Montana speakers?

I've not heard the Montana speakers, but do own the tweeter that they use in their full line, the Scanspeak Reveleator 9900 (the designer told me they use a 4 ohm version). It has a combination of smoothness, speed, and dynamic contrast (both micro and macro), that no other tweeter of any type has, IMO. I also have the Morel MDT-33, and it trades off being barely not as smooth/liquid, for noticeably more dynamic contrast and authority. They're both better than the Dynaudio Esotar IMHO, which was so forceful that it imparted a "steely" character to attack transients, in the test project I'm working on. I've not heard Quads, but have heard ML's and Soundlabs. IMO, if you want to listen at quieter than lifelike levels, esl's are absolutely the way to go. Nothing comes alive at quiet levels like a good esl. If you demand liflike SPL's, a big cone/dome speaker is the way to go. In my experience, ESL panels turn hard and have a plastic coloration, even at moderate levels...where a very good dome tweeter sounds perfect, all the way up to as loud as it can go. Ribbons are very nice also, but trade off some dynamics, for unbelievable speed. And of course, if you have domes/cones several in series parallel, like the Pipedreams (or like one of the projects I'm planning), that can be "otherworldly", IMO. I've not heard the smallest Pipedreams system, but perhaps you should give it a listen...There's not a thing wrong with having the low bass speakers in a separate enclosure, that's how most of the world class speaker systems do it, and it allows the ultimate in low frequency extension, room loading and smoothness.

OK, so you feel the Merlins are the very best speakers, that's fine. I told it the way I heard it, and compared the different tweeters in the same environment, same electronics, and those were the differences I heard. I am a fan of Dynaudio, I own the Esotar dome midranges (also for a project I'm working on), and feel that they are vastly superior in their range, to the esotar tweeter, and to all speaker drivers, for that matter. I am in no way biased against Dynaudio (I love them)...I suspect that you are bised in favor of the Merlin, though I don't doubt that it is a fine speaker. I would certainly use them, and be happy, if I owned them. They aren't the world's best speaker, though. I have heard the effect, with violins, that you are referring to, many times. This was both with my meager little Maggies, and also with my Paragon speakers (Dynaudio drivers)...and either with my Krell, or Rogue amps, and in either of my rooms.

Bookner, the midwoofers in the Pipedreams are around $50 a piece, so unless you are talking some radically high cost for cabinet construction (and of course getting world class finishing with veneer is nothing to smirk at either), then yes indeed you can build the Pipedreams top model for under $10,000 (not sure how much you could do the subs and their amps/crossovers for, that would definitely add to the cost, and you wouldn't have the time and efforts put into it, that Nearfield has already...which is what you're paying for buying them retail, besides the "necessary" dealer markup.) My project will be similar to their smallest model, and I'll just use whatever powered subs I have on hand, and run the "satellites" full range, most likely. I'll be using different tweeters, and a different version of the midwoofer, also...besides radically different cabinet construction and bass loading.