QUAD vs Martin Logan vs Magnepan

You get what you pay for!
MMG's are cheap and may sound really good in the "right" position with the "right" amp in a really narrow sweet spot. Bigger Maggies are a much better comparison to ML & Quad.
The ML's are more forgiving of listening position and easier on your amp. My favorites for the money.
If money doesn't matter, I'd pick the Quads.
Keep in mind that power matters with these speakers more than most. I wouldn't even dream of running these with less than 100 watts and would prefer 200+.
My final rant: Room size matters. These all like big rooms. What are your room dimensions? Ceiling height? Can you place the speakers 3 feet from any wall? I heard the quads in an amazing room but they were 5 feet from any wall, in a room about 20 x 35 with 11 foot ceilings and ran on huge parasound monoblocks.

Of those brands...Maggie 20 series would be my top choice (you will need a very large room)...none of the other Maggies beat the Quads IMHO. Matin Logan...I could only own the CLS's (with subs)...maybe?...I've never heard them with subs to be honest.

Dave

Newbee tells it like it is.

I've owned three pairs of Quads, five pairs of Maggies, and one pair of Martin Logans.

Here's the way I'd put it: The larger Maggies tend to have a relaxing and forgiving tonal balance, but are a little lacking in upper harmonic detail compared with the Quads. The Quads are (to my ears) a little bit forward in the lower treble region. Martin Logans don't have quite the detail of the Quads, nor the coherence of the Quads or Maggies, but they will play deeper in the bass and are in my opinion the most physically beautiful electrostats. Getting a good blend between point source woofer and line source panel isn't easy, and is somewhat distance-dependent, so I would say that either the Quads or the Maggies are going to sound more consistent from one room to another.

As Mrderrick notes, Maggies generally need to be cranked up a bit to really "come to life". If your listening style includes a lot of low-level, late night listening, then an electrostat might make more sense.

The good news is, I don't think there's a bad choice among these three brands. I'd call the Maggies the most forgiving with the widest sweet spot, the Quads the most detailed and revealing with a fairly small sweet spot, and the ML's in between with deeper bass but possible bass/panel integration problems.

Duke

My listening room is 28X32 with vaulted ceings. I run 3.6's with a Sunfire Architectural Signature Sub. The sound is astounding. As previously mentioned they do require a lot of clean power. And they do require to be at a bare minimum of two feet from the rear wall. I owned the 1.6's prior to this. The performance of the 1.6's pushed me getting the 3.6's. I have no complaints whatsover on the 3.6's. I have to be careful over my love for the Maggies! Those 20.1's have my heart pumping but not at three times the price. Well ........ maybe?

Thanks for the advice guys, I really appreciate your opinion. I suppose I should provide you with a bit more detail regarding my interest in the above speakers. I'd always had an interest in hifi and while searching for a Rega Planar 3 turntable found myself in a fairly hi-end store. While there I experienced a real 'freak-out' moment, I literally heard Tracy Chapman appear over my left shoulder, the effect was a bit bewildering to be honest as I'd never any idea that electronics/hifi equipment could be so convincing - to be specific had I been blindfolded I would have been convince there was a real person present, but not only that I could pinpoint exactly wher the 'voice' appeared as it had an uncanny 3d quality to it. Upon enquiry I was informed that the sound was coming from a pair of electrostatic speakers (the brand name escapes me) - but these were nowhere near the apparent location of the 'voice'. Anyways that moment has been a BIG influence on my current inerests. For those of you experienced with, well. general mid-range hifi gear I have a further question. Was that 'real person in the room' effect simply down to the traits & charactoristics of the electrostatic ?....or do box speakers, when partnered with good components, perform that trick similarly.

Again, many thanks