TAD Reference loudspeakers-How good are they?

@Zephyr, ah I don’t think the accompanying amps, front end or cables were at fault when i auditioned the TAD’s. I’ve auditioned them twice, the last time with D’ag Momentum mono’s & a full DCS Vivaldi stack, and the results were the same as the first audition...I left the room after a few tracks. By then my ears were bleeding. Maybe the TAD's can be made to sound good with tubes and enough room treatments, but at the end of the day they'll always be just souped up Pioneers.

Conversely I haven’t found that to be the case with the Magico S series, especially the S5 Mk2’s which are just amazing paired with Vitus. I find I can listen for hours without fatigue. Despite bcgator’s histrionics, I did say "every TAD speaker i’ve heard sounds bright and fatiguing". To imply my ears are lying to me, or perhaps that i’m lying to either myself or others is ludicrous. To each their own.

melbguy1: Thanks for the response; I am very glad you are happy with your speakers and gear combination. I know a couple guys here who had the 3s and have upgraded to the S5s in the last few months and they are very happy as well. I hear they are awesome speakers from many fans of that company's speakers.  To each their own,....absolutely agree. I'm sure your ears are not lying to you nor are mine here. Perhaps I just got very luckly with baseline of gear, cables, power, etc....that I have as the foundation of the system as my hearing is still exceptional and I'm also very prone to finding the least bit of ear fatigue in a speaker and given the Legacy's I owned in various models for year, I know what a fatigue-less (not a word but you get the point) is.  I'm very glad that I have a combination of gear/etc...that is showing the R1s at their best and I've not heard, even in the first 190 hours, the aspects that you are pointing out.  Have a great new year and enjoy your setup and those great speakers!

Zephyr,

From what I have seen the S5 appears to have severe compression issues above 2KHz. So I am not surprised that the TAD (a reference speaker design) would make ones ears bleed if one was used to all that compression (congested laid back treble lacking the ability to convey true dynamics and harshness of horn instruments and percussion). In essence, a reference style loudspeaker is always more likely to sound harsh compared to more popular audiophile style speakers that can be kinder to the sound.

Thanks for your response; that is interesting regarding the other speaker. I had not heard that from the guys I know who own them and are liking them very much. Happy New Year!

@Zephyr, i'm glad you've assembled a system which sounds musical to your ears. Tthanks for your good wishes. All the best to you in 2017!

@shadorne, You must be talking about the S5 Mk1, as respected reviewer Martin Colloms had this to say about the S5 Mk2's in his review for Hifi Critic -

"We also found that the S5 MkII could play almost impossibly loud with near perfect clarity and no perceptible hardening, textural crowding or dynamic compression. The most difficult and densely scored material was handled with sweet clarity and with particularly low fatigue, a strong indicator of inherently low distortion together with exceptionally uniform frequency responses".