Looking for passive speakers. Something with a high mid emphasis and sparkle. $100 or less.

Klipsch are fairly bright/mid driven - I think there's a few Synergy and Quintet line models that'll fit into your budget. You might also see if you can't snag a pair of Yamaha NS-333; probably a bit more balanced sounding (less bright), but very good.

If this is for nearfield use, I would stay away from the Klipsch anyway. Many people find the horns fatiguing, and I can't imagine they would be good up close.

 

I don't know whether they have the characteristics you want, but the Pioneer SP-BS41 ($65 off w/ promo code EMCJNNE72) are considered some of the best sounding speakers for the price. 

 

Also, at your price range, you are probably better off getting something like the Pioneers rather than being too picky about the frequency response emphasis. There aren't that many speakers out there in your budget range that are considered very good. And that's an understatement. 

+1. I assumed this was for a 2ch rig, not nearfield. Perhaps wrongly.

Forgot those Pios were still in production too.

 

Best Buy and a few other places are carrying the new versions of the Andrew Jones Pioneers, but Newegg still seems to have tons of inventory of the old ones. 

 

Huh??? Sure it is. Those speakers are passive. You have to buy your own speaker wire, though. 

 

Nope. Those are not female RCA plugins. Those are standard speaker connection posts that allow bare wire connection or plugin of banana connectors. Most speakers use those these days, except for the very cheap ones that have the spring clip connections. Go look at other more expensive passive speakers, and you'll see the same thing. 

+1.

You can get inexpensive speaker wire from a hardware store, get something like 16AWG. It'll connect straight to those leads, and they're better than most other styles of connector.

 

Yep. For that matter, you can even buy copper wire lamp cord at the hardware store. Works just as well. And definitely no reason to worry about banana connectors. They don't improve the sound quality. Just for convenience for people that want to connect and disconnect their speakers more often. 

I know at Home Depot if you ask for "speaker wire" they will mark it up (they don't sell it by the foot, they sell it on spools (at least the two of them near me do this)); but they will sell lamp/zipcord (for the uninitiated - you basically just need 2 conductor wire of at least 18 AWG) for fairly cheap. Alternately you can get in-wall speaker wire (which is UL rated) for fairly cheap by the foot too. If the store seems like they're gonna over-charge you, don't mention speakers at all - just get however many feet of 2 conductor 16AWG or 18AWG or whatever. It shouldn't cost more than a few bucks realistically (unless you need a *huge* run).

If you want fancier wires, I'd go through a cable maker online; the marked-up stuff in stores is the same razor-and-blades idea as their charging $50 for the USB B cable that plugs in your new $30 printer (which uses $70 ink).

+1 on the rest. I actually don't like bananas for physical terminations - if you were going with physical terminations I'd go with either spades or pins. Crimp-on is fine.

 

I've never seen that comparison, but it's definitely an apt one. Equally disgusting. 

 

Aside: My Brother HL-3070CW has a built in toner out feature. When it has estimated the toner is out (and it doesn't actually measure it), it won't let the printer print any more. I had to find the override codes online to turn that off. Another printer industry business practice rip off.