What were the greatest speakers you've ever heard? - Page 7

The QUAD ESL63. I'd give my left kidney for a pair of my own. Or better yet, the ESL989, or the new 2905.

I hate to be biased, but they'd have to be my dad's pair of B&W Nautilus 802's. I haven't really seriously listened to much high-end gear other than them, but I just find them so musical and involving.

I've heard too many speaker systems to even begin to count - on the other hand, I have never heard a "perfect" speaker, all do something excellent but have some type of failing someplace else.

So the best I can do is list the "memorables", the systems that impressed me, with comments:

- B&W 802: I prefer these to 801's as 801's need a huge space to "breathe" and that simply isn't available in most home installations. So 802's more "restricted" LF response fits well "into the space" they normal see themselves installed in and can sound truly wonderful (but are, truly, power hogs (only when we attached the legendary Citation XX did we truly find out how much...))

- Celestion 600: with copper tweeter, a glorious midrange that truly redefines small speaker power requirements! With the titanium tweeter, probably gains a bit more HF extension but loses, maybe, 0.5% of that "sweetness" (in other words, the loss "seems" there but you can't put your finger on it).

- Wilson WATT / Puppy: sounds much larger than it really is

- ITC 1/4 system: you've never heard of them, and it's a terrible shame. The ITC 1 is a transmission line-loaded 3-way micro monitor, silk dome tweeter and midrange, matched to a upwards-firing woofer with a outboard active line level (insert between preamp/amp or in tape loop) processor to make the response flat to 50Hz. The ITC 4's were an add on, years later, of a stereo pair of transmission line-loaded 12" subs with outboard active line level processor to make response flat to 20Hz. And no bull about that, either. Rich, the designer, came over with the 4's, set them up with our demo 1's using RTA, and played his own personal live digital PCM recording of the organ and choir of Boston's First Church of Christ Scientist in performance, tri-amped (monoblocks for the subs, stereo for the 1's).

Ouch.

Duck and run for cover.

- some various Martin-Logans: very picky of system and placement, but when right gives a wonderful midrange with some "difficulties" in other areas. But when everything is right, the "difficulties" when you do get that midrange is worth it.

I did hear ESL63, DQ-10, etc. About the only speaker that I didn't get to experience, but wish I did, were Infinity IRS Beta. But still, "speakers are speakers" and maybe it's me just not being picky enough or realizing that they never truly sound "perfect", no matter how hard they try - so I've learned to make allowances. Or maybe it's the attitude you get after you've been in the business - that is, "Ho hum, another system..."

Sonus Faber Extremas from the 80's. I have heard bigger more expensive speaker systems, but these remain my all time favorites.

There's something magical about smaller speakers - that is, imaging, the thing larger speakers have difficulties doing thanks to diffraction and cabinet resonance. Most of my favorite speakers are either small (Celestion 600, ProAc Tablettes, ITC1, etc.) or have small enclosure pods for their midrange / HF drivers (B&W 800 series, etc.). "Impact" be damned - I'd rather have glory everywhere else.

My absolute favorite where these ginormous electrostatics that were nearly floor to ceiling in an Alexis Park hotel room at CES '05.

I can't remember which ones they were, but they sounded amazing. And they didn't have any dynamic drivers either, which was amazing.

If I see them again, I'll be sure to take pics.

-Ed

I can think of two times...

The first was listening to the Hales Trancedance 8's driven by Wadia Power DAC's at Wadia HQ in Saline, MI.

The second was Magnepan 3.6's driven by some big tubed Audio Research amps at Audio Dimensions in Royal Oak, MI.

In both instances, I'm sure that the gear driving them made a lot of the difference.

That was probably due to the Krell gear. Hard & bright everytime I've experenced it.

I heard the same Hales system and didn't like it. The room was partially to blame, but my first impression was someone left a sub turned up way too high. Major bass overload that muddied up the rest of the music.

I will agree with Tom on the Maggie 3.6. I love Maggies but don't have the room or amplifier power for them.

I currenly use Merlin VSM-MM speakers which are one of the best "normal sized" speakers that I have heard. Their little brother, the stand mounted TSM-MM with a REL sub isn't far behind either.

I aso like Quads (old & new), the Goldmund Active speaker system I heard was really nice, Martin Logans I liked last time I heard them, Pro-AC speakers were pretty good too.

I have heard Wilson's on several occasions, never liked them.
Cold, sterile, no soul, no life, artificial sound. Why the reviewers all like them I'll never know.

Heard the exact same setup at tweeter in December and pretty much had the same impressions. The ML's were the Aeon i's. Electronics were a $4K Krell CD/SACD player and a $2.5K Krell integrated. Also heard the $4K Focal Profile 918 and they sounded like an even worse value for the money. The room setup at that Tweeter wasn't too bad; I wonder what those speaks would sound like with different gear.

Best I have heard (well the ones I wanted to own the most) were Avalon Acoustics' Radian HCs as part of the "2C3D" system with Spectral components, MIT cables and room treatment by ASC.

I used to spend a decent amount of time at Progressive Audio in Columbus, Ohio and this system changed the way I think about home audio. It isn't the highest dollar system ever, but the synergy created by the complete system was nothing short of amazing. I listened to the Grand Slamms in the next room with their $100k monoblocks and $75k turntable and it wasn't the same. Progressive Audio gave me the opportunity to hear a lot of great systems (and meet Jim Thiel) but 2C3D is the one I would want in my home. That being said, I wouldn't turn down a free set of CS6's with some Audio Research components.

The best I've ever heard are the MBL 101E, which I now own. It took about 2 years of soul searching, but I finally pulled the trigger about 4 months ago and will never look back. I'm listening to them right now!

They're not perfect by any means, and at 82 dB (in)efficient they need a LOT of power/current to get the best out of them, but that problem is now solved with a pair of MBL 9008A monoblocks and an MBL 6010D preamp. They seem to really come to life at about 85-90 dB and beyond, so I've got to be careful not to play them too loud all of the time. It's kind of addictive.

Their major strengths are full scale dynamic impact and this uncanny sense of "being there" type of realism. It's hard to explain precisely but they're very lively and have incredible punch, as in punch you in the nose, knock you out flat on your back, bleeding all over the place, head spinning, and yet still grinning. But they also sound great at lower volume levels (or with more "peaceful" music). They have 3D holographic type of imaging unlike anything I've ever heard before. Each voice and instrument occupies it's own space, and no matter how complicated the passage is, nothing gets cluttered.

My next step will be to build a better room for them. They're truly worthy of it. I'm thinking along the lines of a 22' x 30' x 16' home theater so they can fully open up. Of course that would mean that I'd need to add 2 pairs of MBL 121 speakers (surrounds and rears), an MBL 111RC center channel, and more electronics. Some day. Not any day soon, but some day. For now, I'm very very happy with my setup and the room limitations don't really bother me at all.

The best speaker system I've heard were a pair of Wilson Audio Watt/Puppy's driven by all top-end Mark Levinson electronics (amp; preamp; DAC; transport). I listened to them at Audio Advice, a high-end stereo store in Raleigh, NC. The salesman let me play around with it for a half hour while he went away to terminate some speaker cables for me. They were playing Tracy Chapman's self titled CD. I cranked up the volume and the soundstage was MASSIVE. The sound was so clean. It must have been a >$50K system. When I went home, I put on the same CD on my system. It made me realize how average my stuff really was (NHT bookshelf speakers, NAD electronics).