which floor speaker up to 1500.00

03-31-13: Vapor1
I'm clearly not trying to hide behind a screen name.

I would disagree, you were certainly not being transparent. It's customary for manufacturers and dealers to identify themselves when posting on these boards. I welcome your participation, but your bias does need to be noted and presented.

I agree that in a room your size, a good pair of monitors is the way to go. I don't agree though that a good pair of floorstanders cannot be purchased for $1500 brand new. I can name many good ones that use quality drivers and pay attention to cabinet design to reduce resonance at this price point. Whatever construction and components are use, they still have to sound good to you and be the best the speaker for you - not us. So asking a bunch a strangers in a forum for a recommendation is really pointless. Instead ask yourself these questions.

1. Whats amplification do I have or plan on getting? Does it have a large enough power supply (not watts per channel) to drive low impedence speakers of 4 ohms or less? Should I even be looking at low impedence speakers with sensitivity ratings in the low to mid 80's or should I stick with 8 ohm, more efficient speakers witrh ratings in the 90's?

2. Whats my room like besides its size? Are there a lot of hard, reflective surfaces? Window? Hardwood floors or carpeting? Or is there a lot of plush soft furnture and drapes that can absorb sound.

3. What kind of speakers, particularly tweeters, do I like the sound of now? What have I heard that has already impressed my ears? Do I have a baseline for listening? Tweeters come in all differenet types - soft domes made from different fabrics, hard domes made from different metals, ribbons, ring radiators and compression horns. All these types sound different from one another. At the same time, they can all be good. So the trick is finding out what sounds good to you.

I would start asking myself the above and then go out and start auditiong speakers by type (not brand) to narrow down your driver preference. Also bring along source material that you are very familar with. One you have made a short list of actual models you have heard, then come back and ask forum owners about the specific models you are thinking about. Most will be glad to tell you what they like or dislike about them. Good luck in your search.

I have dozen of speakers in small rooms (11x11) and medium size (12x16) in the past 12 years... dynaudio, vandersteen, magnepan, b&w, martin logans, psb, DIY... I do have a pair of rega rs5, and these are the best compromise imho.
I would take a good listen to those. I have enjoyed Vandersteen tremendously, but they are bulky.

There's a guy selling NIB Revel F32s for $1500. These are close-outs as Revel has now released the new Performa3 line.

REGA RS5 / REGA RS7

see the great reviews in STEREOTIMES

http://www.stereotimes.com/speak022306.shtml

The R7 combines the true-to-the-music philosophy of all Rega products with the resolution and imaging demands of the audiophile world

Great extract below:

>>> After 34 years’ experience in the audio world have taught me that the most common system building error is mismatching the speaker to the room. Place a mini-monitor in too large a room and you get the bass-shy “squawk box” syndrome.

Far more common in the US is buying a speaker whose bass response is more than the room can handle, resulting in various manifestations of boom, thud, and rhinocerine mud-wallowing. It’s more than a simple matter of room dimensions and overall volume: wall and floor construction also play a crucial role. It’s been my general experience that if you can get clear and tight response down to 40 Hz in-room, stop and count your blessings. And think very hard about pursuing response into the bottom octave. One is more likely to screw up everything achieved in the musically useful range of 40 Hz and above. While my own reference speaker, the Sound Lab Dynastat, is flat to 20 Hz in my large basement listening room, the number of times I’ve absolutely needed that bottom octave for musical reasons in the last two years is zero. While the lowest range of the organ might be majestic in a large cathedral, mismatched bass-heavy speakers that literally shake the house on its foundations are more likely to induce vertigo and viscera displacement than aesthetic satisfaction. So how do you walk the line between bass-shy mini-monitors and elephantine bass heaviness in the “normal” room? Enter the new Rega R7 loudspeaker.