The best "imaging" speakers?

No, not "huge." Not even remotely as big a part as the speakers.

You are right, the speakers characteristcs will weigh more than the electronics design of the dac or the amp and even of the 2 most of the times if not always...

But the room will weigh on par with the speakers design half the time, and for the other half will weigh even more...

:)

Theater design is more important than the speakers in the theater, if there is some, no need in a good acoustical theater of powerful amplification or electronics to compensate the room....No need even less for some particularly more refine amplifier design.... :)

Polykleitos the Younger is much older than Edison; acoustic science precede faithful modern reproduction of sound (hi-Fi)...

This is the reason why a good audio engineer is also an audiophile, and why most audiophiles dont need the urge to becomes audio engineers.... :)

« Why dont you own a stereo system? I prefer Greek theater»- Groucho Marx

There is a relative trade-off between soundstage and imaging.... Yes, but i just increase these 2 qualities today, and improved also the timbre, by moving a single piece of metal thin enclosure (a fan) in my room... You can play with this trade-off then, he is not an absolute number linked to electronic design only, but it is mainly the variable sonic mirror of your room ...

People dont imagine the powerful effects that acoustic controls do in a room....They wave brand speakers name without thinking that the Edison business of design recording high-fidelity is relatively new, but Greek theater marvel has already some thousand years old...

Audiophile life is more linked to acoustic than engineering electronics.... More linked to your ears experience than to electronic marketing....We do not listen first to an electronic component, speakers, dac, or amplifier, we listen to music in our room first, and at the end....

A good amplifier is necessary, but the full experience is delivered by your room....

It is one of the three necessary embeddings of any audio system...

Embeddings are on par with design for producing the full experience...

I am proud to say that i create "imaging" and "soundstage" at nearfield listening (3 feet) and at regular listening (7 feet) in my smal irregular room by passive materials controlling acoustic methods and also with many different active methods (mainly different size and kind of resonators)

Most people stick on their favorite brand of speakers, completely unconscious of the importance of the room acoustic.... I even speak with some " reviewer" that argue against the too much importance given to acoustic.... He was not conscious of the fact that the Greek theater exist before Edison.... Hi-Fidelity recording of sound is slave of acoustic rendering by the room at the end.... :)

I call my method the triple embeddings of an audio system...(mechanical,electrical,and acoustical)

Give me a good speakers, certainly half of them are good, i will make it imaging like crazy.... If not his design is very bad....

Like engineering electronic design, acoustic is an art of trade-off, your ears are the judges.....And we live with our judges then why not using them?

I call that listening experiments, it is fun, and the only way to reach, incrementally, one step at a time, at low cost, audio paradise....

I’ve found that imaging is mostly a factor of proper setup, proper room treatment and overall room acoustics. Most speakers will image if the above are addressed correctly. Yes, the speaker plays a part after that, but until you have those other 3 set right you can’t really compare one speaker vs another to say which is "best".

Good to read common sense and experience in few lines.....

I will add mechanical resonance controls, and electrical grid house controls to help better focusing of the imaging....

I call that 3 embeddings ways for any audio system....More important than even the choice of electronic components sometimes...

There is many brand of speakers that can produce imaging but do not or do it wrongly because of insufficient controls not only of the acoustics but of the noise level of the house and of the vibrations-resonance problem....

We can all drop names of speakers but the question is how to make them imaging?

:)