The best speaker you ever heard?

but I have not been very happy with any speakers I have owned.

Norm, that is a crying shame. i suppose we all have our own particular definition of 'happy'. i don't want to put words in your mouth.....so i would appreciate you expanding on your above comment.

you have tried every tweak out there; and more different pieces of gear than anyone else i know. why do you think you have not found speakers that make you happy?

too high of expectations?

room acoustics?

are you more interested in investigating performance of other areas?

i am not busting your chops here but your comment was concerning to me as i have lots of respect for your listening opinions.

btw, staying 'on-topic' i would say that who knows what speaker is 'best'. since best infers 'best in all contexts'....which is a silly idea. OTOH the best performance from a speaker i have heard is the Evolution Acoustics MM3's in my room over the last month or so. possibly lots of speakers might thrive in this environment too.....but that's another question. right now...this is amazing. they are completely coherent and holographic, flat to 10hz in my room, dynamically alive, nuanced and involving, supremely detailed, and effortless in their presentation. a window into the music.

and Norm....i am happy with my speakers.

Mtkhl567, don't worry about MrT. He has the compulsion to place what I call his mantra, whenever he thinks that the opportunity arises. Best to ignore it.

Me, I'm still happy with my big Sound Labs. (:
For me they are "best".
All the same, I have to agree with Norm. If my ears are still full of the sound of real live music, a cloud of unhappiness settles around selfsame, should I fire up my rig. It is best to wait a while to regain happiness and this has been the same with all the speakers I have or shall still own. And I doubt that even Mike's room and a 10hz reproduction, (which would scare the living daylights out of me by the way, 16hz are already quite scary), would heal my of that occasional affliction. The fate of an audiophile who loves going to concerts.

Detlof, I'm totally with you that there is no speaker system that can reproduce an original event 100% despite some claims to the contrary. Anyone who doesn't think that is the case I would advice to go to a live concert of any kind, but large stadium rock concerts really drives home the point. Some of my favorites live events are:

Pink Floyd at Wembley Stadium, The Nelson Mandela concerts in same stadium, Guns n Roses at Feynoord Stadium Rotterdam. I think the difference was probably the amount of adrenaline rushing through my blood helped by a healthy dose of expectation, weed and/or alcohol. Irreproducible.

But since I don't have that expectation from my system, I am quite happy with what it can do. And occasionally, when the wife and kids are away, the volume ... ahum the pleasure control ... can go up and brighten those amp eyes to the max. That can get my adrenaline going a bit, but its a long way off from real live. I'm already happy when music played through my speakers gives me goosbumps ... that's all I expect of my system to do very very well. And it does, very often!

To all audiophiles out there, the goosbump test is the only real "objective" one out there IMHO. You need to be in the right state of mind, but if you are, and there are no goosbumps, then continue your search...

Detlof, i agree that 'live' music can humble reproduced music.....but not always. in fact; the odds are dramatically against 'live' music sounding very good at all in most venues. either too loud, or lacking focus, or not in balance, or bad listening position, or outdoors and lots of issues. 75% of live music have at least some of those issues in my experience. our brains can compensate for sound problems and we can still be swept along with the live performance.

OTOH the 'live music experience' cannot be duplicated in our homes.

there are a few local Jazz clubs and smaller recital halls which do offer consistently excellent live music performance.

regarding 10hz; my experience is that 10hz which has distortion is lethal and a bit scary; but 10hz which is controlled and effortless is really wonderful. it's more a feeling than something you hear. recently i made some adjustments to speaker placement and my bass settings which made subtle but significant improvements to my bass accuracy. it made a huge difference in the coherence of deep bass.....which allowed my body to stop tensing up when i knew that very deep bass was coming.

aaahhhhhhhhhhhhhh.......music.

"aaahhhhhhhhhhhhhh.......music"
How right you are.........
That's happiness.