Legacy Focus XD - will I ever upgrade?

I have reviewed several Legacy Audio speakers for Dagogo.com, if you care to read the reviews. Upgrading to higher models is worthwhile, as the performance changes dramatically. I owned the Focus HD, then the Focus SE, and went to the Whisper, finally doing some upgrades to transform it into the Whisper DSW Clarity Edition. 

I have not reviewed the Aeris, so I cannot speak about that first hand, but the leap from Focus SE to Whisper is enormous. The performance spectrum, even within a line of speakers, is much larger than you think. 

My room is about 20 x 40 but the 40 flows into an open area in back. As to speaker placement, I have Zero Flexability. They are about 7 ft apart and my theater seats including the center seat is about 11 ft away from speaker fronts.

As to which to upgrade to..... I would love to hear the whispers but I know how physically huge they are. They would look insane in my theater room. The aeris is only about 4 inches taller than what I have now and about the same width, so that would work. Are you running the wavelet pre amp with those Whispers because that is what I also need to consider in any future plans..... yes? I will read your reviews

mikekollar, my ceiling height in the room is 7.5' and the dimensions are 13' x 23',  so unless your room has a very low ceiling it will work. If you look at my system images you can see that I do not adhere to the received wisdom that you cannot use oversize speakers. 

The holistic sound quality of larger (upper end) speakers is definitively superior to lower end models, and that is true generally no matter the brand. I

My Whisper DSW speakers were the first of its kind, a hybrid that can be run in 3 modes; Entirely passive iwth as few as two channels of amplificaiton and tri-wiring, or combination of passive midrange and treble with active bass using the Wavelet for bass, or fully active with Wavelet. Over the years I have varied between setups. You'll read about it in the articles I have done about the Whisper. 

I upgraded from a pair of original Focus to the Aeris and have found the difference to be quite astounding. The upgrade from the XD, since it is a newer version, might not be as compelling. The most improvement was with vocals and mid-range. I tried a few different amplifiers to drive the top end. I tried Ps Audio that I didn't care for, and a PL Evo 400 which sounded great on midrange but seemed to run out of gas on louder passages. It also seemed to roll off the top end somewhat. I ended up getting a pair of Pass Labs x-260 mono blocks and haven't looked back. My listening room is 24x40 with 9 foot cielings (open concept). As far as the physical size, there is not much difference between the Aeris and XD. The wavelet is the real deal. In my quest for the best sound I tried many different permutations with pre-amps (tube and SS), speaker placement, DACs, etc. and found the wavelet to be the best performer. Setup was a snap and toggling between room correction and no correction is very noticeable. It works for me and I am still smitten with my setup. My only issue is this nagging feeling that the V's may be in my future. No compelling reason to upgrade further as I am more than pleased but I can't help but wonder. Maybe a road trip to Springfield would help this sickness. 

Lots of great and accurate feedback in this thread, unusual for Audiogon.

For those that don't have the budget for Pass, I would recommend Coda (slightly better for less) or highly recommend Legacy's own i.V2 (really an Ultra) or the i.V4 Ultra to bi-amp. Great review from douglas s above. And here's the latest:

Legacy i.V2 Amp Review