My friend with the Grande Utopia Be's went through every generation of the flagship Infinities and Genesis products before settling in on the Grandes and is loving the fact that the drivers don't deteriorate.
The Evidence is a fantastic speaker and despite being tall, it is VERY easy to place in a room compared to a Grande and will operate in a fraction of the space.
As to hardware, the Audio Research Ref is great stuff but simply not enough for Grandes (or Wilson Alexandrias). They love a kilowatt of power on tap so if you don't have 2000 Series Boulder, Reference MBL, Accuphase M8000's, or the big Soulution mono amps, forget it as they will never work right. A speaker at this level was never meant to be practical or easy to setup but when you really do get it right, it is mind boggling and makes the dollars spent fade to a distant memory. I will gladly extend an open invitation for a demo if you are ever in the area as I would be curious if it would change your mind.
Rockports are also deadly good and very easy to place and power by comparison but when the Grande EM's are set up correctly, the Rockports fall behind. Especially if you value the lower registers and a perfect full-scale presentation that can do complex orchestral without skipping a beat.
At this level, it is mostly all fantastic so we are just splitting hairs based on setup, environment, budget, and preference.
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Originally Posted by DaveBSC  The supporting hardware definitely wasn't the issue in the case of the Grande Utopias. The amps and source equipment were all Audio Research Reference series. I suppose its possible that the room was simply too small, although I've heard the massive Dynaudio Evidence Master in that same room which sounded excellent. I just remember being absolutely floored that the $16K/pr Confidence C4 driven by relatively modest Levinson electronics sounded better on just about every level when compared to the Utopias, and all of the other JMLab demos I've done have been similar disappointments.
Heck, I remember hearing the old Genesis APM-1s which I think sold for around $10K originally, and I liked those better than the Utopias. I suppose it's always possible that in the right room with the right equipment I'll "see the light", but after everything I've experienced, given Utopia EM money to spend on speakers, the last place I would go is to JMLab.
My first instinct would probably be the Rockport Arrakis. My experiences with Rockport speakers have been the polar opposite of the JMLabs, they've all been absolutely spectacular. There are also several others that play in that $200K range that I would want to try like the MBL 101X, and the Marten Coltrane Supremes.
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