MoFi or Harbeth (used)

Sitting off axis is an issue.  I’d go with an omni polar speaker like Ohm if I was forced to sit off axis. 

I have no experience with the MoFi speakers, but based simply on their price point and what I've seen/heard from other MoFi electronics (the UltraDeck and MasterPhono), I think their speakers would be hard pressed to outdo the Harbeths, but that's purely conjecture.  I've been impressed by the MOFI gear I've heard to date, but it seems to be priced above it's performance level.

I picked up a pair of 30th Anniversary Compact 7's a few months ago, just to compare to the other Harbeths I've owned (Super HL5 Plus 40th anniversary and P3ESR SE).  They really wowed me, as well as some of my audiophile friends, and I kept them for months, seriously considering keeping them over my KEF Reference 1 speakers.  At the end of the day, the KEFs are better, but I liked the Compact 7s over the Super HL5 Plus as well as a pair of Stirling LS 3/6 that I had.  They are great speakers.

Toeing them in could help or perhaps your preamp has balance controls.  

My concern with Mofi, as is the case with all Andrew Jones speakers, is that after the initial intro dealers just start discounting them like crazy which has a detrimental affect on resale value. Harbeth is a known quantity and if you buy used can you always sell them at little or no loss.

on paper, the MoFi is a much better value. However I heard them and I was not impressed (which could be irrelevant, could have been the room, the setup, break-in, etc.)

Harbeth is about impressive midrange - again, anecdotally - the good news is, if you are set on these two, you only have to listen to two speakers which is doable/feasible, don't listen to a bunch of nerds, listen to the speakers :) 

For myself I would be more concerned  in what sounds better in my system. If you can get an in home audition that would be great.

I never concern myself with resale values in audio because I do not flip systems. It is after all a Hi-Fi system not a house. 

You simply must go listen to both pairs of speakers and let your ears be your guide.  Period!!!

Harbeth by a country mile.

@soix  All point source speakers are relatively poor off axis as the volume the speaker produces drops off rapidly with distance including the Ohms. The best kind of speaker for off axis listening is a line source. Because the volume drops of much slower with distance you can still hear the far speaker clearly. A full range line source has to run from floor to ceiling, anything shorter becomes a point source at low frequencies. As an example Magnepans become point sources at about 200 Hz. Above that they are line source and clearly audible off axis. The only full range line sources I am aware of are the 8 and 9 foot Sound Labs ESLs. 

I have both SourcePoint 8 & 10 and I’m super impressed.  The imaging is astonishing and it’s a very natural sound.  I’m a big fan of coincentric drivers and have owned many Tannoy and KEF models.  This is a winning combination without the brightness that many speakers these days suffer from.  I have never owned Harbeth, but they have always sounded great at the shows.  SourcePoint speakers completely disappear in my room, and that’s what I love in a speaker.

Given your room size, the Pointsource 10 will deliver more pressurization than that model Harbeth, whatever its other virtues. It comes down to your priorities.  Based on my listening experience, the Pointsource 10 is balanced to be neutral, and from all I hear about Harbeth, they are balanced to be “warm”.  But the 7ES is a smaller box and an 8” woofer, 86 dB vs 91 dB.  That is a big difference.  Your stated music preferences tilt towards greater cone area and sensitivity being advantages.

Source point in a heartbeat. Will get your foot tapping and heart pumping. Harbeth will put you to sleep 😴

 

 

I picked up a pair of 30th Anniversary Compact 7’s a few months ago, just to compare to the other Harbeths I’ve owned (Super HL5 Plus 40th anniversary and P3ESR SE). They really wowed me, as well as some of my audiophile friends, and I kept them for months, seriously considering keeping them over my KEF Reference 1 speakers. At the end of the day, the KEFs are better, but I liked the Compact 7s over the Super HL5 Plus as well as a pair of Stirling LS 3/6 that I had. They are great speakers.

Weird. In my system, the Stirling LS3/6s absolutely wiped the floor with the C7ES3s. It was no competition whatsoever.

