Speakers: What's MOST important to you?...

Dawgbyte, how you audition the speakers is very important. You need to remember that what you hear at the store may sound very different when you bring them home. Room acoustics, equipment matching and your mood also vary. If the salesman doesn't know what he's doing and mismatched a great speaker with a badly matched preamp/amp combo then it is your lost to find out the true sound of that speaker. It is always easier to find a pair of speakers that will sound nice in most of the system matchup but it doesn't mean that it is the best speakers out there. It is a more complicated process than you think. Giving all the speakers I audition are all above average, I think size ( to match your listening room ) is more important to me and then the efficiency ( to match your amp.)

For me, it's detail. I want to hear what is on the record or CD. The down side to being able to hear fine detail, is that I now know that only about 15% of my music collection has a combination of good playing, recording, mixing, etc. And only 3 or 4% is truely excellent, with most of the top 5% being a single cut from an otherwise unremarkable effort. The rest is good for background music only.

Last weekend I was transferring six CD's to tape, as a favor to a young engineer I work with. Thank god for the mute function on my preamp! One was listenable (Moby) with decent playing and recording, the others were poorly played (the drummer for Bad Religion needs to find another line of work) and had no soundstage, separation around the instruments, etc.

Sorry, I got off on a tangent (sounded like my father 30 years ago).

By the way, I agree with Twl regarding getting rid of resonance. In my system I have tried cones, footers, bricks, marble bases, etc., etc. By far, the most noticable improvement (better resolution of fine detail) has come by adding audiopoints under my monitors and selected components.

Best regards, Dave

Realism, then soundstage depth (width is easy). Also, accuracy of the midrange. I'm with Philjolet and Phasecorrect on this important point the. After working the live voices and instruments for 10 years I can't handle most speakers when listening to acoustic music. Don't get me wrong, I listen to a lot of pop and rock, but those recordings are EQ'd like mad (even if it isn't through the listening board/computer).

Let me share with you something I read in a magazine back when it was Stereo Review when Julian Hersch was still there. This is a paraphrase.
--Ask to hear the three best speakers in your price range connected to a front end similar to yours. Use a cd you've heard a hundred times.
--Compare them two at a time,with the volumes the same,with the demonstator not telling you the name brands.
--Keep a chart of these four things checking the better performer in each of the catagories:
#1.Timbre,does a violin sound like a violin,etc.
#2.Imaging,can you follow two or more horizontal lines at the same time without the speakers getting in the way? Don't worry about instrument location;that comes with proper placement in your room. If you can follow counterpoint,that's a lot in a speaker demo room.
#3.Dynamic Range,does the distance between very loud(ff) and very soft(pp) sound life like or shorter than real life?
#4.Frequency extremes,do violin double stops sound pleasing or strident? Is the bass booming and bloated or tight and compact?
--once you have the better system,compare that against the third pair.
--If you like the pair you've selected,start neogiating.If you don't keep looking.

Let me answer your question. I'm an imaging nut with a hard core Magnepan habit.

Have the speakers disappear and forget about critiqueing the sound and just connect with the music.