When choosing new Speakers, what matters most to you?

buying speakers without any measurement is a really risky proposition.
 

+1

Small planars and ribbons. I made a choice 40+ years ago. I've never changed my preference. 70-80s I really liked Stratherans ribbons. I made 3 set of speakers to fund mine. I picked the drivers up from Brian Cheney at VMPS. 20 24" ribbons.

I haven't found a single speaker manufacture that makes a line of planars or ribbon speakers at a 1/2 way reasonable price. 

I liked the Infinity IRS Betas when they had rear chambers added to the monitor section too. One of the best bang for the buck speakers EVER made. The servo system and added rear chamber made them the right size for any room.

The size of the speaker in the room make very little difference if you design speaker cabinets to reduce resonance, and most of all not collect and deform the drivers face. WIDE baffles collecting distortion from all frequencies including the frequencies the drivers produce themselves is real good place to start.

Phase plugs on cone/voice coil drivers and servo controlled subs.

I don't mix BASS and vibration with my planar/ribbons just for the damage alone. I'm pretty sure most of the Ribbons will last as long as the magnets keep working and planars as long as the lamination holds up. 100+ years Then you can rebuild them..

BTW the Strathearns I built in the 70s were still going strong in 2010 when they were passed on to the son or grandson. They bought spare drivers from Magic Markey.

Bottom line they don't make what I like any more. SO I'll stick with what I got. Nothing better so far. Same wife for 49 years too.. :-)

Regards

I will not look at the specs until I have heard the speakers in question.  Many of the specs are stretched a bit so unless John Atkinson has tested them to confirm or deny, the specs don’t mean all that much to me.  I am another believer in a higher sensitivity speaker.  My current are 94db.  Why make the amp have to work so hard?  

I was enchanted by a set of Acoustat 2 + 2 before I knew anything about high end audio. Immediately found out they took massive power I did not have. I spent over thirty years trying to recreate that sound and never really did. But I found I was pursuing a sound that enhanced electronic and small venue music at the expense of all others.

I started regularly attending the symphony and accidentally heard some Sonus Faber speakers… slowly completely pivoted to all tube with Sonus Faber… they sound natural, all music sounds better.

So for me, the sound (which what I was looking for changed over time)… but to fully get the sound all other components must be optimized.

Stereo 5  + 1