Speaker Suggestion for teenage pre-stereophile

Start now by calling yourself an audiophile. Nothing about ownership or non-ownership makes you "pre" anything (aside from more broke, once you start spending!) You have the sound in your head and heart, that's what it's all about.

BTW, I N+1 the Acoustic Energy recommendations. For a monitor, the AE Aegis 1 is a closeout item, having been replaced by the AE Aegis EVO 1. Expect to see new non-EVO Aegis 1's for $200 and under. Fantastic speaker, fantastic bargain.

The Aegis 3 / Aegis EVO 3 is a floorstander, and quite fine (I own a pair doing rear-duty in a $10k setup, and have heard them as fronts in a $2.5k setup, and they are a fantastic speaker.) Expect $575 for used Aegis EVO3, and down to $350 for new-to-used Aegis EVO3. Ebay and Audiogon both have regular listings for these, with the older (closeout) non-EVO models appearing in frequency about 10-to-1 over the newer EVO models.

Wait for the right deals - the market will never be fairer - you should be able to make some serious strides in this climate.

Celestion SL6(bookshelf)...great speaker in the brit tradition...recent pair for $500 with stands...they go quick..so if u find a pair on here or ebay...act fast! ALso..the PSB 2bs are absurd for the money...good luck!

Good suggestions above, but given your space considerations, my rememberances of myself and AC/DC concerts at 16, etc. I think the Vandersteens would be too big and perhaps overload your room and the LS3/5A's would be a bit "warm" (I own Spendor LS3/5A's in a second system and love them BTW), so maybe look at Totem.

Nice vocals, very good soundstaging, can rock, are made very nice with good wood etc.

The newer Totem's are nice, but if it were me, and I could find an amp to push about fifty watts minimum, I might try to pick up one of the older Model Ones. You know, before the Signature model biwire. Or even, throw in a little more, $800 used, and try to scam a pair of Signatures here on audiogon.

The Totems Sigs would carry you through an amp and CD upgrade later. And then a wire upgrade after that, so you would have plenty of use out of them even while your system improved. Also, even if you went to sell them in 3-5 yrs or so, you should still be able to get $500/pr for them, which means that you would have had very good speakers for five years at about $75/yr. Not bad considering that you can also grow into them in the coming years and not feel like you need something else (and, er, if you've found this sight at 16 and are going NAD with Totems, it, well, won't be your last time asking these questions, right guys? My condolences on you burgeoning addiction).

What do you think guys on this reasoning?

Can't argue with Asa's approach (BTW the LS3/5A *are* warmish). Especially, buy something nice now -- which will probably keep even as audiophilia nervosa expands with time. The Totem sounds good -- hadn't thought of that. The older models seem to have a more "staccato" sound, the newer ones more mellow (so, for rock the older ones could be the ticket).
How about Triangle (titus & the like) -- anyone have these & can comment?

Woops, I didn't read this post carefully, thought I was hearing from a father not a son. 600 bucks eh ? I like Asa's idea of buying something to carry you through later upgrades, and I like the Totem and Triangle suggestions. The Totem Ones are _much_ harder to drive than the Triangles though. Maybe one could get lucky and find a used pair of Meadowlark Kestrels ?

However I run a Linn LP12 and I say source first. I have always wanted to spend more time with a system whose source was superb but whose downstream stuff was not, than vice versa. My advice would be to look for speakers that you will love for $600--Totem, Triangle and Meadowlark might be right, keeping in mind they are not equivalent and need different electronics--but do this only if you already have a great source.