Is Apogee in a class by itself among planars?

First of all, Apogee are not planars. They are ribbons. I owned the Scintillas (their 3 way design) many years ago. They were magical at first. However, after living with them for a while, their shortcommings became evident. They did some very impressive things, but did not have the palpability, transparency and the all important dynamic contrasts which makes reproduced music come to life. I found that great dynamic speakers sound the closest to live music.

Yes, but they're not the best.

Bkonig, only of lately has amp design caught up with the Scintilla's potential. My amp is my speaker's master, not vis versa, as had been the case, at the Scintillas inception.

Transparency is what my Scintillas excel at. No dynamic speaker I have heard comes close.

dynamic speakers always have me wanting to let the music out of the box. Their tweeters, unless ribbons, are woefully inadequate to my ears. frequency integration is a stumbling block with dynamic speakers, as well.

They are very nice speakers. I agree that they make the music sound "live." I feel that detail and transparency of the Stages are top notch. I disagree with your statement about the detail of the speakers. Like the cliche goes, it is like putting "Windex to the windows." The highs are the best that I have heard in my system.

However, they are "one person" speakers. You need to be seated in the sweet spot to fully enjoy them. If you stand up or move to the side, the imaging and soundstaging will fade.

I also had Maggie IIIa's with the ribbon tweeter, which do not require the listener to stay glued to the listening seat. I felt the Stages were a notch better in the detail and transparency department, and also were louder and punchier with the bass.

Is Apogee in a class by itself? Just from my limited experience with planars, I would give the Stages just a slight edge over the IIIas. I could happily live with either speaker.

However, in comparing planars to Quad electrostats (I have the 988s and the 57s), I feel that the bass of the Quads sounds much more real, like the instrument would sound if it were live. Also, while the Stages' midrange is outstanding, I feel the Quads' midrange is more organic and rich, more fully fleshed out. The drawback to the Quads is the lack of SPL.

The positive qualities of the Quads led me to sell my Apogees and Maggies. I do miss the ability to play my system loud, though, and I miss the glorious highs of the ribbon tweeters of both the Apogees and the Maggies.

Muralman1 - You have a point about the amp. I was using Krell at the time. I liked the Krell much beter than the levinson, but the Krell couldn't compare with some other designs that were unable to power the Apogees. However, the amps that I think are incredible today (ie: Tenor, dartzeel) also cannot properly drive the Scintillas. These amps coupled with a great dynamic speaker is magic to my ears (incredible imaging, transparency, resolution, etc). I found no problems with the integration of the drivers in the great dynamic designs (Kharma, Verity, etc. )