Goldenear Reference Vs. Focal Sopra #2.....pocket the $5k difference and don't look back?

contuzzi106 posts"gdhal: that means nothing.  Sandy Gross is the ultimate wine & dine and marketing master when it comes to reviewers.  They’re not bad speakers, but if you’re ever going to be skeptical, be skeptical about anything he touches, review wise."


So true... I've demo'd all of his products... and... they do not possess the dynamics, transparency, or clarity of many other good speakers - not even close.  Certainly not the Focal Sopra's.  

And... if you want "price-competitive" speakers that sound much better there are:

Wavetouch Audio Antero's or Grand Tetons
Magnestand 1.6's
And... of course... the Linkwitz LX521's or used Orion's 

To all the Golden Ear naysayers about the the parts quality, China, Sandy and what have you I’ve personally listened to an in home audition of a $200K of Alta Statement towers and I’m rather content in knowing how much of a better value (price/sound/quality ratio) my Golden Ears are. And when I check into some of the speakers mentioned on this site throughout the years, I find it interesting how much of the "best" qualities of those other speakers are actually found in the Golden Ears. These qualities include high efficiency, large voice coil, ability of voice coil to handle high temperature (play loud), d’appolito driver array, built in sub woofer amp, anechoic chamber used in its design/voicing, fully balanced crossover, high-velocity folded ribbon tweeter, mix of lamb’s wool and Dacron for effective internal damping, 3/32˝-thick steel plate for stability, the list goes on.

It doesn’t matter (to me) whatever you write to disparage them or compare them to in a negative light because it will not change the enjoyment I receive on a daily basis as I listen to them. And I’ve heard a handful (20?) of rather high end systems and don’t believe I’m missing anything.

Ignorance is bliss.  Truly.

I think it comes down to personal preference. I got a chance to listen to Goldenear (not sure about the model) at Audio Concepts in 2014, and it left me unimpressed. Surprised by @jnc's comment that they were "in your face" when he listened to them. On the contrary, they sounded muffled and the upper frequencies seemed missing. Now the Focal 1000 series and Sopra series sounded pretty nice when I got to demo them. The Focal 1000 series has a slight hot treble. But the Sopras sounded balanced in a system that had Simaudio/Moon amplification and CDP.

FWIW I think golden ear speakers are great. I respect them a lot. I just don’t think they’re giant killers, or necessarily punch substantially above their weight (price) at all (very few speakers actually do).