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Best bookshelf speakers

I’m building my first high fi system after being more of a portable audio person. I want to start with the speakers. Space is limited so bookshelf speakers are a must.

Preferences:
Balanced and revealing with a hint of warmth.
Midrange most important to get right over highs and lows
Timbre is super important - I listen mostly to acoustic music especially jazz
But I do need some bass as I also listen to some electronic music
Smaller is better but SQ is most important
A speaker that sounds good with different amps but also scalable with high quality sources
Wide sweet spot - I wont have money for a great amp at first but want them to be scalable for later

These speakers have caught my eyes - any thoughts on them?

Ascend Sierra 2s - Ribbon = dispersion limitations?
BMR Philharmonitor - See above. Also massive.
Buchardt S400/S300 - Wary of the sudden hype train and limited info
Silverline Minuet Grande - Limited info
Reference 3A De Capo - This caught my eye as a potential endgame speaker if I could blow up my budget a little. But concerns about BE tweeter as well as some potential snake oil stuff (cryogenic treatment (!?)), exaggerated sensitivity claims and wonky measurements put me off.

What else should I be looking at?

Edit: I could have sworn I had <$2,000 in the title... Anyway, my budget is 2k.

stuff_jones
stuff_jones OP
65 posts
 
@ whoopycat Trenner & Friedl look amazing ( and sounds amazing in this demo: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A5R4Eplg1z4)

@ 2y2ret - Thanks, I hadn't seen those and they look really good. Nice and small too and well within my budget.


stuff_jones OP
65 posts
 
Somewhat tempted by the Genelec M040s. Add a decent DAC and controller and you have what should be super transparent but listenable sound at about 2k total.
tinear123
241 posts
 
mofojo…  the LS50W is great on rock but only at reasonable volume levels in a normal sized room.  They are keepers for me and large improvement over my old B&W 805N and De Capo.
audiotroy's avatar
audiotroy
3,841 posts
 
tinear123 you are missing one cool additonal trick, with the LS 50 wireless . Which is you can add a subwoofer.

If you add a subwoofer to the LS 50w they sound even better and fill up a large room even better.

The new Kef Kube 10 and 12 are very good sounding woofers and are dirt cheap at $599 and $699 respectively and they make a nice match with the LS 50 making a state of the art streaming/self amplified loudspeaker subwoofer package for $3k!

The powered loudspeaker market is heating up with the new Elac model, the Dynaudio xeo, and the Dali Kalisto

Dave and Troy
Audio Doctor NJ Kef, Elac, Dali dealers
stuff_jones OP
65 posts
 
I think I'm going to actually go much cheaper than the 2k I put in this thread. In looking at speakers <2k range it seemed like I needed to spend a little more to get something that I wouldn't regret later. Something like the Trenner and Friedl or Fritz. And then I would have to upgrade my electronics purchase to be well matched with my more expensive speakers and then my overall budget would be blown up. And then I wouldn't enjoy my purchases because I'd be hyper critical having spent so much - at least that's what happened when I ventured into top of the line IEMs and DAPs.

So it looks I'll try the Silverline Minuet Supreme Plus. They look like the most balanced very small speaker under 1k. Then I'm thinking of pairing it with Spark Audio Vista and the very capable (with IEMs at least) LH Geekout V2A DAC. On paper at least that should get me capable sound at around 1k which I won't agonize over (until/unless upgrade-itis strikes).  Obviously the Supreme Plus' will have their bass limitations, but its a lot easier to swallow those compromises at 700 than 1700.

Any reason to expect that the Supreme Plus' and Vista won't be a good pairing?
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