I recommended two (2) speakers;
1. Spatial Audio X5. I own these speakers and they SMOKE! They do need to be at least 3 ft. off the front wall to create a musical magic show and the more distance from the front wall will help to eliminate bass cancellation that dipole speakers are prone to have. They take a long time to break in, so you should not judge them critically until after about 200+ hours of break in. They are very thin in depth, but they are 14” wide as you mentioned they were big, but they work for me in my space, so hopefully you will reconsider them. I haven’t heard anything in their price range that sounded that good. Pure Audio Project (PAP) supposedly has a nice open baffle design, but I chose Spatial Audio because the PAP’s were even bigger in width and their business model of having customers build their own speaker wasn’t something I wanted to deal with. PAP’s owner, Ze’ve, was great to talk to and I almost bought a pair. With the X5’s, all instruments sound real and they deliver a very open soundstage. It is very different from box speakers which don’t sound as open after you compare them to Spatial Audio’s open baffle design. I would say you have to spend a lot of money on a box speaker to truly outperform the X5’s. My front end gear is a Mac mini, Intona USB isolator, Intona USB cables, HoloAudio Spring DAC2 KTE version, PrimaLuna EVO 400 preamp and amp combo, Cardas Audio XLR interconnects and speaker cables. I can’t say if PrimaLuna sounds better than the AR LS28, but the build quality of PrimaLuna gear is hard to beat at it’s price point. Call Spatial Audio’s owner, Clayton Shaw. He is very personable and will answer all of your questions.
2. Wilson Audio Sabrina (Used) - If I decided to go back to a traditional box speaker design, I would buy a used pair of Wilson Audio Sabrina speakers. They smoke, period! My cousin owns a pair of Sabrina’s and his front in gear is a CJ LS17 preamp and CJ Premier 11 mono blocks and his system sounds great. His room treatments took it to another level as well.
Lastly, after all these years of building my hifi system, I finally learned that room treatments make a big difference. We don’t realize how much we are listening to our room vs. our hifi gear. We keep replacing components thinking something is wrong with our gear when it’s our room we are listening to due to a lack of room treatments. Treat the room before critically judging your hifi gear. The room treatments are cheap compared to what we pay for our hifi gear. I like GIK Acoustics’ room treatment offerings.
Have fun with your search!
1. Spatial Audio X5. I own these speakers and they SMOKE! They do need to be at least 3 ft. off the front wall to create a musical magic show and the more distance from the front wall will help to eliminate bass cancellation that dipole speakers are prone to have. They take a long time to break in, so you should not judge them critically until after about 200+ hours of break in. They are very thin in depth, but they are 14” wide as you mentioned they were big, but they work for me in my space, so hopefully you will reconsider them. I haven’t heard anything in their price range that sounded that good. Pure Audio Project (PAP) supposedly has a nice open baffle design, but I chose Spatial Audio because the PAP’s were even bigger in width and their business model of having customers build their own speaker wasn’t something I wanted to deal with. PAP’s owner, Ze’ve, was great to talk to and I almost bought a pair. With the X5’s, all instruments sound real and they deliver a very open soundstage. It is very different from box speakers which don’t sound as open after you compare them to Spatial Audio’s open baffle design. I would say you have to spend a lot of money on a box speaker to truly outperform the X5’s. My front end gear is a Mac mini, Intona USB isolator, Intona USB cables, HoloAudio Spring DAC2 KTE version, PrimaLuna EVO 400 preamp and amp combo, Cardas Audio XLR interconnects and speaker cables. I can’t say if PrimaLuna sounds better than the AR LS28, but the build quality of PrimaLuna gear is hard to beat at it’s price point. Call Spatial Audio’s owner, Clayton Shaw. He is very personable and will answer all of your questions.
2. Wilson Audio Sabrina (Used) - If I decided to go back to a traditional box speaker design, I would buy a used pair of Wilson Audio Sabrina speakers. They smoke, period! My cousin owns a pair of Sabrina’s and his front in gear is a CJ LS17 preamp and CJ Premier 11 mono blocks and his system sounds great. His room treatments took it to another level as well.
Lastly, after all these years of building my hifi system, I finally learned that room treatments make a big difference. We don’t realize how much we are listening to our room vs. our hifi gear. We keep replacing components thinking something is wrong with our gear when it’s our room we are listening to due to a lack of room treatments. Treat the room before critically judging your hifi gear. The room treatments are cheap compared to what we pay for our hifi gear. I like GIK Acoustics’ room treatment offerings.
Have fun with your search!