Experienced audiophiles best speaker

I'll admit that first impressions are important- you know immediately when a speaker sounds good if its in a good setup. But you have to live with a speaker to really understand its virtues with different types of music. A 'lively' speaker can eventually become fatiguing, and a more neutral design might be preferable over the long haul. I also think that speaker (and amplifier) evaluation is highly dependent on music type- for example, some speaker designs that excel with symphonic music simply fail with heavy metal, and vice versa.

We're not talking about absolute truth here, since the definition of great audiophile sound varies. That's why these opinions always need to be qualified. And its always nice to know the opinion of those who are really well-informed.

Not sure about this, but I think if a speaker could do symphonic music right, it will get heavy metal right, you really have to do an awful lot well in a speaker to get symphonic music right, including scale and dynamics. There are certainly speakers that are great for solo acoustic singer type music that can't quite get symphonic music right since so much more is demanded to reproduce a real symphonic presence. If you can do Mahler, I think you can do Metallica IMHO.

Just an observation, I think you can really screw up a great speaker when you try to make it produce real bass below 35hz or so, that insistence on the lowest bass really challenge a speaker, an amp, and a room. A long time ago I decide I was willing to give up that bottom octave to have a speaker that was "the best" for me. But then again, I don't listen to alot of symphonic or heavy metal:)

This is getting interesting.Some very good points.In my own experience,I found the "bast speaker" was always a moving target.

Often I liked something,only to get tired at a later time.I've had great non audio show demoes of stuff like BIG Infinity 4 tower designs(I've owned two systems of these in the past),The Nola Exotica Grand set up with mega buck German origin amps,Big designs from JM Labs(the the Be series),to Pipe Dreams,to TAD speakers.

In the long haul,though I too like orchestral big bang stuff,the vast majority of the Big Boys simply gave me a head ache,after the initial shock of so much energy.Well set up or not.

Though I "did" have a fantastic demo of three different mfgrs(all present)putting their own sets of electronics on the JM Labs Nova Utopia Be's.This might have been my own personal "best in what I've been most impressed with to date"!

There was Zanden,VAC and VTL....all both analog and digital,and we'd go back and forth between each set of electronics on the speaker....in a huge room.Low,and high power(the Zanden was pretty low-ish tube power,but came in first,to me and a few other lucky listeners.

Fortunately the speaker was an easy load to drive...but...for less than half the asking price,the VAC stuff was 95% as good,Imo.

That's just me,and why I'd opt for a simple,somewhat full range design,in my old age -:)

I kinda' think with technology these days,the time of the BIG speaker is coming to an end.There are some amazing small-ish designs coming down the pipe.

I don't care to measure anything as long as I think it sounds good.

I'll probably change my mind again before I turn around -:)

Good luck with it all

Sirspeedy,
Nice to see you back.
If ever in nyc drop by and give a listen to my new setup.

Hey Pedrillo.Great to see ya posting "quality" threads.

Btw,since you last called me on the phone,how did the Milk Diet "pan" out? -:)

I'm still going ga ga on mastering music theory and looking to add a 5th guitar.This is very rewarding for me these days.

Gonna' just sit back and occassionally look at Audiogon for interestinf folks like you.

Good luck