Non-fatiguing speakers in $10K range?

Now, music-wise I do not listen to jazz or classical or vocals, sorry. Classic rock, hard rock, 80s new wave, punk, pop (classic and modern) and African blues like Tinariwen. People tend to insta-suggest forward sounding speakers - you like metal, right???. But I don’t like piercing sound and I rarely go to concerts exactly because of this. I listen to AC/DC but NOT at ’realistic’ revels. I like rhythm, melody, but I don’t care about 120 Db.

Considering your tastes in music, you shouldn’t be taking any speaker advice from guys who listen to female vocals/Diana Krall @ 60 db... Metal/Hard Rock are harder genres to obtain a high fidelity listening experience with choice of gear. As a long time fan of hard rock & metal myself, it took me a while to get that sorted out. Guys who know nothing about such genres are the ones who come up with Klipsch, etc. The latter is a lousy speaker for metal, in reality.

If you want your hard rock and metal to be "high fidelity" (and also do justice to your 80s new wave and pop)... a couple of speakers that are above your budget comes to mind.... But, not to fret, you probably won’t be able to beat the GR Research "Bully" for your money. If you are not a DIY guy (it is cheaper if you can DIY the kit), it appears that you can obtain a finished Bully from GR research for 5k to 6k now with the finish of your choice, i.e. 4k under your budget. Good luck with your search...

Well I am not sure what in GR caused people to get angry? Engineering appears sound, measurements are good, adjustable sub section is a good thing, speakers go down to 20 almost flat, Danny improves and upgrades speakers from big names and people seem happy with his work.

Big names employ engineers like him. And after all, Tesla also was small shop installing batteries into Lotus frames... Linus started alone and almost dethroned huge names in operating systems with Linux...

@mikhailark ,

a) Several Agon guys are dealers (or pied pipers who work for such dealers) throwing names of things they sell at ya. GR is a manufacturer direct brand. Hence, no dealer middleman around here is making any cash if you bought a GR speaker. You will note similar levels of animosity on display for other manufacturer direct brands as well.

b) GR’s speaker upgrades (of other brands) tends to expose a lot of design flaws, excessive corner cutting, etc in name brands that these dealers tend to carry. When their sales dive downwards a bit thereafter (understandably), they have historically been mad at GR instead of telling their goofball speaker designer to get his act together.

To summarize, GR is a bit of a double whammy disruptor. Hence, the dealers association around here tends to hate him a bit.

The Bullies are good speakers BUT in LOOKS and SQ...They simply don’t belong in the same conversation as some of the EXCEPTIONAL Speakers that are being discussed on this thread......PERIOD.

Did you hear these speakers? I have a feeling you didn’t. Guy in town got these in for himself and i got to hear it well and good...

What are these other exceptional speakers that blew these out of the water? If they are exceptional because of looks, ok, so be it/understandable. But, sonics, i don’t buy that notion at all...W.r.t looks, the bully with the walnut finish or whatever doesn’t look any worse in real life than any big old school jbl, tannoy, klh or even a mofi.

Metal/Hard Rock requires a significant amount of slam (no ph.shifts killing the deal in the higher octaves), significant sound power in the upper bass, lower mids, etc., not an abrasive top end like the klipsches and whatever else. The Bully has perfectly integrated rythmik style of servo subs from the designer (while he still had all his dofs open) covering 20 to 200 hz. It is a rarity or hasn’t been offered before. You won’t find it in those exceptional speakers. Some bigger eminence or a few of those in some of these other "exceptional" speakers don’t hold a candle to what a pair of servo subs can do. Resolution, clarity, etc (perceptually), i would put it up against many speakers that cost a magnitude more these days.

Do you know that there are guys who can easily afford half a million dollar rigs who sit around with that GR NX-Treme 7 foot tall speaker? It is approx a 5k kit (!!) that one builds. For the type of electronics that the OP has, he would be just fine.

Just because that GR dude gave you good things for charity prices didn’t make it a non-competitor (sonically) against the "exceptional" speakers.

@deep_333 Ok.....If you like the Bullies so much...go buy them...I HAVE heard them...and I like them . They are great for Rock. If that’s mainly what you listen to , then they are the speaker for you. I can speak for the Borresens because I own them...They are fantastic speakers for ALL types of music. We have different tastes and that fact is respected.

I don’t need to buy another speaker. I have plenty of other things and It’s an overflowing house, in my case. But, the OP specifically mentions a budget of 10k or under, and says that he likes hard rock and metal. Hence, this bully suggestion came out, best possible sound for that cash and his preference in music.

As i mentioned on my earlier comment, i would have suggested a different speaker if he had a higher budget, 30k or so.

It is curious though that a guy says his budget is 10k or under and there are a bunch of other guys suggesting 40k, 50k, etc speakers to him... That’s the curious part, an assumption on the expansiveness of the OP’s wallet.

@mbmi - I am sure Borresens is a nice speaker. However - I don’t need speaker for "all kinds of music" - jack of all trades is always a compromise at a given price point.

Only X2 is my price range and there are no dealers anywhere close to PNW. Borresens Web site is rather frustrating, such basic information like specs is nowhere to be found, just nice pics.

@mikhailark , With Borresen, you will need the X6 for the extra drivers (refer to earlier note on sound power) for your hard rock/metal. So, that is 25k w/tax. You may need different amplification than your Accuphase (most probably). You may end up needing a more "forgiving" dac (possibly). It is difficult to integrate subs with Borresen. Very few/specific subs seem to wanna play nice with it...Hence, you may easily end up spending 30k+ or 40k+ (i.e., extra work and expense).

On the contrary, the bully could be a lot less work at 5k, 6k with your Accuphase and starting to have a good time. GR may have made things a bit easier for you.

Nevertheless, the Borresen can be a great speaker for hard rock/metal "after all the stars aligned right".