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As Advised, Starting With Speakers First.

After licking my wounds and on the mend financially, I’m getting poised to rebuild. My wife and I are going to be doing a little touring around WA & OR last week of December and wondered what any of you Pacific Northwester’s thoughts were (yes you too Chuck being a local, but not thinking Tektons just yet) are on some of the local dealers around the area? There’s Tune Hi Fi, Hawthorne Stereo, Definitive Audio, Kitsap Audio and Gig Harbor Audio that all offer some interesting products. Also Reference Media in Bellingham. Any others, pros & cons, general advice, are all welcomed!

These establishments will not even graze all the speaker options out there, so if you have any other speaker recommendations, please let ’em fly. I know, there’s are a ton of threads on speakers, and I am trying to go and hear what I can with my own ears, but I would like to hear of peoples experiences where they order factory direct, which is fairly common these days, sight unseen/unheard and if they are getting/hearing what they want when purchasing blind. Or are you all spending a lot on return shipping?

The listening room at the new digs (ya, even sold the house too) measures 24’ x 15’ with a slightly vaulted ceiling and an L shaped opening to a small kitchen about halfway down. The two end walls that are 15’ wide both have doorways in them so speakers would be in the way. Probably best to have them on one of the long walls. One wall is solid for the first 2 feet then widows 5’ up from there the total length of the wall. The other side is solid, but my back would be to the view whilst listening. All hard surfaces.

Listen to just about every genre of music except Country & opera. Floor standers would be nice bypassing subs, but I’m open (maybe not the wife though, it’s a small house!) Had Martin Logan Spires in the past. Fun to listen to in the sweet spot but got fatiguing during long listening sessions and very unforgiving to poorer recordings. You get what you play.

Budget, well, I sold my previous entire $20K system for about half that so maybe in around $10-12K to replace amp, Dac, source and speakers inclusive.

Thanks
high-amp
twoleftears's avatar
twoleftears
5,318 posts
 
Can we just say matching, instead of overused, overtired synergy.

Although speakers are at the very end of the chain, they are definitely the tail that wags the dog.
jjss49's avatar
Ag insider logo xs@2x
jjss49
6,612 posts
 
i would agree with leftears and others

speakers in the room - that is what actually makes the music you will experience

find the speakers that work well for you in your environment, then tailor the rest

of course, you need to have a source in mind as well, but if it is a reasonably high quality, good  sounding, tonally balanced source, the speaker choice is the lynchpin, around which you match other components
high-amp OP
508 posts
 
Oddly enough, a few years back, I had my Martin Logan Spires in a very similar, but much larger room. The room was all hard surfaces. Glass, granite, wood, a full wall of glass, etc. They were also pretty close to the back wall, which I custom made a couple of acoustic panels for. All in all, they sounded pretty darn good, I was very surprised! Still a bit fatiguing but consider the room and the placement, not bad at all.

Since then I sold the ML's for $2,500 and to replace them with a newer equivalent is well over $10K (ESL 11A's).  Don't think I'm going there  there!

Honestly, I would prefer some passive speakers that I can somehow make work in this room, just not sure how...yet.
duckworp's avatar
duckworp
257 posts
 
I am sure you are planning this but I would urge no one to buy a pair of speakers, or at least not expensive speakers, without demoing them in the room they are going to be placed in.  Speakers are so room dependent that it is better to find a small range of options from dealers prepared to home demo, rather than listen to a ton of speakers in other people's rooms. 
high-amp OP
508 posts
 
duckworp -

Great advice, thank you, but like many others looking to purchase audio equipment most dealers are in the big cities, which can be a long trek for many. On the other side of the coin, some direct sale manufacturers offer in home trials for X amount of time. If you don’t get the right fit after a few try’s, return shipping fees will really start to eat up the budget.

It’s funny, many here say they have hit it just right purchasing unheard equipment, whereas others, such as yourself, say you would only purchase if you could actually here it in their own room.

Now I know what that space between a rock & a hard place feels like.

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