Vandersteen 5a's - an upgrade from Vienna mahlers?

I respectfully disagree that people who purchase ported speakers have not done their homework regarding speaker design, or, that there is consensus among respected speaker designers that acoustic-suspension / sealed-box designs are superior.

I lived with a classic acoustic-suspension design, Advents, for nearly seventeen years. I then owned a more serious application of this design principle, six-ft. tall Dunlavys, for six more years (and spent a lot of time listening to my friend's Dunlavy V's, which are one of the most serious attempts at the sealed-box design principle). In between, I owned ported KEF's and now own ported Mahlers and ported Salons. Both sealed-box and ported designs have their advantages and disadvantages, as does electrostatic technology, planar ribbons, transmission-line loading, single-driver, etc. ad nauseum. I dislike sealed-box designs because even giant sealed-box speakers are prone to compression on fortissimos, something that is unacceptable to me given that I listen to a lot of orchestral music. On the other hand, I recognize that the use of ports introduces resonances into the sound, the exact opposite of what a speaker designer should be attempting to do. The following article is helpful to clarify the advantages and disadvantages of ported v. sealed-box woofer loading:

http://diyaudiocorner.tripod.com/dilemma.htm

My experience is that quality of sound in speakers is not so much determined by choice of design principle, but rather, how well a given design is implemented. Returning to the Mahler, they are designed for truly large rooms and can sound bloated and loose if used in small venues (Sumiko, the Vienna Acoustics and Sonus Faber distributor in the U.S., used to recommend Mahlers over the Amati Homage in large rooms). As for the quality of the drivers used in the Mahler, it uses the Scan-Speak carbon-fiber midwoofer that is used in the WattPuppy 7, Maxx II and Alexandria (it is also used in the Blue Heron II, and used to be used by Verity), and uses an expensive Scan-Speak tweeter that is floated in silicone gel to isolate it from cabinet resonances. The upper midwoofer is run from 70 Hz. to 4 kHz, spanning six octaves and giving the speaker a coherence that I find very appealing. The side-mounting of the woofers is a perfectly legitimate design choice that is currently also used by Audio Physic, Genesis, and Mission to name just a few, the benefits of which are described succinctly by Israel Blume of Coincident:

http://www.coincidentspeaker.com/whatsnew.html#Anchor--The-39790

The Vandy's powered woofer is nice for the reasons described above, but I would not own a powered speaker because it is just one more thing to break on an item that weighs a couple hundred pounds boxed and will be a real pain to return to the manufacturer (or God forbid, a powered speaker breaks and the manufacturer has gone belly up, which is real possibility -- speaker manufacturers seem bested only by restaurants when it comes to business failure rates).

So is the Vandy an engineering tour-de-force and the Mahler just a pretty face? I don't think so. I respect Richard Vandersteen, but I lived with time-aligned speakers for six years and do not care for their tiny sweet spot. The Vandys' use of both first-order crossovers and a sealed-box design limit dynamics and that is unacceptable to me, given the type of music I listen to. Powered woofers are a potential maintenance problem. Vandys to me are ridiculous looking, while the Mahlers look like furniture. When the homework is done, and be it for technical or aesthetic reasons, the Mahlers can be a very deliberate and very defensible choice.

With the Vandersteen, the woofer amp and all components can be field repaired or taken out and returned to the factory if need be. You don't have to ship the speaker-thank God! Vandersteen has been in business since 1977. I really don't think he will be going anywhere until his retirement considering his success to this point.
As I said, each to his own. However, I personally will buy the Vandersteen's. The 5a's ARE more furniture if that rocks your boat. However, I don't think the rest of the Vandersteen line is that bad looking compared to some of the other offerings in the market (ie; electrostatics)and I'm not in this for show. I for one buy for sound not furniture. If the two coincide, so be it.
As for ported vs sealed bass, the only place ported will win out is in shear volume---that's it.

The link to Israel Blume's comments about side-firing woofers referenced in my last post did not come through -- here it is again:

http://www.coincidentspeaker.com/whatsnew.html#Anchor--The-39790

"I lived with time-aligned speakers for six years and do not care for their tiny sweet spot" - and I'm new to them and can't seem to locate this "tiny sweet spot". My 3A Sigs sound wonderful in or not in my sweet/spot - seat.

"The Vandys' use of both first-order crossovers and a sealed-box design limit dynamics and that is unacceptable to me" - like in the other thread, I'm not hearing this limited dynamic knock on the Vandy. From jazz, to classical, to acoustic , to rock and roll, none of it sounds limited to me. Now, factor poorly recorded music into the mix, and they will tell you about it. If I love the artist/the song enough, I don't much care - I just won't use it to try and show my system off. Put on Ray Brown - Solar Energy or Eva Cassidy's Songbird - well what's limited there? Absolutly nothing.

I know of NO manufacture that will not say his design is the best compromise. However, as Sean says, some basic research is required into such design when you are going to spend this kind of money.
I can only say from my research that [I] will stick with sealed designs. I have spent considerable time with the 5a. It does not have a small sweet spot(of course, personally, I haven't found any Vandersteen to have that small of sweet spot if set up correctly.) It is dynamic, transparent and has some of the best bass I have ever heard from a speaker system. It also reproduces voices as good as I have ever heard with the proper height and width and a amazing holographic soundstage. It will play considerably louder than other Vandersteen's(if you are in to that.)
By the way, I have a set of Advent "The New Advent" (circa 70's) and let us hope we have come a little ways since then. They were excellent in their time but not up to todays standard. But even back then, a ported speaker couldn't deliver the bass it would.