Sean, kudos to you. You definitely have had the final word on this topic. Your thread, no, your essay is well considered and right to the point. I use a wall of stators, carefully selected and even more carefully placed, reinforced by plasma tweeters and subs, whereas a close friend uses the excellent horns made by a-capella in Germany(www.acapella.de), which also use the same plasma tweeters. They are very good in their bass rendering as well, the biggest horn having a diameter of about 130cms I think. As you say, they are less finicky with placement, much more efficient and more dynamic than my stators, but also a tad less demanding of the electronics feeding them. As you indirectly infer, I had to spend much more time and care, as well as money to get my music right, in comparison to my friend, who however spent as close as the equivalent of $60.000 for his speakers.
On the level of personal taste I admire the finesse and delicacy of his setup, a soundstage, which to my ears is unsurpassed, but in spite of the wallop and dynamics his rig can develop, I find the musical rendering a trifle too polite. In comparison, my wall of stators is clearly less good in the rendering of the soundstage, but will develop a directness and can play "dirty" as I call it, in the way real music often is, which his A-capellas cannot match. I have never had the chance to listen to the US SOTA speakers like the Pipedreams et al, so I cannot compare, but his system and mine in rare moments let you forget that you are listening but to a facsimile of the real thing.
On the level of personal taste I admire the finesse and delicacy of his setup, a soundstage, which to my ears is unsurpassed, but in spite of the wallop and dynamics his rig can develop, I find the musical rendering a trifle too polite. In comparison, my wall of stators is clearly less good in the rendering of the soundstage, but will develop a directness and can play "dirty" as I call it, in the way real music often is, which his A-capellas cannot match. I have never had the chance to listen to the US SOTA speakers like the Pipedreams et al, so I cannot compare, but his system and mine in rare moments let you forget that you are listening but to a facsimile of the real thing.