an all out assault on state of the art. So it isn’t surprising that your success with them is proving to be the exception to the general rule in regard to amplification for the Thiels.
Best of luck,
Charles

Charles thanks for supporting my findings.There was obviously a reason for me to drive all the way to Zürich, the only place in Europe where it was possible to demo the Aries Cerat separates with Thiel CS 3.7s just because the Swiss Aries Cerat distributor happened to own a pair of 3.7s.
This demo wouldn't have been possible in France.To answer your questions we have used many genres of music from pop rock to electronica, alternative, jazz and classical.We were amazed how the AC amps handled many genres of music and at prettry loud level.I was really shocked at how the AC amps had an iron hand grip on the Thiels just like a big V12 engine but with dynamics and speed.
The bass was uber stable, deep and highly resolving not to mention the unmatched musicality and richness of the mids and treble, just world class.At €46K for the AC separates i hardly think the €88K CH Precision combo will do much better.The CH amps are the most liquid sounding amps i have ever heard at any price even compared to d'Agostino M400 but it won't have the meat of Aries Cerat IMO.
The AC separates already beat the Ypsilon separates to my ears.IMO Stavros Danos is the real deal in tube amplification now days period!The last step for me would be to demo CH L1+X1+M1stereo on the 3.7s but that's going to be pretty difficult to arrange.One last word, tubes is so magical on Thiel speakers!

As the saying goes, and as Charles alluded to, there is an exception to every rule. And from a technical standpoint I don’t find it surprising that the Aries Cerat Concero 65 SET amp can provide excellent results with the CS 3.7.

First, while the speaker’s impedance is of course very low, as well as challenging in terms of phase angles at certain deep bass frequencies, it is relatively flat throughout most of the frequency range. Which will minimize the tonal consequences of impedance interactions with the amp, that would be problematical pairing many SETs with many other speakers. Second, both the amp (apparently weighing 220 pounds per monoblock) and its power tubes (each of the paralleled 813s has a plate dissipation rating of 125 watts) are monsters. And given the 65 watt rating of the amp the tubes are probably being run conservatively, in a region that provides better linearity than if they were being pushed closer to their limits.

It would be interesting to know the output impedance of the amp, or equivalently its damping factor. (The output impedance of the 4 ohm tap would be approximately 4 ohms divided by the damping factor). If that is relatively low (for a SET), say in the vicinity of 1 ohm (equivalent to a damping factor of 4 or more), it would further account for the amp pairing well with the CS 3.7.

In any event, if you purchase that amp keep away from the wire that runs up to the plate cap on top of the power tubes, as can be seen in this photo. It probably has around 2,000 volts on it. Probably only around 1,000 volts or so on the plate cap of the driver tube, though. 😉

Good luck, however you decide to proceed. Regards,
-- Al