Hi LL,
Thank you for the thoughtful reply! I can assure you that Avantgarde is an electron microscope. (As is MBL).
Do I see you switching to horns down the line?
Thanks, Caesar. I have always been agnostic as to horns v panels or cones. While I acknowledge 'characteristics' of the designs, I have found great panels and others that did not inspire. Same for cones and horns.
My sense has been that horns always had such great potential when I heard them, but the balance more often seemed very off. Great alacrity but not much tonal depth, or a disjointed presentation...and yes of course sometimes 'shouty'.
In the case of the AG Trios, they were categorically the first that has finally gotten me to say 'that was special'. I
still found the treble that one day harder than I preferred...something I would definitely want to investigate unequivocally before making any commitment.
That said, YES, I see that it has the potential to be the only speaker I have heard that (for me) tops my current favorite speaker, the Rockport Arrakis...but I accept that even if I became confident, the AG Trio G3
could create a rounded, pure and supple treble, I would still want to be sure I could get repeated and committed setup with them because a solo effort on that is not something I would want to take the risk on when even professionals admit they find them very very demanding of the set up.
Interestingly, given that both Mike and J Heilbrun seem to think high power and AG Trio G3 is not inappropriate (and in case of JH, have heard he likes his Dartzeel 468 monos with them)...I do wonder if the Robert Kodas could be a perfect match with them. Only one way to tell, and that is definitely not today! Perhaps someday. And if the match was indeed exceptional, then YES, I could see it being a next and final move up.