Upgrading from Wilson Sophia 2's?

See here for plenty of great alternative suggestions with no mention of Wilson Sophia. I like the last suggestion - Active PMC great detail but not fatiguing.

Well, I agree your room is certainly Dead!

A dedicated room is a great thing to have, so you should take advantage of it. I'm kind of surprised that your speakers are sounding aggressive in that room with all that "deadness" around you.

A couple of other points:

How old are your Speakers? Are they fully broken it yet?

You certainly need to dedicate one seating position for yourself, with the proper seat height at the midrange-tweeter axis. I assume you're sitting in the front row, correct?

I would recline the other chairs behind you when not in use, but I can't believe that would be your problem, nor do I think your screen is the problem, because your room is dead enough, any deader and I would think that we need to get "CSI" down there.

I also don't understand why you have to move the speakers back and forth for movies and audio only. It took me 3 weeks to setup my speakers, with laser pointers calibrated by NASA>.

You need to find the best listening position for the speakers and then you should try to work the screen around the speakers and not the other way around. Sometimes too much toe-in can sound a bit aggressive, even if you're off by a 1/4 inch for each speaker, then that could translate to a huge difference. Tape on the floor is not accurate enough in my opinion. I'm telling you..., even if I look at my speakers the wrong way, they sound different.

Another point that I agree with is that you should strongly consider demoing a Tubed Amplifier.

If none of this works, then I think you may need;
"NEW SPEAKERS.... NEW SPEAKERS....NEW SPEAKERS!!

Road Trip!

Rich

before you go off on another pair of speakers, and I'm not a big fan of Wilson from what I've heard of them in local showrooms, I'd say try this one thing...

CAll the cable co and ask for a pair of Nirvana SX Ltd, and a pair of Nirvana SL ICs. Put the SX onto the ??? source, and the SL onto the preamp to amp.

Things should then be mo betta.

That move will cost $50 or so to find out... and that beats $10K or so, easy.

Wilson's have a bit more life in them than the Revels, but I've found both less than musically satisfying without tubes throughout... but that's just me

you could try all SX Ltd throughout too, even in speaker cables. The ambient retreval is fascinating. I'd bet they'll fix your woes... and save ya some dough in the process!

it is inexcusable to have speakers costing over 10 grand (or for that matter ONE grand) that sound this disappointing. the sophias are good transducers, no question, but raising this many issues in (what sounds like) a decent room with very good components upstream just doesn't add up. i'll bet a pair of eggleston andra's (or similar speakers like sonus fabers or von schweikerts) would sound very natural and unforced, while giving up very little in resolution. and you can get a used pair for a song...

it may be worth a call or email to wilson. you may find a simple solution such as changing the spike configuration. i know with the wp, spikes and spacers are tools that can produce some very dramatic changes. wilson support has been very responsive and helpful in my experience, particularly jerron.

some interesting perceptions in this thread. personally, i see the sophia as a speaker that is extremely versatile and pleasant. to my ears, laid back and easy to listen to. i attended a gathering with dave and daryl wilson a couple of months ago and they set up sophia2's with a small krell integrated and a krell dvd standard. the cables were middle to low in the mit line, the room was not treated and over all bad. they sounded amazing. i wanted to go home and sell all my big dollar stuff and get an integrated/sophia pair.

people hate on wilson for many reasons unrelated to the sound...