looking for upgrade suggestions - 12,000 to spend

Wouldn't it be wiser to invest that money in the stock market, and enjoy the world-class stereo that you already have? I know, I know, stupid me; upgrading is always the way to go, right? It was just a thought...

There is no doubt that the room is one of the most overlooked aspects of an audio system. There is a product used in furnaces called spinglass that comes in 2x4 sheets 1, 1.5, 2 inch thick. They also have round tubes from 8 inch to 20 and 6 ft tall these make great acoustical room treatments. Yes you can hire some one but this stuff is so inexpensive and so easy to use that after a little trial and error you can get your room just fine. Once you get the spinglass you purchase material and wrap it with U pins a very easy process and then you use T pins to attach to the drywall. Anyone can do this and you will save a fortune. If you want an idea of what it looks like go to Stereophile page 174 and look at the ad by American Acoustic they sell essentially the same product except that they cover it for you.
After the room do not forget that everything starts at the wall. You seem to have decent powercords but you do not mention a good line conditioner like a Hydra, sound application, etc.
Also great audio racks and resonance control make a massive difference. One of the largest effects on my system was adding Zoethecus racks with the Z shelves. Yes they look awesome but the sonics are amazing.

What improvement would you like over what you're getting now?

I sell a speaker that would work well in your room and does some things better than the Dunlavy's, and some things not as well. This is the Sound Lab Millennium-2, a full-range electrostatic. Sound Labs excel at reproducing the natural timbre of voices and instruments. They do inner harmonic nuance and texture extremely well, and are consistently described as extremely relaxing and non-fatiguing (I could explain some of the acoustic and human auditory system factors behind this if you'd like). And unlike most full-range planar speakers, Sound Labs really do have bass. Your Dunlavy's will go deeper, but the Sound Lab M-2's will do 30 Hz and have better pitch definition (I know that's probably hard to believe).

On the other side of the coin, the Sound Labs are an inefficient, difficult load. In your room they would like to be on the short wall, and about five or six feet out into the room. And they're pretty big - about 6 feet tall and two and a half feet wide.

I'm suggesting here the M-2's instead of the larger M-1's for two reasons: First, the wider M-1's wouldn't give you quite as wide a soundstage in your room as the M-2's because they couldn't be spaced quite as far apart; and second the big ones would stretch your budget a bit.

Your Rowland amp might not give you the dynamics you'd like - but there are options that would allow you to stay within your budget if you sold or traded in the Rowland.

Among conventional speakers, the Kharma Ceramique 1.0 is voiced rather similar to the Sound Labs, if you'd like a reference point.

I don't know exactly what improvements you're looking for, and since the Kharmas were on your list I figured the Sound Labs might be a possibility. By the way, I like all the speakers on your list. I'll admit that the Sound Labs are a rather radical departure from the conventional, and I'd be more than happy to answer any questions you might have.

Best of luck to you in your quest!

1. Soundlabs, ditto. If the Electro idea scares you - it shouldn't given where you are at - Eidelons.
2. Bigger Rowland amp with amp/speaker sale in order to drive Soundlabs.
3. PC and current conditioning: NBS Staement I PC at $500 for digital, Electraglide PC for amp, Bybee Pro conditioning used at $900.

This operating on my assumption that you will be a patient used buyer and throw in, eventually, a bit more - like we all do...

Or:

Basis vacuum TT, Graham 2.2 revised, Koetsu cartridge, loads of vinyl, save some more for Soundlabs, then forget about audio forever...

Buy a pair of Legacy Audio Whipsers, may cost a hair more than 12K, but you will never look back. I owned the talon Khours (NOT the X version) and they are notanywhere close to the Whispers. The Whispers are more like live musinc than ANY and ALL the other high end (speakers costing sometimes more than 6X as much as the Whispers) speakers I have ever heard.

Mike