most accurate loudspeakers....

I completely agree with Donald. You cannot have both and I prefer the first possibility he's mentioned. I would only add the old Quads to his Sound Labs.
Cheers,

I would agree with Donald & Detlof above, and raise the following point: an "accurate" speaker-system is capable of creating a NEW musical event in the room, BASED on the original recorded event."
This is just an attempt to paraphrase or review Donald's No1.

Gregm,

Good point. I think that

an "accurate" speaker-system is capable of creating a NEW musical event in the room, BASED on the original recorded event."

is a nice way to put it.

I also think that Donald's statement,

1. Most accurate at creating the illusion of a live concert or musicians in your home?
2. Most accurate and reproducing the input signal's waveform in room at your listening seat?

At this time I believe these 2 possibilities are mutually exclusive.

is so true of the majority of HI-FI today. Sadly the pursuit of sizzle and hyped sound in order to differentiate and impress has left people feeling that the above are mutually exclusive goals. Either you get an atmospheric warm lush sound with little accuracy in timbre and poor dynamics or you get a clinical and dynamic sound with the tiniest sweetspot and with music so unnatural sounding that it feels like it has been torn apart or dissected, even if it is exciting because of the impact.

However, I strongly believe that THE goal is to strike a healthy balance.

A large sweetspot with an even and natural sound field coupled with precise timbre and realistic dynamics.

Aristotle would describe this as the "golden mean". A "Goldilock's System", where everything is just right and balanced; natural in tonality, timbre, dynamics, accuracy AND acoustic sound field.

The blind pursuit of any single passion, such as a holographic image or deep lush bass, generally comes at the expense of other virtues in a system. It soon becomes tiring and the gear "merry-go-round" keeps on turning...

Once in a while, I get the magic of realism. This is a fragile experience affected by the recording, probably the quality of electrical service, and even my sensitivity at the time. I know that speaker positioning, room treatment, breakin, stability of the cabling (not having been moved), etc., but when nothing involving these has happened, there seem to be some times when everything is "right."

I did not have the magic moments in the past which suggests my system has improved. I guess I need to concede that good speakers are part of this improvement, although I really think that speakers have improved very little in the last 40 years.

I do seek the idea of my system providing a musical event in my room. I want to at least have the "magic" of thinking I am at the recording event. If this is the definition of an accurate speaker, that is what I want. I do certainly agree that all speakers are compromises. Over the years I have recognized that it is the leading edge of the music and its dynamics that most pleases me. I like light weight diaphragms and high efficiency which really only leaves horns, but I also hate crossovers! This is why I got so excited about the new Feastrex full range drivers, only to realize that they are still a work in progress. What I would give for a 20 Hz-20K Hz, single driver, 103 db efficiency speaker!

The first and last speaker to fool me I was listening to a live performance was a tri-amped pair of Tannoy 215 DMT II that were being used as the main playback (not mixing) monitors in a recording studio. No other system, in any room, has come close. Of course, the studio had probably spent as much on acoustic treatment of the room as on the speakers (which used to retail for $9K/pr.).

JT