Speakers free of grain, glare and steel?

As already mentioned, Fritz Carbon 7s definitely fit bill at your price range. Ditto the Selah Veritas monitor and the North Creek designs. All silk dome designs that are likely excellent choices for people bothered by edgy highs (as am I).

John

IMO and in my system high-hats and brushes sound like they should with the Spendor speakers I've owned. In reality they will only sound as good as what your upstream components can deliver to your speakers, your amps in particular. The Spendor's are pretty neutral, so they're not going to get in the way as much as say some electronic components might. As for overly polite, I don't think so. These speakers can rock if they have too. I've played mine loud with rock and alternative music and they chugged along just fine.

The Fritz Carbon 7's are very nice speakers. I had a chance to listen to them for a few days.

Unsound,

"Walsh" drivers are an operating principle, not a specific design.

The older OHMs as well as the newer "Walsh" line models all employ Walsh drivers of different designs. So do German Physiks and a few others these days as well.

Each has strengths and weaknesses and user preferences will vary accordingly as is always the case.

Of course I think you know all this already, so just a reminder....

If you can find a pair of original OHM Fs in assured good working order in the target price range, they would also likely fit the OPs bill. Hoever these tend to be delicate devices and service and support for these nowadays is sparse though available, for a price.

Mapman, I disagree. Not all of OHM's speakers feature bending wave Walsh drivers, the DDD drivers that German Physiks uses doesn't have the mechanical cross-overs that the Walsh drivers do.

What people's experience been with and without Merlin RCS, standard and master? Do they generally make a difference, and if so, how much? Are they more effective with tube or solid state amps?