Which speaker might be a better bang for the buck

[Mark Adams]

Hey folks

i am new here and in advance i would like to thank you for your advice.

I wanted to see who here can recommend a speaker better than B &W 685's but in a floorstanding model that can take advantage of an XPA-3 Emotiva amplifier? (But not at the CM10 S2 Price Point) I know this can be sujective but i love the sound of the B&W's but not the pricetag and amp load that comes with it.

Seems like there are a lot of obscure brands out there that aren't mainstream that do a really good job of building quality speakers. I have an order out with HSU Research to give them a try.

For what its worth i own a set of Deftech BP8060ST floorstanders and have never been impressed with them. I mainly bought them because of the price which was $738 a pair

I hope to have the ability to switch from surround to 2.1 stereo. (My Listening Preference)

My past experience has just been with AV recievers...Pioneer Elite VSX-32 and Sony Str-da2800es units.

Any advice is appreciated.

 

[markw]

That's a hard question to answer. If you don't like the sound of a speaker then, no matter how much or how little you paid, you paid too much for it.

Listen, then decide.

 

[BoredSysAdmin]

at $700/pr I think that bigger bang for the buck would be with Ascend CM-340SE with stands .
I have yet to hear one person who didn't like them.

 

[XEagleDriver]

If you like the "English" sound of B&Ws but not the price point, you may want to look into the
Wharfdale Diamond line.

FWIW: I use two pairs of Diamond 10.1 Bookshelves, supporting a 2.1 computer room system and a master bedroom 2.0 system and have loved them.
- There are also several Wharfdale floorstanding speaker models as well.

Cheers,
XEagleDriver

 

[Mark Adams]

thanks for the feedback... i meant to add that i am looking to upgrade from the b & w 685's to the next step up. I just feel if i am going to spend $1,500 to $2,000 per speaker it better be much better than the b & w's

 

[BoredSysAdmin]

with $2k budget for a great value towers I would look very closely at:
http://philharmonicaudio.com/slims.html

and they would massive improvement over 685s