The best speaker you ever heard?

DON MORRISONS 1700 LIVE without the noise.

Dear Dingus, excellent choice.Infact that speaker is a text book loudspeaker design.The designer is a genius.The original concept called for a 4" dome instead of the 4" flat mid-woofer, but B&W did not want to fund such an expensive and time consuming driver project.Till date whenever B&W tries to design a replacement, they still cannot come up with even one concept that seems to better the Nautilus project.
BTW the MF and HF drivers on the new Vivid speakers are the culmination of the designers ideas with regards to metal domes.
Here is a little trivia,the original Nautilus was conceptulised as a 5 way, using a 16"/8"/4" dome/2"dome/1" dome.Cheers.

Rockadanny: I went to Jim Salk's house to audition a pair of his Veracity HT3s. After listening for a bit, I came to the conclusion that they are better than live. Or at least what live SHOULD sound like, were it properly miced, set-up, and amped. They magically fill the room with high resolution, no distortion, crystal clear music. Exquisite and incomparable - both in sound and asthetics.

I'd be curious to know which speakers you are comparing HT3's against? A comparison with Tyler, Zu, Silverline, Acoustic Zen, Daedalus etc would be great, but if you have others in mind it would be good to know what they are.

Aktchi,
Comparisons were of some speakers past. I admit that the HT3s were nearly the most expensive speakers I've heard. The others: Audes Blues; Tannoy Eyris DC-3; Vandersteen 2ce; Von Schweikert VR-2; Zu Druid; Vienna Acoustic Beethoven Baby Grand; Polk LSi25; Martin Logan (?). And IMO the HT3s were not just better, but better by far. Then there are mine: EgglestonWorks Fontaine, but truthfully speaking I am holding judgement on these until I get my system back up and operating. It has been out of commission for a few weeks. I am looking forward to comparing the HT3s to my Egglestons soon. So I guess I jumped the gun a little comparing the HT3s to my Eggys. Keep in mind that the HT3s use perhaps the best drivers available, with an amazing ribbon tweeter, and a cabinet whose size and construction contribute to the enhancement of the sound. Of the other speakers I mentioned (except for my Eggys) , I never felt their cabinets played any significant role in adding to the quality of sound. And IMO the cabinet is just as critical as the drivers. Dynamics is one thing, and many of the above speakers have it. But only the HT3s, and I suspect my Eggys, have properly sized and contructed cabinets to add qualities such as tone, timbre, and clarity, making them musical.

Re: B&W Original Nautilus

BTW the MF and HF drivers on the new Vivid speakers are the culmination of the designers ideas with regards to metal domes.
Here is a little trivia,the original Nautilus was conceptulised as a 5 way, using a 16"/8"/4" dome/2"dome/1" dome.Cheers.
Sphere

Sphere,
Thanks, I know next to nothing about the original Nautilus and appreciate any further info I can get. Certainly an exceptional speaker. Guess I will have to check out some Vivid speakers now.