To the OP: I haven’t heard the MoFi’s but it’s hard for me to imagine they wouldn’t give the Harbeths a run for the money considering the dismal performance I experienced with the latter, which happen to be one of the most overhyped speakers in all of audiophilia, IMHO. 

@mijostyn You're kinda half right. A point source output follows the inverse square law: level falls off at the square of the distance: double the distance, -6dB in level.  In free space.  Listening rooms are not free space. Speakers behave according to their width - a 12" wide speaker is an acoustic half-space from about 1100Hz up. This is the 'baffle effect' designers have to take into account that adds up to 6dB of total output above the baffle step frequency. A perfect line source is a line source above the half wave length of the line array height itself. Below that it is effectively omnidirectional, not a point source, just like any other box speaker.

You may find this interesting reading - from Linkwitz Labs https://www.linkwitzlab.com/frontiers.htm#E

Line arrays are a big thing in live sound because they offer great horizontal coverage with good vertical dispersion control and as importantly in large venues, the sound propagates as a cylindrical waveform  and so falls off at the inverse of distance, not the inverse square - 3dB per doubling of distance, not 6.dB. Consider this: the difference between one semi of sound equipment and two semis is just 3db. so halving your requirements makes the logistics and cost much more appealing. FWIW Stanal Sound out of Kearney, NE pioneered the use of 'flying' line-arrays in the mid-1970s for such arena-scale acts as Neil Diamond, John Denver, and Bob Dylan. I worked there during that period and helped design some of the cabinets we used as well as some of the first high-output subwoofers. 

Hello Hugo1.  I never heard a Harbeth I didn't like. Hard to go wrong there. Happy listening.

I’ve heard both.  Mofi probably more bang for the buck.  

I have the Mofi 10s, love them but they are BIG so not really 'bookshelves'. Very sseamlessly coherent speakers with a natural tonality.

Harbeths are an acquired taste IMO and are picky about music and electronics, the Mofis very accommodating with just about any genre and gear but will reward expensive electronics.

However the 10s have crap resale value, for some reason Mofi have begun discounting them, so if that's important to you look elsewhere.

@panzrwagn I am 100% right if the line source ends at barriers like the floor and the ceiling. The line source behavior then extends down to 1 Hz. As you note, line sources project power better and are used exclusively at large concerts. Their vertical dispersion cuts off sharply so they curve the arrays to cover the height of the arena. In my instance the line sources are dipoles and their horizontal dispersion also cuts off sharply. The Sound Labs are therefore curved to cover a 45 degree arc. The advantage of this is much less room interaction. I only need sound absorption directly behind the speaker. 

The baffle effect may add 6 dB but the volume still drops off at the square of the distance making it more difficult to hear the speaker farthest from you. 

You might be interested in this https://imgur.com/gallery/building-resonance-free-subwoofers-dOTF3cS  These were not designed to be high output. They are - 3 dB at 20 Hz. Their sensitivity is 89 dBSP/1watt/1meter. Getting the right bass response still requires a lot of power and digital signal processing. 

Did you get to see the concerts you rigged? The most insane bass rig I ever heard was Stanley Clarks line array with RTF back in the 74. Must have been 30 feet tall. The most incredible bass I ever felt was Les Claypool with Primus at Red Rocks with one exception, Jerry Marotta's Bass drum in Peter Gabriel's Security Tour. It hit so hard I was getting nauseated!  

I recently got a pair of MOFI 10s new from The Music Room at a big discount. I heard them at the Tampa audio show  2 years ago and was very impressed. Andrew Jones was using the HiFi Rose 250 to drive them which i think is 200watts/channel.  They have replaced a pair of Klipsch Heresy IV speakers in my 14 x 16 room. They are a much more rounded and satisfying speaker in my room than the Heresys (which I did like).  I am powering them with a Bob Latino 120 push pull tube amp and have not had any problems driving them. At the price you can get them for now, I don't think you could go wrong.   

