Road trip to demo $10,000 speakers

Shkong78, Ive added the Martin Logan Impression ESL 11A’s to the spreadsheet. Thanks.for the link too.

Jafant, glad to hear you had such good results from you search and afterwards. That’s encouraging. Any audio stores in Baltimore you particularly like or have had good experiences with.

Glupson, You’re so right about how the NYC retail scene has changed,since the advent of the internet especially, Brick and mortar of all sorts has been disappearing at an alarming rate, not just audio outlets. When my wife was still alive we tried to go to the Garment District to find some drapery material, only to find most of the fabric stores had disappeared. It was shocking. I miss all the old record stores/outlets too.

Ieales. Sorry you wouldn’t presume to make recommends or at least point out some speakers you found lacking without more info. My listening room is approximately 13 feet by 22 feet with a cathedral ceilng that goes up to maybe 15 feet from the floor on a 12/12 pitch, centered on the short walls Picture how a five year old might draw a house and you got the configuration. The two side and the back walls are lined with book shelves as the room doubles as a library. The room has three dormer windows on the back wall, one centered and the others equidistant and eight feet apart with 2 foot by 7 foot long "corridor" leading to them on that wall. Have oak floors, speakers will go on the front long wall,

I like to listen to 1950’s jazz, think Miles Davis, John Coltrane, Sonny Rollins, etc, Actually everything, other than Ornette Coleman type free form, from Ellington, then Charlie Parker on through to Weather Report. Dating myself, I love late sixties rock and roll groups, and R&B artists, everything from the earliest rock and roll and doo wop up through punk. Think Stones,Joplin, Hendrix, Aretha etc., through Bowie and the Clash. I like fifties rock and roll, and blues too. I have some classical and other material and world music, though not lots. I listen to music at moderate sound levels usually, picture maybe a bit more loudly than you might typically listen to TV. I like a clean sound where I can hear all the detail and the speaker disappear. Muddy and poor source material I find irritating.

You obviously are well versed in this area, way more than me, so I’m trying to squeeze some more direction out of you or at least some speakers you’d avoid or don’t meet your parameters. And by the way what are ’squids?

Twoch, I’ve always had way to many questions for that approach, and way too little expertise to be making sound decisions. I know just about enough to be dangerous especially after a forty year layoff in stereo equipment research and purchasing.

Lancelock, Thanks for the Janzen electrostatic recommend. I’ll keep an eye out. I listed my room dimensions just above in my response to ieales. Thank you for your interest and asking.

Thanks again all.

Mike

skyscraper,
We have somewhat similar spaces and taste. Additionally, I have a penchant for classical and opera. My room is a bit larger with bamboo flooring and several large thick wool area rugs.

Since Heyser in the early 70's my mantra has been "It's not the frequency. It's the time." Sadly the trade rags never focused much on it and once valid publications have devolved into manufacturer cheering sections. Consequently, most of the public is ignorant of phase defects and proper solutions are labor intensive and tend to be 'unconventional'

I loved Quad ESL but limited level and frequency response at both ends disqualified them. Dayton-Wrights were sonically great, of questionable longevity and ZERO WAF.

DQ-10's were my first phased speakers. I mirror-imaged them and modified the XOver to adjust low end response as I had them on stands.
In the mid-70s, 'squids were about $1k. Adjusted for inflation, about $3500 today. Admittedly, the 'squids were little more than utility build and many of today's are gorgeous. However, I'm not buying furniture. Many 3- & 4-way systems have egregiously worse phase response than a $1k 2-way. They go lower and may play louder but for fail miserably on image specificity.

If I still owned DQ-10s, I'd rebuild / have them rebuilt. See http://www.regnar.com/dahlquist-dq-10-speaker-parts.html Replacement of electrolytic and mylar caps with polypropylene will astound. I'd probably add a DQ-89w or two. See http://www.regnar.com/dq-89w-powered-subwoofer-features.html

I cannot listen to MP3s on my system due to nebulous image gallivanting. Any system where any instrument or voice moves regardless of program complexity is disqualified. Listening to uncompressed source in demos of Magico, Focal, Paradigm, KEF and others suffer these defects in multiple salons, so I conclude the defects are natal.

Reticent as I am to recommend, were I to require loudspeakers I'd hear Vandersteens, [see https://vandersteen.com/support/faqs/ and http://greenmountainaudio.com/speaker-time-phase-coherence/ for decent comments on time and phase], Wilson, some B&W, Carver ALS, Magnepan, Martin Logan. There are certainly others. Not sure I would own large planars again, but I would have to hear them. Others with varying parameter requirements will surely howl in protest.

Were I in the market, I might start here: Kii Three https://www.kiiaudio.com/for_home.php sold in the US at GTT Audio https://gttaudio.com/ and reviewed here https://www.stereophile.com/content/kii-audio-three-loudspeaker.

Be very sceptical of manufacturer claims. Many are just plain flat out wrong from an electrical perspective. For example some tout first order slopes for summing. However, that is only valid with drivers that perform identically for at least a couple of octaves above and below the xo frequency AND have physically aligned drivers. Vertical flat baffle? Fogedaboudit!

IMO, the whole small footprint, multi woofer tower on a vertical baffle is fundamentally wrong unless every driver has DSP control AND sophiticated alignment equipment. Ditto vertically mirrored drivers.


Sadly, most forum recommendations are fan-boy ravings, some even by those who don't possess, just lust.

I have Gamut M7 that certainly put all the anterior mentioned to shame. Including the Kantas that wasn't what I expected at all. Gamut M series was replaced with S series buy only for business purposes because the M series was to expensive to built and the profits were not high at 18k. They named RS series and double the price.
Good luck 

I have one suggestion. Bring paper and pen to make notes on speakers, amps, preamps, sources and your thoughts about each audition. 

ieales,

Reading your two posts above is humbling and relieving at the same time. I would dare to say that most of us have not even close to as much understanding of technical details as you do. I, personally, can be described just as skyscraper described himself. Enough knowledge to be dangerous. That was the humbling part, accepting reality that I am clueless.

Relieving part was that, despite the black hole of ignorance, I function on the simple level. "I hear it, I like it, here is my credit card." If I knew all you do, it would drive me crazy. To understand that I am buying something so imperfect would be a torture. Like this, I walk out satisfied. Ignorance is bliss, as they say, and, apparently, there are many blessed ones here.

"However, I’m not buying furniture."

You surely are a hard-core enthusiast. Many speakers are bigger than some of the furniture in the room they are placed in so they are hard to ignore. Once you do not care about that, you have really arrived. Consider yourself lucky.