Harbeth 30.2 XD Vs Triangle Magellan Duetto 40th anniversary

I auditioned both in my standmount speaker’s odyssey. Both are very fine performers with very different sonic signatures in my personal experience. Hence, a more careful system synergy matching exercise in final selection is strongly recommended IMO.

I chose the HARBETHs .….

My personal experience in MY system ( emphasis added) [ REGA OSIRIS integrated amp, REGA ISIS VALVE cdp/dac, MOON 280d MIND2 network player/ streamers / dac, PHILIPS 673 fm tuner, all CARDAS CLEAR cables loom]

-Both speakers crave high-end upstream electronics to perform at their  max. Both will graphically expose any warts or compromises 

-The DUETTOs are comparatively more forward and top-end brighter. The 30.2 XD’s are  smoother  with a sonic and musical coherence of the 2 drivers that is exceptional, with a class-leading midrange . Since about 80% of your music resides in the midrange , if you get the midrange right, everything else will fall into place. Get it wrong, and all the king’s horses…

- It may not matter much in a near-field listening arena, however otherwise standmount speakers are limited by physics in reproducing the frequency response bottom octave . In a larger listening area venue, consider Introducing a quality high-end sealed subwoofer with high-end inputs worthy of the HARBETHs ( think bottom firing ATC C1 MK2 ) 

- Speaker cables: I don’t drink any of Alan Shaw’s KoolAid that cables don’t matter .I started out with my incumbent Ag-over- Cu NORDOST FREY that were now too  bright for me with an annoying emphasis  of digital “edge” or “glare” . A worthy upgrade fix was met to an all-Cu CARDAS CLEAR loom.

TAKEAWAY :. Some drive Fords, ….Some drive Chevys ….choose wisely.

POST SCRIPT ;

(1) Without prejudice to anything higlighted above , check out the harbeth p3esr xd review for near field arena listening 

https://youtu.be/22BwUQZ50eQ

https://www.stereophile.com/content/gramophone-dreams-86-harbeth-p3esr-xd-loudspeaker-and-nelson-subwooferstand

(2) If the DUETTOs sonic signature really stirs your drink, then think an upgrade to ELECTROCOMPANIET or YBA as terrific and best of breed upstream stablemates IMO.

 

May I ask why just these two justifiably well-regarded loudspeakers? Have you considered Revel PerformaBe M126Be (or the small floor standing F226Be), KEF R3 or Reference One, Arendal 1528, or Philharmonic BMR? Or active speakers (Genelec or Neumann)?

Edited to add Fritz loudspeakers.

Thank you, @akg_ca . This is super helpful and more on point than i could have reasonably hoped for.  (I’ve been thinking about the integrated DAC/Streamer Electrocompaniet, too….)

And @hedwigstheme thank you as well; Fair questions. The Revel F226Be may be a better size, in fact for the space, which turns out to be a bit bigger than i had thought; more like 15’ x 25’. And also, sad i think about it, more than 1/2 of the listening would be done from about 12-15’ away.  I’m adding it and the ELAC Vela 408.2 to the mix.

15x25 is a pretty good sized room and opens up more options than just monitors. That's the size of my dedicated listening room and it will support very large speakers.