Can you give me your speaker suggestions?


Currently looking for new speakers as I have grown tired with mine, I would greatly appreciate any suggestions that you think would fit my needs!

I had a pair of heresy iii speakers and loved the sound from 600hz and up but felt pretty much everything below that was thin sounding with no weight. I built a bigger ported cabinet for the drivers and it made a decent improvement from say 40-90hz ish but I still needed a subwoofer. 100-400hz still sounded thin, drums lack that punch and impact and male vocals lack weight and presence. 

Basically I am looking for a speaker that gives you the "musicians are in the room" feeling that the heresy gives me but deliver more in the lower midrange/upper bass area. 

I listen to jazz, femal/male vocals, 70's rock, 80' pop etc.. across all genres the heresy is equally good and equally bad (no matter what genre it feels like the 100-400hz area is sucked out of the room).. speaking of the room im in a 15foot by 22 foot room (its an L shape, half way down the 22 foot wall extends another 22 feet about 550sqft total). not an ideal room but its the only place I have. 

I am using a prima luna prologue premium with 37ish watt/channel, I currently purchased a Pathos logos mk ii with 110wpc into 8, and immediately noticed my main area of concern sounded even thinner, the more powerful hybrid amp sounds less powerful, less meat on the bones if that makes sense. when I get new speakers, I will sell one of the amps. 

my current budget is around $4-6K USD, I would consider purchasing used, or even a diy kit. 

the sonetto V reviews seem to tell me they will fit my needs, does anyone have any thoughts? 

thank you in advanced!! 

128x128palutena

IMHO a strategy to consider...

Ideally you want a speaker that can capture as much of the frequency response as possible. The greater the frequency response the greater the sound stage.

For your budget that might be in the 36hz - 40Khz range. I would then look for a sub to capture the lower Frequencies, which would not only provide you with the bass response you are looking for, but would greatly enchance the soundstage and flesh out the details within the midrange. 

Once you have identified speakers within the appropriate range, listen to them to find the brand that meets your personal taste. 

good luck

PL owner here. I run KT150s into NSMT model 75s. No bass issues and plenty of transparency. Good luck

If you still own the H3s, I would damp the mid horn, tweeter horn, and the woofer basket, with Dynamat, and use the factory enclosures. I would buy a Class A, ss amp ( I can recommend a few if you go in this direction ), and if you like tubes, use a tube preamp, to give you some of that warmth and color. Some of what you describe, cannot be done with tubes, ime. Elevate the H3s with a good pair of stands ( no longer use the risers of the H3s ), and as mentioned above, get a pair of powered subwoofers ( sealed ), and all this can be done below your budget. I will likely get some slack from folks here, but play a fast and articulate bassist, and listen to the attack, and sustain, of the notes. This is not tube amp territory, I am sorry to say. Any questions, you can email me. My best, always. MrD.

@mrdecibel thanks for your suggestions! I have damped all the areas you have mentioned with something similar to dynamat as I could not find dynamat at the time. I can not use the factory enclosures, the enclosures I built are better in every way. the factory enclosures make the speaker unlistenable to my ears, huge resonances around 2-400hz, anemic bass. I built ported cabinets about the same size as a forte (curved unibody design with bracing, 1 inch thick) and everything I was looking to improve, improved, just not enough unfortunately. they have served me well for about 2 years, and I will always keep them at least in a home theatre set up.