Joseph Audio Perspective2 vs Harbeth SHL5+

Thanks for the response @arafiq I wasn’t too surprised that the Supernait 3 sounded poor with the Harbeth SHL5+. It’s the same experience when I tried the Nait XS on the SHL5. Somehow the Naim integrateds are not very good in my book. Perhaps they are good for easy to drive speakers only.

The Luxman L-590AXII is truly a marvelous amp. I’ve not tried a lot but this one is really something special. Refined, delicate and nuanced - these are the keywords I would use on the L-590AXII. The bass may not be the punchiest or most visceral but it’s clean and pure. In other words it’s a tight, defined and nuanced bass quality made possible by the low coloration of the amp. Other amp designs which produce more bass sound more colored to me with their forced presentation, masking some of the detail in the bass and sounding slightly unnatural or less nuanced.

I realized that I had not updated my virtual system pics in a while. I accidentally deleted the virtual system and had to create a new one. I will write more about the sonic impressions for JA Perspective2's in a day or two. But as you can see they are a thing of beauty. They look so elegant -- even my wife made a comment that these are the best looking speakers she's seen in the room thus far :) Tonight I'm going to put the Harbeth SHL5+ back in to compare with the JA's. Hope to report my impressions in a day or two.

@arafiq 

Amazing.  Those Perspectives look so gorgeous.  I was blown away when I got mine and they are still among the best looking speakers I've ever had (or seen IMO).

I hope you'll give your impressions first without the subs!  :-)

Here's a photo of my Perspectives:

@prof Thanks for sharing the pic. These speakers are just gorgeous. Honestly, I feel pics don't do justice to them, they're even better in person. I do have a question while looking at the pic: It seems that one of the speakers is placed right against the sofa. Is this their regular position or did you pull them out further to take the pic? If so, does it not compromise the sound in some way? 

arafiq,

That's usually the question I get when I post those photos :-)

The explanation for the positioning is here (where I also post photos of my Thiels in the same room):

As to the sound:  Fortunately, there are no discernible sonic consequences to the right speaker being in that position.  Sometimes it's further away from the sofa, sometimes I pull it right up for more nearfield listening like in that photo.

I'm sure it works because the drivers are up higher over the sofa (same with my Thiels) and so aren't impeded at all, and bass frequencies not being directional.

So there's zero balance issues in terms of the L/R sound that I can detect.  Bass sounds terrific too!