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Totally overwhelmed (speakers under $5k)

I am newer to the audiophile community and don't have much in the way of higher end gear to be honest.  I have been upgrading things as I go with my home theater (now Anthem receiver, Martin Logan speakers, and SVS sub) and am now wanting to upgrade my music system that is in my home office.  It is currently equipment that was originally in my home theater that has been replaced.  So I have a BasX preamp, 7 channel solid state BasX amp running 2 channel, T2+ speakers, and cabling all from Emotive.  The wires are basic copper speaker wire with banana plugs on the ends.  And I have an RSL Speedwoofer 10"  subwoofer. My source is Amazon Music HD on a Macbook Pro fed to the preamp by an optical cable. All in all it sounds pretty good but I want to take it up a notch.  

The other day I spoke with James at Raven Audio about cables and he said suggested that I would actually get a lot more bang by upgrading my equipment than worrying about my cables (which is fair).  Of course he is a fan of his own brand's amps and speakers but he also said very good things about Dynaudio and Focal (which I do have some experience with for car audio and headphones).  In doing research on the Raven Audio speakers, I have seen people lauding the Tekton Moab, Aperion Verus III, as well as others.  When I do searches for "best speakers under $5000" I get lots of mainstream review sites that talk about brands like Definitive Technologies, Polk, KEF, Klipsch, SVS, and more.  But they generally don't talk about Ravel, Tekton, or any of those. I assume it is because they are too small. 

Honestly though, at this point I am overwhelmed. Too many brands with too many speakers and where I live there are not a lot of shops to go listen to these higher end speakers. I have seen lots of debates on here along with folks that really have their definite opinions.  Here are my requirements and hopefully I can gain some knowledge, insight, and direction from folks on this site that have much greater experience than myself. 

1) I want speakers that are clear and clean with lots of detail.  But I also want to be able to just listen to the music, being immersed without having my ears ringing from the sharpness after a bit.

2) I want to be able to plug them into my current preamp and solid state amp and be able to enjoy them as is.  Later on, if/when I decide to change the amp to a tube amp, I want them to be able to work well with those characteristics too. 

3) I want the new price to be limited to $5k and under.  I am open to used in the right circumstances but hoping to get a smoking deal on some used $15k speakers (like some Legacy's) is just wishful thinking at this point.  With new, you know what you are getting and will have a warranty.  

4) I listen to all sorts of music so it needs to be able to switch between rock, heavy metal, classical, jazz, hip hop, bag pipes, and everything in between.  

5) Subwoofer is optional.  I have the Speedwoofer currently which is know is not perfect for music (ported).  I am fine upgrading to a sealed SVS at some point or getting towers that don't even need a sub. I actually have an older pair of Infinity SM 125's that I got close to 30 years ago that don't really need one.  

6) Aesthetics are a plus but not a requirement.  I am a function over form guy.  Some of these B&W's, Focals, and others look beautiful compared to the Moabs which are more utilitarian but I am not stress about it. 

7) Size can be whatever.  Again, the Moabs appear to be massive and that is fine but so is something that is much smaller.  The room is roughly 14' by 24' with 9' ceilings.  While it isn't an auditorium, it isn't just a small room either.  

Ok, I think that covers it except to say straight up, I don't tend to care for negativity.  If you have heard something and you don't care for it for X, Y, and Z reasons, great, please say so.  But please don't put something down because you don't like their marketing or you believe that it has to be a $100k system to be worthwhile.  Thank you in advance for your responses. 

ddonicht
arafiq's avatar
arafiq
1,599 posts
 

Harbeth Super HL5 Plus -- you can find a gently used pair between $3.5 - 4.5K.

Fritz Carrera BE is a great choice too, but I think they might struggle a little given the size of your room. However, Fritz offers 30 day home trial, and these speakers can go toe to toe with Harbeth on SQ alone, but like I said they might struggle in a relatively big room like yours.

jackd
1,037 posts
 

The Fritz Carrera's will work fine in that room as your obviously not going to sit 24 feet away. He also makes the same basic speaker with the Scan Speak Illuminator tweeter instead of the Be tweeter.  

ddonicht OP
14 posts
 

Thanks for the responses thus far.  

In no way do I have my mind made up.  In fact that is my issue...there are too many very fine speakers and I have no clue what is what since I haven't heard most of them. 

To respond to some others, the room is fairly open as technically it is my living room..  10' or so in front of my desk is the front door and the stairs up.  On the left it opens to the family room and kitchen.  So it is a definite space to fill.  My Emotiva  T2+'s sit behind me on each side, angled in toward me.  The tweeters are about my ear level when seated.  They are roughly a foot from the wall. With new speakers, I can put them pretty much anywhere in the room I want.  

As for the tone, yeah, I kind of want it all or at least as much as I can.  Good clarity but not painful to listen to. If I put on house music and turn it up, I want to feel the base hits. Which is why getting a sealed sub may be in the future as well.  If I am listening to the 1812 Overture, I want to feel the cannons but still let the beauty of instruments shine.  A live track of All Along the Watchtower should make me feel like I am at the concert.  But if I am listen Sarah Brightman's version of Scarborough Fair, I want her subline vocals to come through clearly and not get overpowered by the rest of the music.  So basically a mix of old and new recordings.  And pretty much every genre you can think of. 

I had been thinking of new because used is 1) dependent upon what is available at that point and time and 2) is a gamble that what comes through your door is what you thought it was. Effectively it broadens the list so big that my feelings of being overwhelmed by this just gets worse.  

Those are absolutely gorgeous speakers. I will check them and the others mentioned out.  Unfortunately, I don't know of any clubs in the area, which could just be my ignorance.  There are not a lot of high end shops either.  

If have looked at the streamer but I do have the concern about ease of use vs the macbook which I am working on.  I have also been looking at DAC's other than the one build into my preamp.  

To be clear, I do plan on upgrading pretty much everything, I just don't want to have to do it all at once.  So components should work well with, or at least be forgiving of the components that have not been upgraded. 

 

scottscottsdale
103 posts
 

I would keep it simple if I were you. Revel F206 speakers and NAD C368 amp with Bluesound streamer built in.  Perfect. The sound is good and speakers look great.  You can add an external power amp later but you would be at 5K right out of the box. 

petaluman
140 posts
 

Don't worry about getting "the best sound for under $5000".  There are so many choices because being a speaker builder is a passion project.  The best value sound-wise might well be from some young, bright-eyed designer start-up ... that closes shop when the founder moves on.

Most speaker builders tend to have a "house sound".  I'd start by trying to hear a couple of good brands with a more neutral sound - KEF or Dynaudio, for example.  Then try some more exotic sounds, like Magnepan or Focal.  This should at least give you an idea whether you want to keep going down the rabbit hole or stay closer to the status quo.

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