Hold off on the speaker purchase, then. Electrostats and planars require lots of "room" around them in order to produce that lovely soundstage. At least 4-5 feet for my friend's Martin Logan SL3's, and 3-4 feet for my other friend's ML Aerius. Wiggler mentioned to me recently that Planars are quite similar in that regard. I have heard a pair of 1.6's too close to the walls; not a pretty sound. Very flat, no soundstaging to speak of. Just make sure you have the room for them... I'm dreaming of a pair of B&W N800 or N801's, but I'll have to wait a few years and another house 'till I have the room for those beasts. As it is, my N805's sound alot better in my space than they would. Matching speaker to room is VERY important....
As for Rotel, I never liked their stuff until recently. I took a Rotel 2-channel poweramp home when I was auditioning and eventually bought my McCormack, and the Rotel was way outclassed by the McCormack and even a little Creek integrated. Very grainy and fatiguing. But I hear their newer stuff is getting much better (and loves to be paired with B&Ws, specifically); and I can vouch for their new RCD-1070 CDP. Excellent, EXCELLENT CDP for the $$. Their build quality is exemplary. My local shop has seemingly dropped Arcam and Adcom b/c Rotel is kicking ass for the $$ right now. I do love thier silver/black look; very classy.
I am actually selling my Cary CD-308 at the moment, another step above the Rotel, IMO. 24/96 upsampling, HDCD, even an analog volume control so you can run it right into an amp if you desire. $1500 new. If you're interested in mine, check my audiogon listing ($975).
As for tubed power amps and electrostats/planars, be very wary. I have never heard ANY tube setup sound good with ML's; they dip VERY low in impedence, and their "capacative load" is not handled well at all by tubes. For example, I used to have a little Jolida tube amp, very sweet with all the B&Ws I ran with it... I took it over to my bud's house and his SL3 sounded like ASS through it. It was almost as if the music was in syrup; very slow, no PRAT, nasty nasty. It was magic (for the $$) with cone speakers, tho. I heard ML's with killer audio research stuff at my local shop, and it just didn't have the juice to drive them; it was a similar scenario although not as marked. Maggies are similar, in my experience... The best Maggie setup I have heard to date is 1.6's through a pair of Bryston 4BST's. I think you need the control of solid state for planars and 'stats...
If you like tubes, look at McCormack stuff. IMO it's the best of both worlds; his gear combines the best of tube (lushness, soundstaging, harmonic richness) with the best of solid state (awesome bass control and grip, timing, extended high freqs). I like some other gear better, but not until you get near and into the 6-figure range (Spectral is a current fave of mine).
I envy you, starting a hifi is so much fun
Topic: ROTEL gear ? (Read 4269 times)