Focal Mini Utopia vs Merlin MXe


Is this a fair comparision(sound quality wise ignoring price)? Looking for comments from people who owned both speakers for good length of time. I own mini utopia and Quad 989s and love them both. Trying to simplify and get full range speaker which will better both mini and quads (bass, imaging, stage depth & width, seamless in crossover transition) for 50% jazz and 50% Classical. This is new system building so open for amplifiers choice but leaning towards Transendent sound OTL. Please keep this discussion limited to these two speakers. Space limitation is making me sell my quads. Thanks.
celestial_audio

Showing 2 responses by toetapfactor

I owned the Minis for well over a year and never could get them to sound even close to good..Tried Pass labs 150.5/McIntosh 402 as well as numerous tube amps including AR/Cary/Wavac( paired up with a couple different subs) Loaned them to a buddy and he came up with the same results.Ive never heard the Merlins but they have to be better than those Focal minis,IMO..If you decide to open the thread up for speaker recommendations that blow those mini yucks out of the water let us know!!!!
Sstalwar...IMO, the Micro BE would be a better step up and of course the new UtopiaIII if wanting to stay in the Focal family.If it were my money I would addition the Dynaudio C1.At 4 grand on the used market there is no way you can compare the mini utopia to it on any level.Add a sub and your done.Pesonally I think the tweeter on the mini sucks especially when compared to the Esotar2.Just my take on it.Let us know what you do