What speakers?

Talk with George Short at Northcreek. Very knowledgable.

I think you would like these for jazz, vocals, etc., and they're designed for close to the wall (real world) placement.

http://northcreekmusic.com/Kitty/Big_Kat_Info.htm

I replaced a pair of larger Maggies with Ohms for similar reasons.

If you like full scale classical or other large scale recordings with realistic dynamic range, low end extension, and impact, along with the imaging, detail, and sound stage, monitors may not cut it alone without a sub.

If it must be a monitor, look at the GMA Callistos or perhaps the new Eos. Great speakers for the money that do most things right, and very little wrong.

Shakey

I dont have the funds to try alot of amps or buy cutting edge gear, I do power mine with Aragon which is considered a "poor mans Krell" and I am going to swap in Classe amps my father is giving me. I have also run Parasound, Many like "Ampzilla" power amps.
There is a VMPS owners club at audiocircle.com if you wish to learn more. I do think VMPS would be very close if not the exact answer to what you are looking for.

Chad

I have not heard the VMPS but they look very interesting.
I will check these out first.
What amp do you like best with them... Given my taste in music.. Mostly easy listening jazz?

Regards,
Dan

Again VMPS comes to mind, the RM2 or the QSO626R will both likely give you what you like about Maggies and a more livable placeable speaker, I had Electrostats mains and Maggie speakers for HT and found VMPS greaat giving me exactly what I liked about each but better bass and placement options.

07-20-08: Steuspeed
Johnnyb

Eminent Technology LFT-16

Ah, yeah, I forgot about them. And that made me think about the Oskar Heil Aulos at $1850 or so.

Review here.

Thanks for all the input guys...

Let's try this: What monitor speaker can be put within a foot from back wall and will give the best imaging? And depth? biggest soundstage? Anything do it all for under $2k used ?

Regards,
Dan

Johnnyb

Eminent Technology LFT-16

http://www.eminent-tech.com/main.html

To sound like a Maggie, a cone-based speaker has to have no enclosure resonance, project a sort of line source image, and be dipolar to energize the room in a similar way.

Minimonitors don't do that. They function as a forward-firing point source, which is an entirely different dispersion pattern. Hence, they don't disperse sound or engergize a room like Maggies, and therefore can't sound like them in-room.

There are dipolar cone-based speakers such as the Nola Viper 1A and the AV123 Strata Mini, but they're not mini-monitors and I suspect they need the same amount of space behind them as Maggies.

I suspect if you look around, you may find a stand-mounted open baffle speaker that gives you what you're looking for, but I can't think of one offhand.

Gallo Ref III. May suffer some near wall though. Since the tweeter is only 180 degree firing it might minimize rear wall interaction unlike the MKII 320 degree tweeter. The top end is fast like your Maggies. Great soundstage anywhere in the room.

Try VMPS.....RM-30's are nice.

Dave

Dan,
I had the Maggie 3.6's for a few years. In my experience, I have not heard any cone driver monitors that sound like the maggies. Immediately you lose the scale and height of the images. Also the soundstage depth suffers. Of course the conventional monitors outdo the maggies in other areas.