Best way to A/B speakers......

I suppose you could merely go by test CDs.

I prefer listening in my own system with familiar recordings and taking notes. Honest & objective ones, if possible. I say it that way as sometimes I've been prone to believe for no really good reason that a particular pair of speakers should or do, sound better than another on a few points... esthetics, price, size, brand, driver types, x-overss, etc.

So I'll just make and use my own notes on each pair... when that becomes a possibility. Usually, it's not that way. Apart from two way monitors, getting a pair of large pricey near full range squeakers in house for a demo hasn't happend yet and likely won't.

Primarily because I usually have to sell my reference squeakers so I can buy the next step up units my last two main loudspeakers were purchased, one on a dealer demo, the other completely in the dark. the one I actually heard? I sold. The latest ones, Sonata IIIs, I've been pleased with and kept. They've also been a learning experience, yet a rewarding one. The only regret there was the color choice, 'following' a complete remodeling and painting of the room for HT uses.

blindjim method is seconded. A lot of work but absent a double blind process it is the best you can do at home.

With all due respect, you have just come upon the leading edge of a very steep learning curve. The reason you can't tell the differences is because you have not established a frame of reference.

To use the automobile analogy, On Monday you drive a Porche, on Tuesday you drive a Mercedes, on Wednesday you drive a Cadillac, on Thursday you drive a Mazda. You (probably) can easily retain knowledge of these experiences even though the cars are different in most all respects and demos are days apart. You not only retain the experience of the individual performances and the differences between them but you assign a value to them.

Probably not so with audio. You probably have never heard what a good system sounds like in an audiophile's home and/or you have never visited a dealer show room where time an effort has been expended to proper set up a system. Most dealers who are trying to sell good speakers will not use an A/B switcher because each speaker has seperate needs to sound good, including selection of the amplifier, as well as room set up. So, in that respect you have no goal. With out such a frame of reference, you could go into a store which utilizes a speaker switcher like your car audio store, hear two terrible speakers, and buy the best and assume you had good speakers. You could hear a very good speaker not properly set up and driven and it could sound like crap.

There is no quick fix for this problem. What I would do is get the assistance of some audiophiles in selecting a system which will sound the way you think you want it to sound (by telling them what aspects of sound are important to you in response to thier questions) and setting a budget to work in. DON'T just go into a store an buy the best speakers (according to your ears) that you can afford and take them home and expect them to sound great. It ain't going to happen unless you have a habbit of winning lotteries.

FWIW.