Von Schweikerts or Coincidents or ?

i'd 2nd the avalons or merlin vsms.

i personally wouldn't own anything from albert von upgrade. how many friggin models and upgrades can one guy have (btw: the hovland upgrade for $1k is an insult to anyone who knows how to build a crossover).

his speakers are ok. i don't like the way he does business, but that's whats important to me, not everyone.

other speakers for R&R, etc: reimers; used rockport syzygys (if you're blessed!); silverline sonata or lafolia. all are pretty tube friendly, and plenty of bass punch.

best
rhyno

romandoc
i have no loyalty to mfgs. only good products. the products i listed, particularly the rockports, the merlins and the avalons are amongst the best at their price point. if you want to buy more drivers for more money, go ahead--each of them will be of lower quality, as will the x-over, as will the sound. ever heard of quality over quantity? a 2-way for $8k will beat a 4-way for $8k most every time, except in select regards (thunderous bass being the primary one). go listen to some ML CLS2z or soundlabs (no x-over). that's one driver--and it sounds better. period. to get the quality of a merlin x-over in a 4-way, expect to spend $25k & up.

want bass? buy some used entecs and be done with it. full range speakers rarely can do full range properly.

i maintain what i said about albert von upgrade. the way he does business is just plain shameful. look at rockport: 4 models in its history. look at vandy: the 2c has been around forever. look at merlin: vsm for a long time (with slight upgrades, all at reasonable costs for the amount of work---no $1k expenditures for a friggin capacitor!). look at soundlab. look at silverline. my point being, none of these high-end mfgs feel the need to bombard the mkt with model after model and upgrade after upgrade. continuous models and upgrades, my friends, is the way to run a software company--not a loudspeaker company.

rhyno

to integrate subs, use nothing more than a GOOD cap in series w/ your amps inputs, matched to your amps input impedance. this will give 2db per octave, and sound 100x better than a sub's internal (or a marchand / bryston external) x-over. this is the only way to integrate a sub properly (assuming you know your subs rolloff slope).
i've done this w/ merlin vsm-ms, and to my knowledge i am one of the only people to integrate subs w/ merlins and make a $10k speaker investment trump anything under $15k (soundlabs are at that point).

my point is if you have a limited budget, full range speakers are DAMN expensive to do right, or you could do what i described above.

btw: i never said albert made "bad" speakers. i've heard better (at the price, i liked celestion better for a 4-way). his are ok (better than krell, wilson, thiel). but i do what i will given his business practice: i vote w/ my $$ and buy elsewhere. frankly i wouldn't consider his products for that very reason; i am not alone, just alone on this post.

one more thing: no speaker is a lifetime purchase. if you own AVS, good luck w/ a resale value (hint: yes, everyone DOES want to own the latest thing).

rhyno

i'll be taking ownership of a custom made preamp by tony at G&D. its rank is 2nd, behind the CTC. i'll let you know...

i've posted enough tips over there and been told i'm wrong on so many things. and frankly, i dont like tipping people off on vintage gear that I WANT. now that i own my pair, i can say conclusively that there are few subs that can compete w/ the entecs (yes, the watchdog is nice--bring your checkbook). so many people think REL is the answer---what a joke. why dont i just listen with my nose in the carpet?

resale value is very much a fxn of age & style (like automobiles, when a model changes body style, the previous body style goes down in value). if you're a buyer for life, dont sweat it. if you're like me and you don't like losing money in this hobby (sold the joule for a profit), it does matter....and thus limits the products one would consider.

rhyno