Whittling down my choices to a final few pair...

What amp (S) are you using?

Simple. You and your bride take a trip to a nearby city where you can have a romantic weekend and drop in to audio stores where you have scheduled auditions to these speakers.

Buying any of these without experiencing them is crazy. If you are both invested in the sound… you must hear them.

Personally I’d go for the Eggelston… but that is me. Not in any way likely to be you. 

@fthompson251 I have an ATI 4007 currently however I'm looking into the Benchmark AHB2 and Boxem amps.

@ghdprentice Not a bad idea, Houston can be romantic. Thank you

Well I think if you are getting a new amp then the speakers and amp should be in the same conversation with your selected dealer. FWIW - The Legacy Aeris is self powered or can be bi amped with your amp of choice, or one of theirs. The others need to mate an amp to get the best especially when spending that much on speakers. JMHO. I read that the Wilsons can be tough on an amp if you don't have a lot of current for them as they drop down near 1-2 ohms at some frequencies. Not positive about that though. .

I agree with ghdprentice....completely. You and the lucky woman owe it to yourself to audition these higher priced speakers. 

@cwolff09 

That is a nice list of choices you have. Another speaker to add would be the Rockport Avior ii or the Cygnus. Rockport makes incredible speakers and are universally praised as one of the best speakers made. Read the reviews and especially the comments on the forums about them. You will be glad you put them on the list. Good luck! 
 

Ron

You have to match the amp and the speaker to get the performance you paid for. You should biamp to get them to open up. Think in terms of pairing, not just the speaker. I prefer to get active speakers like this one:

Really need to know what sound characteristics are most important to you to make any meaningful recommendation, otherwise you’ll just get what we like. 

Every ear has a different response so the speakers will need to be custom tuned to your ears. Whether that happpens by chance or intentionally, it is the only way to achieve satisfaction.

The Wilsons would suck that little Benchmark dry, you'd be better off keeping the ATI. 

Hello cwolff09!  The Legacy Aires is one of my favorite speakers! It would do very well for you. Happy Listening!

I agree with sunshdw. The benchmark does not have enough power for the wilson’s. It will choke on the low impedance of wilson.

As a happy Legacy owner, you simply can’t go wrong with Aeris!

Man, audition the Arions, mostly because I'm a huge fan of line sources.

The amps you are considering seem to be poorly matched with the speakers on the list.  Synergy makes all the difference.

On the other hand. Get a fantastic set of speakers like those listed that really appeal to the OP and the next steps will be to optimize the electronics driving them. I always start an upgrade cycle with speakers.

OP I've heard all the brand you mentioned at axponat hey are all good speakers but they are not for me except eggleston not the savoy. I own the Andra eggleston. I almost gave up on them, they like power.Very picky on amp . They did well on Krell and Mark Levinson and with my supercharger 550 musical fidelity monoblocks. My favorite amp for the Andra is my Tsakadiris Apollon  150 w tube monoblock.

Don't buy speakers without hearing them first, especially if you value your own opinion. 

Agree with most, you should find a way to hear any and all first. And hopefully then check out the used market. Depreciation in 4-5 years is insane, worse than buying a new car ! 

Cheers 

@cwolff09 

My beloved bride and I are down to the last few pairs of speakers (I'm rolling the proverbial dice on all of these, going by Internet Opinions

I'm a little confused: you and your wife came up with a short list of speakers that you are interested in, but you haven't listened to ANY speakers at all?

How could you possibly make a list?

Regards,

barts

What?? No Tannoy on the list? They are much better looking and probably sound just as good, if not better.