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What are the world's best speakers to bring the philharmonic into your living room?

TwoSeventy said:
I would say some of the bigger PMC three ways. Obviously dependent on room size and budget. I have the PB1is which are fairly low down the range and they render large scale orchestral music extremely well. My dad has the quad esl57 electrostatics which are good but the bass and treble are rolled off and there is a slight low mid boost. The midrange is great and they sound great with orchestral. The PMCs are similar in some ways with regards to the midrange but the whole frequency spectrum is more accurate. Much more scale. I recently went to a classical symphonic concert and was expecting the sound to sweep me away compared to my hifi. I was actually shocked that when I got home and put the hifi on that it sounded extremely similar. In fact I preferred it. I dare say if we could have sat a little closer to the orchestra I would have enjoyed more impact but I was surprised what can be achieved in the home.
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i home auditioned a pair of pb1i's and was very impressed with them, had them for a week and was about to buy them when i got a offered a second hand pair of mb2s's which blew them out of the water so must agree that large pmc's definatley would fit the bill
 
Magnepan or Martin Logan, nothing else comes close. I'd think the Quads, too, but haven't heard them. Conventional speakers just don't give the same sense of breadth.
 
Quad ESL-57's can sound quite excellent with all kinds of music including full symphony orchestra. They always played plenty loud enough for me when sitting a few meters from them actively listening. I'm not one who listens much past 85 db which was well within range for the quads. If you want to go apeshit with volume, get horns.
 
whisky180 said:
i home auditioned a pair of pb1i's and was very impressed with them, had them for a week and was about to buy them when i got a offered a second hand pair of mb2s's which blew them out of the water so must agree that large pmc's definatley would fit the bill
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Go easy on the Pb1is! I must agree though I heard some mb2s with the matching bass cabinet and they sounded amazing. I think deutsche grammophon are using the active version for monitoring at their headquarters.
 
You need both extreme bandwidth and dynamic capability teamed to neutrality and coherence. Not easy.

Two loudspeakers that really impressed me with large scale classical works were the large Avalon Isis ( and it's slightly smaller brother) and the Westlake HR-7 Tower.

Both of these are truly capable, although I personally would add four subsonic subwoofers to each in order to accurately reproduce the acoustic at high levels.
 
John said:
Quad ESL-57's can sound quite excellent with all kinds of music including full symphony orchestra. They always played plenty loud enough for me when sitting a few metres from them actively listening. I'm not one who listens much past 85 db which was well within range for the quads. If you want to go apeshit with volume, get horns.
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The ESL 57s were largely bought by classical fans, and to a lesser extent, jazz aficionados, in the 50's and 60's. Having recently wheeled mine out, I'm amazed at their ability with many genres of music and they certainly have their unique magic.

However, compared to my much larger Quad 2905s, they don't really do the scale, which is not surprising. The 2905s really emulate a concert hall compared to my equally enormous ProAc Response Four cone speakers, which were no slouches.

Scale is a forte of large electrostatic speakers, I've read, and I understand that the bass/mid coherence problems of the MLs has now been illiminated. Their all electrostatic CLC (?) is pretty damned good, but pricey.

Must try some Summit Xs some time.......hmmmm!
 
Sue Pertwee-Tyr said:
Provided absolute volume isn't a key parameter, I'd fancy a pair of Magneplanars. They seem to get the energy into a room in a way rather different to a conventional pistonic driver. A bit like the Quads, at a guess, but with better bass and more impact.
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Nope and nope...I had a pair of MG3.3R's..all midrange, sweeeet top with no real sparkle and no bass impact at all...and I have a very large listening room..sold them to my sister for a few hundred Euro..750 to be precise..they sound better in her room, but if you want bass and impact... don't ever ever go the Maggie way..and don't even THINK about trying to use them with a sub..asking for disaster..and yes I did use them with a multitude of different power amps, including Krell and NVA Statement Mono's...they do light classical rather well though..
 
Big Maggies would probably do it, with a nice big SS amp pushing them.

The room is going to be just as important though.
Replicating the sound of a large orchestra in full pelt just cannot happen in a small-medium sized room.
You need lots of space around you, around the loudspeakers, plus between you and the loudspeakers.
 
As a postscript, and because it hasn't been mentioned, big (wooden) horns have a reputation for scale (and bass). I heard the alternative horns; expensive Avant Gardes under excellent conditions, but something kept honking at me at a certain frequency, esp. on female voice. Each to his own, I guess.:)
 
Tony L said:
...voiced for the BBC 'ealth 'n' safety' 75-80db
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Nothing to do with health & safety. Classical BBC monitoring is based around the idea of listening about 10dB above natural level. Human speech, mid to late sixties dBSPL*, monitoring at about 75 - 80 dBSPL.

* 0dBSPL refers to the threshold of hearing
 
I have maggie 2.5 r's. With the right amp they can do bass pretty well. Eminem, lets get down to business positively makes your chest cavity vibrate through them.
 
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