Just an update for anyone following this thread...
My wife and I both agree that the key problem with our home theater is a distinct lack of lower midrange warmth. A prime example might be in a Yo Yo Ma cello solo, where the mid and higher notes are fine (beautiful!), but the low notes sound weak and hollow. Contrary to most of the advice here, I really don't know how a better sub, such as the SVS or the EP's, would really help much because honestly we want full-range sound from our front mains. Some of our listening is done from SACD's, and they just seem to be engineered to be played on full-range speakers.
So with that in mind, we put together a collection of songs that illustrate what is missing at home, and hit several higher-end home theater shops to demo various speakers. Staying in the $1,000-$1,500 range, we listened to various speakers from B&W, Klipsch, Martin Logan, Deftech, Vienna Acoustics, and Dynaudio. We tried as best we could to listen paired with receivers similar to my own. We tried to be as objective as possible, or as is possible when weighing in on something as subjective as sound quality.
To make a long story short, the B&W 603 and 604 came out on top. B&W's definitely have a warmth and presence about them that our m22's are seriously lacking. However, this is where it gets complicated. I can't honestly compare $400 bookshelves to $1,000 - $1,400 floor standings. My wife really liked the sound of the 604's and probably would have walked out with a pair, except that both B&W stores were out of stock and couldn't promise anything for at least 2 weeks. I convinced her to wait and let me do further research on the M60/M80 before proceeding. So has anyone here been able to A/B the M60/M80 vs the B&W 603/604 speakers?
