ronkent,
I still think the 3.7 is the "better" speaker. It's more open, slightly more detailed, more evenly controlled top to bottom, more neutral, casts the bigger more impressive images and soundstage, and disappears better.
That sounds like a slam dunk for the 3.7, but subjective taste enters the equation and that's where the 2.7s catch up quite a bit for me.
I find the sound of the 2.7s a bit more tonally rich and dense, with even more precise reach-out-and-touch-it palpability. And a punchier mid-bass on down that really drives music even more than the 3.7s which can sound more reserved. For instance, that tune I may have just heard on the radio may or may not satisfy on the 3.7s, but it's likely to have the "fun factor" and drive on the 2.7s.
And as I've said, the 2.7s seem a bit more dynamically alive - even the way a trumpet player or saxophonist will run up and down a scale, there is a bit more lively micro-dynamics of each note that give the 2.7 presentation a bit more life-force-like presentation.
Plus, the 2.7s image huge as well, so it's a very life-like presentation even given their more modest size.
So it's a question of taste, really, for me. Sometimes when I hear the way the 2.7 doesn't image as well to the sides as the 3.7s - instruments panned hard right or left tend to sound more coming out of the speakers than floating behind them like the 3.7s - I'll pine a bit for the 3.7s. Other times when I hear the utterly engaging density and punch of, say, drums on the Police record on the 2.7s, I feel like I couldn't live without that.
From my experiments with a subwoofer so far, I get more of the speakers disappearing, even for hard right/left panned instruments, on the 2.7s once the subwoofer is on. So I think I won't really have anything to pine for if I can successfully integrate the subs. That is, so long a I can maintain the tone of the 2.7s that I like so much. I'll finally have time within the next couple of weeks to give my JL Audio subs and crossover a real go.
