Indeed - buying without hearing for yourself first is always a worrisome prospect. Internet-direct companies try to assuage this fear by offering 30-day trials and full refunds, but even so, the hassle of boxing and shipping the speakers back is still a major deterrent, so I fully understand the hesitancy.
Still, I think many of us are very familiar with the experience of listening to speakers in a store, only to bring them home and have them sound significantly different! The simple fact is that the room itself plays such a huge role in the final sound that there really is no way to "hear" what a speaker truly sounds like outside of your listening room.
And because of that, I'm sure that is why so many of us come to message boards and forums simply to discuss and maybe get some suggestions. Even though it's not a substitute for hearing a speaker in your own room with your own ears, it is still a more educated method of narrowing down your choice than simply picking a speaker and hoping it all turns out for the best
I've had the pleasure of listening to many many speakers in my own room. This is a real hobby for me, so I don't mind paying the cost of return shipping or restocking fees
Every month or so, I have new toys to play with and no really huge expenditures since I keep so few of the products that I try. For sure, I may be "abusing" the return policy of stores and online vendors, but on the other hand, I also end up recommending speakers all the time and I'm sure there have been at least a few sales that would not have taken place otherwise.
With speakers, there is no strict "right" or "wrong". I actually lament that somewhat as I would personally love for there to be some sort of industry standards, much as there are for displays. But for now, when I audition and listen, I mostly attempt to pick out distinctive traits with each speaker.
Given enough time with placement, upstream equipment and equalization, virtually any competently made speaker will sound "good". But what I try to make a note of are clear (albeit, often subtle) differences that are inherent to the speakers themselves.
Sometimes, a certain trait will reveal itself and thus, make that particular speaker especially good or bad in a certain situation.
I figure, that is the sort of thing that anyone asking on a forum would like to know about. There are a TON of "good" speakers. Every brand you mentioned that you would like to audition is "good". You could literally chose any one of them and it would hard to be disappointed.
Of the ones you mentioned, the only brand I have not tried personally are the Mordunt-Short.
My own experiences with the other brands yielded the following notes:
PSB - I found these to be rather "forgiving" speakers. From top to bottom, the sound was pleasing and accurate, but in comparison to some of the most detailed or "revealing" speakers, I found them to sound slightly veiled
Aperion - I only tried some of their earlier models and the lineup has since been updated, so things may be different now. My experience with their older speakers though was that they were not even from top to bottom. The cross-over regions exhibited uneven frequency response and I found the upper frequencies started to sound distorted before reaching my own peak tolerance for loudness. As I said though, their speakers have been updated, so things could easily be different now.
Monitor - I tried their Silver line of speakers. I found them to basically be without any fault or obvious traits of their own. Essentially, I could control their sound however I pleased depending on placement, equalization and associated equipment.
Totem - "Warmth". These definitely had their own character and it was a "full bodied" type of sound. My own personal desire is for neutral speakers that exhibit more or less no character of their own, but I can certainly understand why many people would immediately gravitate to the Totem sound.
Paradigm - "Wide Dispersion". If I had one thing to say about Paradigm's speakers it's that they would be excellent for a larger home movie theater, but they are less precise when it comes to pure music listening. These really gave me the impression that every seat in a theater would be granted very similar sound, but when it comes to pin-point focus, that is not their strong suit.
By all means, those are only MY experiences and opinions and by no means any sort of definitive take on any of them. I'm sure plenty of people here would be more than happy to disagree or debate my own findings. But never-the-less, I think some people find it helpful, so I offer it simply as one man's opinion
In any case, for your own room and described taste, raptorzfan, the Rockets were the speakers that jumped to mind. They just seemed to hit all of the factors that made sense and I tried to describe those factors in my previous reply.
With all of the speakers I have tried, I can honestly say that there are very very few where I would actually be disappointed to own any of them. Almost any well made speaker sounds "good" and can be adjusted to closely match your taste. In the end, my advice is to not get too hung up on it. There will always be someone who thinks their choice is "the best" and you will always wonder if there is something "better". But after dozens of speaker brands and a few years now of switching out speakers on a regular basis, I've come to the conclusion that there is far more "the same" about well made speakers than there are differences. For sure, there ARE differences, and that is the fun of trying so many! But my point is that there really aren't very many outright "bad" choices, so there's no need to worry. Buy any well made speakers and they can make you happy
