Hi James, I see a lot of people here don't seem to think that speaker
placement is important. It is imperitive. If the speakers are
positioned badly (such as too close to walls) the sound will be
horrible.
I have to admit that the choice of Quad 11L's for rock and roll is a
bit of a surprise. I use the Quad 22L's for jazz, and classical, but in
the days when I wanted to crank out rock, I used quite different
speakers. Surprisingly I found that Klipsch ( I know not true highend
anymore), though not the best for jazz and classical, were good
performers for rock.(I had a pair of Forte II's which can be had for a
good price used)
The one thing I haven't seen mentioned however, is the possibility
that you will need to reverse the polarity of your speaker cables. I
have a preamp that inverts phase, and due to this, I need to reverse
polarity at my speakers to have proper sound. This is pretty common in
better audio components, such as my conrad-johnson preamp.
There is also the possibility that the equipment, even though
reviewed favorably by someone else, really doesn't sound good together.
There are going to be a lot of people who will give you advice, some
good, but more often bad. Try things, and trust your ears. You might
also want to look up some of the forums on www.audiogon.com .
Good luck,
Joseph