Best small, desktop speakers, $500 or under (new or used)

I've chased this for years. I decided internal amplification for computer/desktop was the way to go, then improve the source: high res music files, good soundcard or DAC, Amarra, etc. I started early with new Altec Lansing ACS48s - loved them. Then B&W MM-1: excellent and fun but, like Audioengine and my Adam Artist 5s, all sounded accurate but slightly processed to these ears. A pair of used Swan M200 Mk II arrived with damaged internal amps but sound terrific with external amplification. I love our sublime Totem Arros and other small Totem designs have that magic but I'm not tempted by the sound of the self-powered Kin Play. My keepers: 1) Decware DM944s (now DM945) - I used then nearfield for awhile but they deserve more room – and tubes. This brings me to 2) Vanatoo Transparent Ones - the knock-out punch. Music leaps and thunders out of them. Jaw-dropping yet very musical. Miraculous. The Zeros are smaller, and perhaps cooler design-wise, and equally astonishing for their size - I've heard them at length and in conversation with one of the owners. For context, I always buy used; myroom-sized systems have included Klipsch Quartets and Klipschorns; Merlin, Mirage, Allison, Canton. Omega 7 XRS Alnico, Tekton OB4.5. My keepers are all full-throated, balanced, transparent and tonally rich to my ears: Klipsch Epic CF-3, Decware DM944s, Totem Arros – and for desktop use, the Vanatoo Transparent Ones.

It's just that they're so old and perhaps mid-fi that I was thinking that maybe big advances had happened since, well, 1988, and I could easily best these things with even something well under $500.

I think you could trounce them multiple different ways for $100, for instance, with the Dayton Audio MK402BTX.