johncj,
I was auditioning all these speakers with a friend of mine who was really doing the searching for his new setup. I was along for the ride so to speak, and there in part to give him advice and overall cost-performance type opinions.
In short answer to your question about the Paradigm Studios, they were not in stock in any of the shops we perused that day. We did get to hear them once before at another store but not for very long and with a salesman telling us how they sounded during the listening. He was not a fan and kept calling them Para'booms'. Not only was this annoying but he's influenced how i think about these speakers. I will not comment on the Reference line until i get the chance to hear them again more critically and without a boneheaded salesman yapping away while i do it.
The Energy lineup that we heard are another comparable low end- high end set of speakers that i guess you could say we used as a reference for relatively good and not so good sound reproduction. Mind you, my friend's home setup originally consisted of a $700 Sony HT in a Box so it truly was the epitomy of horrible.
