Best overall Speakers for $2,500.00 or less, New?

Get the Vandersteen 2Ce Signatures. You've described them to a "T" above. Also, you can get them new for under $2000 and spend the rest on great speaker cables.

Hi-fi Consult - Nordens most and Best High End butik.
Hello look att there Speaker Jupiter! Impressive.
Caindly regard.
Anders.

I have been into mixing and matching for over 25 years and by far the Jean Marie Reynauds Trente are the most musical
in the truest sence for musical enjoyment .I am a sound engineer and a highly experienced audiophile .Compared to the Spendors,which are similar in a way , Harbeths ,Merlins and Sonus Creamonas these are more musical and warm ,not at the expence of detail ,timing and
speed .Sure there are more resolving speakers out there like the Merlins or detailed like the JM labs be for absolute detail, at what price though.Listen and you will see what I mean,you just enjoy and forget about what is not right or wrong.

Second vote for the Totems. I have the Hawk (msrp $2500) and it's a wonderful all-around speaker. It replaced Naim SBL's and has comparable midbass and speed characteristics (arguably best in class), but has a great soundstage and imaging as well (which the Naim has virtually none of).

I also looked at more expensive models from Spendor, Neat, Naim, Thiel, Dynaudio, and Living Voice before deciding on the Totems. I added a Totem Lightning sub later (msrp 1500) and it adds low-end seamlessly to the Hawks.

Graham