Cheap volume for large room

Winchell, please clarify your aim. Are you looking for a system that will fill
the entire room with well balanced sound? Or are you looking for a system
that sounds well balanced and provides sufficient volume in a well defined
listening area of the room?

Here's a few quick thoughts. One of the problems most speakers will have in
such a large room as yours is generated enough bass volume. Moving your
speakers closer to the rear wall might help. You might also consider adding
subwoofer(s) to your current setup. If the lack of volume problems is further
up in frequency, then the cheapest solution is to move your listening position
closer to the speaker position. Sound falls off at 6dB/meter.

look at a pair of vandersteen 3 or older 4's...

Thanks for the suggestions.

Unsound -- Klipschorn...looks different...what's the catch?

Btstrg -- The ML Prodigy is only a step above my ReQuests. I really think the electrostats are part of the problem because of their characteristic placement sensitivity. Don't get me wrong, ML is awesome...for small rooms.

Onhwy61 -- basically fill the room over good sound in one area. The ML's sound great but only at a low volume and front-and-center. They don't have any "reach" on the low end. The treble is also bright sounding partly because there are absolutely no soft surfaces in the space. I know there are things that can be done about the overall sound other than replacing the speakers but I feel like it would take way too much building "around" the ML's.

So main goal is to fill the room with a warm sound and enough bass (preferrably without a separate sub).

Right now I'm looking at the Legacy Classics and PSB Stratus Gold. Any others (used) worth looking at for up to $2.5k?

Klipschorn is a particular model from a paritcular manufacturer of speakers incorporating a horn loaded design. The Klipschorn's are legendary. They also prefer corner placement which is not a requirement of all horn loaded designs. Horn loaded designs are notable for their ability to play quite loudly despite modest power requirements. They often have other sonic charateristics that I personaly find objectionable.

If you have two corners, then get some Klipshorns. Esentially the room becomes part of the bass drivers folded horn and you are literally standing in the speaker. They have quite the following and you can play with low wattage tube amp designs and tweak them to your liking.

Your neighbors may not like you though ;)