One of the problems is to get know the equipment.
It is almost impossible from one-time listening.
To know the characeter of the speaker, you need to listen to it with different cables and amplifiers at least.
It is not rare that dealer pairs one type of equipment he's selling with other type of equipment he's selling for the only reason he's selling them both, but it is seldom a perfect match. I am not talking about the 989, i heard it in "appropriate" setup consisting of Quad mono blocks and Quad pre. If you are buying second hand your situation may be worst. You have one specific setup (sometimes owner is transition to another setup, so the amplifier he has is not exactly the one that matches the speaker he is selling etc).
Of course, i am not expecting a dealer to have each and every equipment and do any pairing i want. Actually i spend quite some dealer-time with no significant decision yet.
All i am trying is to emphasize the point that unless you familiar with the equipment through different combinations, it is very difficult to see whenever this particular speaker will blend with some yet unknown equipment in the future to form a sound that subjectively good for me.
This is the reason i try to find a speaker that i like, that would sound approximately close to my subjective "perfect" and then i can buy this speaker and build a set around him sooner or later.
At least, i have a reference set to start playing with...
May be i am wrong with my approach. But how else can i "distinguish" a speaker ? I should either listen to it in many different sets (music types) - problematic, or i should find a set at some "sane" budget that will play the speaker the way i want it to...
As for a precise equipment.
Again, i tend to agree with you, although i, myself, still don't feel this way :-) But my recent searches show the more precise equipment is, the more different music types it is able to play.
The problem, it starts to lack magic and becomes more analytical (and fatigue) to listen to. On the other side, SF and Quad never sounds too analytical and probably SF being a dynamic speaker is not bad as all around.
Guarnieri Homage is probably my next homework...
It is almost impossible from one-time listening.
To know the characeter of the speaker, you need to listen to it with different cables and amplifiers at least.
It is not rare that dealer pairs one type of equipment he's selling with other type of equipment he's selling for the only reason he's selling them both, but it is seldom a perfect match. I am not talking about the 989, i heard it in "appropriate" setup consisting of Quad mono blocks and Quad pre. If you are buying second hand your situation may be worst. You have one specific setup (sometimes owner is transition to another setup, so the amplifier he has is not exactly the one that matches the speaker he is selling etc).
Of course, i am not expecting a dealer to have each and every equipment and do any pairing i want. Actually i spend quite some dealer-time with no significant decision yet.
All i am trying is to emphasize the point that unless you familiar with the equipment through different combinations, it is very difficult to see whenever this particular speaker will blend with some yet unknown equipment in the future to form a sound that subjectively good for me.
This is the reason i try to find a speaker that i like, that would sound approximately close to my subjective "perfect" and then i can buy this speaker and build a set around him sooner or later.
At least, i have a reference set to start playing with...
May be i am wrong with my approach. But how else can i "distinguish" a speaker ? I should either listen to it in many different sets (music types) - problematic, or i should find a set at some "sane" budget that will play the speaker the way i want it to...
As for a precise equipment.
Again, i tend to agree with you, although i, myself, still don't feel this way :-) But my recent searches show the more precise equipment is, the more different music types it is able to play.
The problem, it starts to lack magic and becomes more analytical (and fatigue) to listen to. On the other side, SF and Quad never sounds too analytical and probably SF being a dynamic speaker is not bad as all around.
Guarnieri Homage is probably my next homework...