I've been shopping for some Aerius mains and Cinema Cetner speakers for my HT. The guy at Tweeters says that the Aerius are not particularly power hungry and my Denon 2800 will work fine with them.

A salesman at another store (who sells Magnipans and not MLs) says that I'd never be happy with the MLs unless I got an amp worthy of them. If I just had to go with a Receiver/Preamp/Amp combo, the least I should do is a B&K 305.

For me buying the Aerius and Cinema would be an expensive upgrade to my system. Throwing in a B&K 305 or better would over double the cost. At double the cost, I'd probably forget about upgrading.

Anybody have any thoughts on which salesman is right?

yeaa you should be going with B&K 305...i could get into and explain it...but i'm tired right now.....robert custom a/v p.s. post again if you want a explaination

Hobson,
If you were to go with a more basic Denon receiver, you would not be getting the performance that the ML's can offer you. I have ML's and yes they require (like all electrostatic and planar magnetic) a significant amount of high quality power.
I would recommend going with a dynamic driver speaker system if you want to stay in your budget. Dynamic driver systems are much more common and have been perfected for nearly 50 yrs.

John

John,
Thanks for your thoughts on this. I could bite the bullet and take this plung if I thought it would be worth it. Maybe you you (or anyone else) can help me with this decision.

Have you been happy with your decision to upgrade to the MLs and all stuff to handle them? Are your MLs bigger than the Aerius? If so, did you go larger because of a very large room, or because the bigger ones sound that much better. I have a 21'x 22' room to fill and believe the Aerius will be large enough to handle it. Do you agree?

I currently drive some B&W 602s with my Denon 2800. So I'm trying to decide how much of an upgrade I will be getting for the $7K or so I would have to spend.

Thanks for any input on this.

Hobson

Hobson,
A new ML has been introduced to replace the Aerius. This speaker is called the Aeon. This would be a better solution than the Aerius. Granted a larger ML doesn't necessarily have to be in a bigger room. Remember, the larger the panel, the better the resolution. You can have a relatively small room, but go with the Ascent because the Ascent resolves a lot more than what the Aerius can ever do. In other words, performance is much higher.
If you finally plunker down for the ML's and get yourself a better receiver, not only will you benefit from better speakers, but better electronics and amplification. Overall, the entire system will sound incredible. I mean Incredible!
I have the CLS IIz's which are ML's full panel electrostatics (they don't have dynamic woofers). I need very good electronics to make them sound right. My room is roughly the size of yours. I chose those speakers (they are very large) because they have incredible detail.

John Y. Chao
Sound Components

Might I suggest another possibility. Perhaps you should consider a receiver, such as a Marantz SR5200, which has pre-outs for all channels, and then consider a used amplifier. Used amps are a great buy since they are very reliable, and can usually be had for about half of original value. I have a pair of Magnepan MMGs which are powered by an ATI 1502 amp, which puts out 150 watts into 8 ohms, and about 225 into 4 ohms. They have a six channel model, the 1506, which could be bridged into an incredibly powerful three channel amp, which would be perfect for powering a ML center and a pair of mains. Some will argue that using a receiver as a preamp is a compromise, and while this may be true, this is a perfect upgrade path, since any muscle amp you buy today will still be good even if you eventually go to a separate processor.