Avalon Eidolon Diamond or Aerial 20T v2.

Well that's good. I think your amps will work fine. I was afraid you were going to say you had some 100 wpc tube amps or something and then there was no point to considering the 20t's.

Here are my comments to your remarks:

"I have a good lead on a fairly new used pair in black." V2 has only been out for about a year or so, so they'll all be fairly new.

Aerial 20T v2 Cons =

"I'm a little worried about the ribbon tweeter." The ribbon tweeter is the best sounding tweeter I have ever heard. On horns and percussion it will give you goose bumps because of how real it sounds. It is directional so if you were standing in the corner you would miss the best of what it does. If you listen while seated it's fine.

"Are they as holographic as the Avalons?" No. But then almost no speaker is. That is what Avalons are all about. Even the inexpensive models do it. But they are very fussy about room placement. They need at least 5 feet from rear of speaker to wall, and that's minimum. Anything less and they are just a decent speaker without the holographic imaging. The 20t's are ported on the bottom and very tolerant to being close to the wall. For me this was the single most influential factor in moving from Eidolons to 20ts.

"Will they give me the bass that I want in my room?" Yes. The 20t's have incredible low bass slam, if properly driven. Subs on 2 channel audio are overkill w/ 20t's. Also the 20t's are more dynamic from top to bottom. If you plan to use them in your home theater set up that may be important to you. If I were creating a home theater and choosing between Avalons and Aerials I don't think I'd have a hard time figuring out which would perform better.

"Ship in cardboard boxes that are lined with wood inside. Should be in
crates at this price level." Because oif their size and weight they ship on a pallet and the packaging for mine seemed very solid and secure. Not sure I'd make that part of the decision process.

Avalon Diamond Pros =

"Everyone I talk to in person says they are the most holographic. Sounds like the people are in the room with you." That is very true if you have the room for them.

"I have to say just a great looking speaker with excellent build quality and fit and finish." They are beautiful. Not as stable as Aerials if you have small kids around.

"Seem to hold there value better (Although everything is tougher to sell in this economy)" The last pair I saw for sale (about 4 months ago) went for 16,500-ish from a dealer w/ warranty. There really haven't been many 20t v2 on the market yet. Too new.

Avalon Diamond Cons =

"Harder to find them used and price. This is bad for buying but better if you need to sell them." There are two for sale right now. They list for $38k so expect to pay more for them than the 20t V2 which list for $32k.

"Will these give me the kind of bass I want without running subs." For music yes unless you are crazy about bass. For home theater- I seriously doubt it.

I don't have a stake in either so I'm not trying to sway you one way of the other. I'm just trying to help. They both do different things well. I suspect in your set up and for your use the Aerials might be the better fit. If you scrap the theater and you have the room you might prefer the Avalons. I could happily live with either (except for my room limitations) so I don't think you can go wrong.

Thanks for the detailed response Mmike84 that is the kind of answers I'm looking for. The one thing you say that intrigues me the most is about placement. My room is just over 14 feet wide and the screen for the projector is about 8.5 feet wide so I can only go about 2.5 feet from the sidewalls. Any further and the left and right speaker start getting in the way of the screen. From the front wall I can go out up to 5-6 feet no problem.

Why are you selling your 20T's Mmike84.

Make sure you listen to the Diamonds and not the standard Eidolon or Visions. The Diamond is a very different speaker and you can see a very different price tag also. The Diamonds have more bass output plus it will go deeper. There Diamond tweeter is the best in the world period but for how much they cost it better be. The Diamonds have a different woofer, tweeter, crossover and cabinet then the Vision.

The Aerial 20T is pretty close to the V2 so you can get away with listening to the 20T and getting a good idea what the V2 will sound like. I had the 20T's and was ready to get them upgraded but I didn't feel the V2 was worth the extra money. If you listened to the Aerial model 9 it sounds nothing like the 20T same is true with Avalon.

I can tell you that the 600Se is not enough power for the 20T. The 20T love to be Bi amp with tons of power. Now if you used 2 600Se it would be closer.

Now the Diamonds like distance behind the speakers more then distance from side walls. The crossovers in the Diamonds is flat out amazing.

I will tell you that they both are very very different speakers.

Mtdking why are you selling your Diamonds and which did you prefer the Avalon's or the Aerial's.

I'm selling for personal reasons.

Well it's not fair to compare the Diamonds to the 20T because of the price difference. The 20T retailed for $10,000 less then the Diamond. The Diamonds are better but again they should be. I have never heard a speakers sound like the Diamond and I've owned Wilson's, Jm labs, Kharma, Vandersteen, Dynaudio and some others in the price class.

The Diamonds are ultra transparent with a midrange that is spooky holographic. One of the only speakers I have heard that has no driver integration issues. They are super fast and the top end has no limit.

There is a reason why you saw so many Avalon's at CES and Rocky mountain audio shows. Avalon has figured it out. It's there crossover that makes them so good. I heard other speakers with the same drives sound horrible (Kharma).

Email me and I can give you more and some other speakers you should look at.