Both these speakers do things well....Harbeth for purity, vocals but not much SLAM....Mofi, Rock n roll Jazz..................Harbeth Classical...Mo fi  Rock and Electronic music.  Harbeth is a Finesse' speaker...MoFi will knock your socks off with not much Finesse.

I just picked up a pair of KLH Model 3's...WOW....best soundstage Under 4K...Great speaker for all types of music. Some like them better than the Model 5's and I can agree.

the KHL 3 is a fantastic value...

Greetings,

Looking for speakers in the $7,500 to $10,000 range. I like speakers that are more natural-sounding without emphasis on any particular frequency. I also listen off-axis quite often. I have AR electronics. Any thoughts on Bryston? If possible, and I know this is difficult, I would prefer to stay away from Made in China brands.

Thanks in advance for your thoughts/suggestions.

@lovehifi22 Looking for speakers in the $7,500 to $10,000 range. I like speakers that are more natural-sounding without emphasis on any particular frequency. I also listen off-axis quite often.

Have a look at KEF Reference 1’s. 

Perhaps Fritz speakers? In the US, they would be at the top of the list if I were looking and half or less than your target.  Other speakers too, below and within your target price and not made from the PRC.

Have a look at KEF Reference 1’s. 

I tried to stay away from suggesting things other than what the OP said they are considering, but here goes...

This not a bad recommendation, but the KEFs might be too much speaker in a room that size.  I have the Reference 1s as well as 30th Anniversary Compact 7s and did an extended (about 2 months) comparison between the two.  The KEFs won in my room, but not by much.  The KEFs do soundstaging better (again, not by much) than the Harbeths, which is a plus if you're going to be off-axis.  Overall the KEFs are more dynamic, and are just slightly better in the areas of clarity, imaging, and as mentioned soundstage.  Both are tonally pleasing, with the Harbeths having a slight edge there.

If we're going to toss other speakers into the mix, I recommend trying out the PS Audio Aspen FR5 speakers.  They are a bargain at their price point and have very wide dispersion, which would be a plus with your off-axis situation. PS Audio has a very generous return policy, so you can do an in-home demo and return them if they aren't too your liking.

A friend who has KEF Reference 1 Metas recently did a shootout with the Ref 1s and the FR5s and ended up keeping the FR5s.  While the KEFs are "better" in almost every way, they overloaded his small room while the FR5s created a much larger soundstage in his small space.

go w/the harbeths!

My concern with Mofi, as is the case with all Andrew Jones speakers, is that after the initial intro dealers just start discounting them like crazy which has a detrimental affect on resale value. Harbeth is a known quantity and if you buy used can you always sell them at little or no loss.

Valid concern. There is a 50 point dealer markup so there is room for online dealers to discount MoFi, Focal, etc. I believe Harbeth doesn't allow dealers to discount...meaning if they do they get cut off.

One thing specific to Andrew Jones. He is known for making MK2 and MK3 versions of his speakers. I can almost guarantee you that he is already working on a MK2 version. He is very productive and he will find improvements. Smart business too...releasing an incrementally improved product prevents manufactures from competing with the used market for their own products.

Alan Shaw resists change and will only update his Harbeth line when he feels forced to. that's fine too 

I owned the Harbeth C7ES3 for years and have lots of listening time on the MoFi 8s. 10s and 888s.  

The MoFis have good attack and better bass.  However to my ears they are not refined and the midrange has no magic or bloom. 

The Harbeths are super refined and smooth and have excellent midrange warmth and detail.  Listen with the grilles off.  

When you are used to the refinement and forgiving nature of speakers like Harbeth and Spendor (owned two of each) the lack of refinement that the MoFis present is a deal breaker for my ears. 

soix is right, the Ohm Walsh 2 are terrific for off-axis listening and i have a set in my bedroom.

This said, I own the Mofi Sourcepoint 8 and it is enough bass for my living room, which is the same size as the OP's. The Sourcepoint 10 would have been too much.

One more thing, with patience you will find the Mofi speakers on the used market. Mine were gently used, found on Craigslist locally for $1600.