I can't remember which Martin Logans they were. They had 8" powered woofers. The other 'drivers' were electrostatic. They were a bit 'cold' and lacking in detail.
I also listened to the Vienna Acoustics 'Grand Piano' (I believe that was the model). The sounded very good but I did not have the same listening material I had been using so can't make a direct comparison.
The gallo's did an outstanding job with male vocals, they look fantastic, are very fast, very clear in the highs, never got harsh, and the 10" dual coil woofers are very nice and add a lot. They also had an incredible sound stage. My complaints are that they are missing something in the transition from the woofer to the midrange, not sure if they did not shift some of the music to a little higher frequency then they really are, and finally while they did not get harsh they did come close to being annoying at times in the highs. In addition placement too close to a read wall seriously impacted sound quality & stage.
The B&W 803's while acceptable to the wife did not have the same artistic flair of the Gallo's (impacts the wife not me). They did not seem to have the same presence as the gallo's or even the XT4's (the bass riffs hit much harder in the XT4's). The sound stage while good was not as good as the gallo's. They were a bit smoother than the Gallo's. While both speakers did a good job on the Tool CD we were using (it is a poor recording) they B&W's did a better job. There also seem to be some transitions that the B&W's could handle better.
Let me give more thoughts to the pluses & minuses to the speakers and talk with one of the guys that has listened to the speakers with me.
ACI makes some very nice stuff. I really like their Maestro Sub and would be intersted in getting one. The only issue is going to be that they probably won't make it past the WAF.
Before today I would have expressed concern over the driver selection in the Onix Reference meeting the full range sound I am looking for. After listening to the B&W XT4's I am open to smaller drivers. The Onix have two issues, 1) they are too tall and 2) they will not meet the WAF.
Now let me describe what I am looking for. This will probably end up as sounding like the attempt to build a perfect speaker but here is goes:
- Not a traditional box or tower look. The B&W's pass due to the tweeter on top and the fact that the front is not a flat place (this is of course a WAF issue)
- A full range speaker. The speakers should not fall on their face if the sub is removed from the mix. They should handle everything from Metalica, Beastie Boys, NERD, Tool, Chopin, Bach, Beetohven, Tchovisky, Steely Dan, Rage Against the Machine, REM, Blue Man Group to HT, e.g. King Kong, War of the Worlds, Master & Commmander, Fifth Element, Ronin, etc.
- The speakers should provide a presence. You should be aware of the music. It should convey the sense of being at a concert.
- Fast. The drivers should be able to keep up with the transistions/music.
- There should be no 'missing' areas or the appearnce of poorly chosen crossover points.
- They speakers should handle the highs well but not be overly bright. A bit more on the warm side than the bright side.
There are some other items I should list but the first time I wrote this response I suddenly received a message that I was not logged in and lost all my work.
