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My personal in-home tube experience thus far was restricted to small output amps below 20 wpc. Yet I am familiar with the real world of watt-almighty tube power from my friend Ricky's McIntosh C1000+MC2102/Dynaudio Temptation Evidence setup. The Audio Space combo duplicates that illusion with the Dynaudio Facette quite faithfully though on a reduced scale. I never knew these slender floorstanders capable of delivering this kind of breadth and grandeur without betraying their suave, organic and neutral nature. And bass extension was appreciably improved. I guess the valve bloom was helping. No wonder Audio Space has been using Dynaudio speakers in their recent audio shows around the world.

Ultimately, it was the Audio Space/Apogee synergy that gave me the most musical enjoyment. With the Centaur Minor in particular, timbral accuracy combines with exquisitely rich tonal harmonics to give musical instruments and vocal rendition that nail-biting realism and involvement. Musicianship is effortlessly communicated. There must be some chemistry on tap with the amps and the 6.5" woofers and 26" ribbons for the overall frequency spectrum to not merely be coherent but fully extended as well. I've never heard such convincing low-octave bass from them. On that note, the Stage, to my surprise, fell slightly behind. The specs on both these small Apogees are identical yet somehow the Stage, which employs ribbon woofers, is cleaner and more articulated in bass response. When I bi-amp them from the NuForce P9 and Ref 9 SE + Ref 9 V2, I prefer to add paired Infinity BU1 down-firing subwoofers that happen to fit perfectly behind the Stage stands. Thanks to the magical valve bloom, the Audio Space combo has the ability to wring more bass response from the ribbon woofers than the NuForce combo. Not only that, the midrange is richer and fuller, making up for that smidgen of bass slack compared to the Centaur Minor. Now I can comfortably turn off the subwoofers. Solo instruments and vocals are well focused although orchestral tutti lack the definite layering and resolution of NuForce. To a lot of people, this is a good trade for musical warmth in return.

It's odd for me to say that procrastination paid off. But it did. I am glad that I didn't submit my review before Christmas. Now one click and all my 6 months of hard work were deleted from my hard drive. I didn't bother saving a copy. I didn't feel that to be a loss because it had become irrelevant. What's relevant is that this is a truly, admirably musical system capable of matching a wide variety of speakers, with most of mine not so amp friendly. My heartbreak was healed, my high expectations met. Now I was in the mood to experiment more and dig deeply into serious tube rolling and the unusual features.

Tube rolling
Adhering to the Centaur Minor and Mark & Daniel Maximus-Monitor as the reference speakers, I rolled through Bernard's private collection on the Pre-2 and arrived at the following conclusions:

Valve Electronic C. V. 1985 6SL7GT: These tubes offer telltale textural details and clear-cut definition. They have the honesty to expose everything. String fortes in a close-mic'd recording become unapologetically sparkling and even abrasive at times, which in fact is realistic if you have heard real violins at close range. In soft lyrical passages, string ensembles carry an overtone luster with a pearly sheen. With piano recordings, you can discern a Steinway from a Yamaha, the latter always distinguished by the brightness in the highest octave. These tubes also yield the deepest soundstage and unwavering imaging.

Sylvania 6SL7GT/VT-229: The strength of these American tubes is their ability to beautify everything they touch with a buttery suaveness and poetic mellowness. Presentation is always polished, with a minimum of compromise in attack and transient speed as well as soundstaging and imaging.

Shuguang 6N9P: These Chinese stock tubes are rich in harmonics, sweet in midrange yet punchy enough to kick out rock-solid bass from the 6.5" woofers of the Centaur Minor and Maximus-Monitor. Soundstage is expansive with well-focused imaging. In depth-of-field camera terms, if the Valve Electronic is f22, the Sylvania is f8, the Shuguang f16. These tubes seem to have everything in the right balance and I would strongly advise potential buyers to give to the stock tubes a fair audition before investing in overpriced NOS.