today i went to a couple different locations to listen to some speakers so when i order my axioms, i will have a reference in order to judge them on. My demo discs were M Jackson's History
and vivaldi(most of my cd's are at college, and i am home for Turkey Day)
I went to Tweeter, ABT(local electronics dealer) Best Buy, And Circuit City
i list the speakers in order of prefernece
Mirage-$599
Klipsch-(the whole floorstanding line from 400-600)
Energy C-5 699
Saphire ST1B 599
Boston Acc Cr95B 549
JBL 150 599
MK 750 750 (bookshelf)
Energy C-3 399
nfitinit -$299
Paradigm-$150
Bose(the whole floor standing line)
some other crappy speakers
First thing i learned is dont shop at Best Buy or Circuit City. At Best Buy nothing worked, and at Circuit city the guy who was trying to help me kept turning up the rap music(extremely loud) and i kept turning it down. It was being played on floorstanding speakers under 300 dollars and it maxed out pretty quickly.
2nd thing i learned is Bose really sucks.
3rd thing is try not to get an old person helping you out. (wow-i just offended a lot of people in one sentence). The old man at ABT (he was the only elderly man in a store with 400 young employees, was less then adequate in both answering my questisons, and navigating his way through a moderately complex electronic system.
anyways on to the review
To start off i must say i was basically only concerned with highs and mids, since i will be also buying an SVS sub which will solve any problems the mains miight have. I make not comment on build of construction(as i have a limited knowledge on that subject.) But i did listen for the bass, just not as much. Also, for the speakers i reviewed without model numbers, it doesnt matter-dont buy from that speaker company in those price ranges as they suck(except for the mirage).
The most impressive speaker was the Mirage. For those that have not heard a mirage's omni directional sound stage/field it truly is amazing. It sounded as though you were listening to 5 or 6 speakers, not just 2. Really impressive. But, i did not like the sound as much, and am looking foward to trying out later models. The sound seemed more pronounced in the mids, and less clear in the highs. The tone of the mirage seemed somewhat off(take that for what its worth as i am by no means a quality and referenced reviewer-its all just IMHO.) anyways the mirage actually managed to excite me a little bit, but then i settled back and listened to the sound it was alright.
Moving on.
The Klipsch speakers where generally pretty good. I currently own a 4.1 system for the computer so it may be i am used to the Klispch sound, but i think they sounded alright. Model prices ranged from 399-699. One thing i liked about klipsch compaired to other companies, is that the speakers all sounded the same(exactly the same), except the more you spent, the more bass, depth, and loudness(thats not a word-ohwell) you recieved. They sounded pretty good in the highs, allright in the mids. The bass was alright too. Nothing speciall. Its hard for me to comment on the klipschs because i am used to them. Hard to pick things out(also, it was the only speaker i was able to listen to in Best Buy, so trying to remember what the other speakers sounded like was difficult. And the speakers were not in a designated listening room, which may of hurt, or helped the klipschses. The best thing about the klipsches though had to be its soundstage. I really enjoyed the wide soundstage the klispch offered. It may be that this was because the speakers were directed towards the listening area at about a 30 degree angle from about 2 feet away. Every other speaker was in the usual flat position at about 6-9 feet away. Just something to think about.
C-5. The c-5 was a pretty good speaker. Good bass, good mids, and some decent highs. Sounded like a good rap/hip hop system. The sound stage was alright, nothing special.
The Saphires sounded alright too. Its bass was not as good as the C-5, which is why it is ranked behind it. In terms of quality, the 2 are very comparable, but one is 150 dollars more expensive. If money is an issue, you would have to test yourself. They are both quality speakers, but not amazing. It was fairly clear in both highs and Mids, but i think less precise then the Boston Accoustics(i think-those two speakers i had a very hard time deciperhing which one i liked more.
The Boston seemed to have a smaller soundstage then the Saphire, and less loud(in terms of both mids and bass). Still unsure which one i liked morre. But it also seemed to be more precise and detalied.
The JBL was simply outshined by the C-5 and the similarly priced BA and Saphire. Just not as good in all areas-not as loud, precise, or clear. and less of a soundstage.
The Mk 750 was a perfect size for me, so i really wanted it to be a good speaker. its the same size as an m22 (i think) but more expensive. Anyways it didnt sound very good. When played loud the mids overshadowed the highs, and kind of hurt. Most expensive speaker on the list, and would place it right around the JBL and BA accoustics speaker in terms of sound quality. It did get loud though.
The C-3 had an odd tone to it. Maybe it was just me. I just didnt like it as much. Maybe it was mored detailed maybe not. I quickly changed off of the C-3. Something sounded odd. Also it wasnt very powerfull at all.
Final 3-Dont get Bose. It just sucked. The paradigms and Infinites under 300 dollars were alright for the price. They sounded decent enough. The infinity actually should be higher on the list, except for the fact i had a terrible time listening to them and(i was at Circuit City and it really hurt my ears). , i really wasnt interested in them as it was below what i was looking to spend. I enjoyed the infinity and would recomend you to listen to it if its in your price range.
It got so loud at circuit city, that another worker had to come over to the audio area and tell the worker who was 'helping' me out to turn it down as the boss, who was about 40-50 feet away was on the phone.
Hoped this helped. Any questions just ask.
Hopefully this wasnt too long. If it was too long, it means you stopped reading my review a while ago. If your still reading, this doesnt apply and you shouldnt of read these 3 sentences.
