My other equipment is a Roksan Kandy cd, amp and Cobra 3 interconnects, odyssey 2 speaker wire, project turntable and Graham Slee gram amp 1 bridge phono stage. Sounds great through headphones, just not convinced with quality through speakers, detail, muddy, unrealistic sounds. Thanks.
There are a ton of speakers out there Andrew. I couldn't possibly list everything that'll be an upgrade.
Your entire system is excellent. I'm not a fan of any 600 series B&W stuff, but that's just me. It may be you too.
Before you start changing speakers, make sure you've exhausted all other possibilities. Are the speakers placed correctly? How big is your room? How are the room acoustics? Are you using any room treatments? Wood, tile, or carpeted floors? Windows covered with curtains? Speakers on spikes? I could keep going, but I think you get my drift.
If it is in fact your speakers, what price range do you have in mind? Do you want floor standers or monitors? Placing big speakers in a small room isn't any wiser than placing small speakers in a big room.
Roksan gear is excellent. IMO it deserves significantly more speaker than the 604s.
Thanks Stu, this is my gut feeling too, through cheap headphones the cd and amp sound amazing, through the speakers they sound good. I bought them hearing so much hype, and I have to say I am not impressed. In my younger years I had a bit of luck and came across some old A R speakers, these were only 70 quid and really really clear, great sound stage even as all my other equipment at the time was pretty average. Trouble is apparently they are not made as they used to be. I think and have heard monitors can give a lot more clarity than floorstanders, if the comparison to the old A R speakers to my B W ones is fair, then perhaps I will be looking at a pair of moniters with stands for around a grand to 1200 quid sort of range. Thanks for your reply dude.
Monitors can give better better clarity, but there's no absolute rules in anything. If the price of a monitor and a floorstander are the same, a monitor has the advantage in that more of the cost goes in to the drivers and other parts without a large cabinet and multiple drivers eating up costs. That doesn't mean this is always the case, but its too often the way it goes.
Again, there are a lot of speakers out there at different price points. If your're looking for a floorstander for the same amount of money you spent on your 604s, you're not going to get much improvement. You'll get different. A different speaker with different tradeoffs. It'll end up being more of a lateral move than an upgrade IMO. If you're spending the same amount of money as you did on the 604s or perhaps a little more, look into monitors.
There are a lot of excellent monitors in the $1000 - $1500 US range IMO. Maybe even a little cheaper too. Being in the UK as I'm assuming your are, British and European gear will probably be a tad cheaper over there than it is here.
Some excellent monitors I came across when I was looking are -
Audio Physic Yara Evolution Bookshelf (I ended up buying them) Dynaudio Focus 110 (my second choice by a good margin) PMC DB1+ Rega R1 (Rega towers R3, R5, etc are very un-tower like) Totem Arro (Basically a monitor built into a tall cabinet) Totem Rainmaker Naim N-Sat ATC SCM7 Focal Chorus 700V series
There's far more out there. EPOS, Tannoy, Monitor Audio... I could go on forever.
The ones I listed are the ones I heard. "Better" speakers are better, but there's a price to performance ratio that can't be ignored by my wallet. I found these to be a perfect balance. Everyone has their preferences, and all of those speakers have their trade offs. I found the best overall by a significant margin to be the Audio Physics. Its funny because I hadn't considered them when I was putting a list together. They were more of an afterthough. The ATCs may have been the best speaker, but they required far more power and SPL to open up and come to life than I can and am willing to provide them.
The new Epos "i" range has just begun to be delivered to dealers and may be worth a listen as they are garnering alot of positive attention...including mine...I just bought a pair (M12i's to be delivered next week) and would be fascinated by how they would compare to those fine Audio Physic speakers.
Add the Totem Dreamcatcher which some folks like better than the Rainmaker. Also the Era D5 is a heck of a fine speaker.
I wanted to hear some EPOS speakers, Art. Only problem is the dealer who carries them is the same clown who didn't want me to listen to the Yaras. He had some EPOS monitors on the floor when I asked him to hear the Yaras and he instead pushed the B&W 684, Revel Concerta tower, and Maggies down my throat.
I'll never step foot in his shop again. I said it before, then made changed my mind to hear the Yaras. After he refused to let me hear them and tried to make me buy what he wants me to buy, I'm done with him. I'm glad another dealer had the Yaras otherwise I wouldn't have heard them.
I just read this today:: Stu, some yo-yo wouldn't let you listen to something he had instock / on the floor / connectable?
That is simply nutty. If I walked into a couple of my hi-end stores, they'd hook up there freaking Computer Monitors if I seriously wanted to hear them...... The guy understood you actually were good for the purchase price?
As a long time Maggie owner, I can attest to the fact that 'getting one down your throat' would be painful/difficult to digest.
"Stu, some yo-yo wouldn't let you listen to something he had instock / on the floor / connectable?"
Yes.
"The guy understood you actually were good for the purchase price?"
Yes.
Its a bit of a long story, but I've got some time to kill...
A few years ago, I went into his shop for the first time, looking to audition an NAD 320BEE. He didn't have one on the floor, but couldn't be bothered much anyway. He had a Marantz stereo receiver on the floor that he said I'm "better off buying." "It has more power, more inputs, and a tuner." "At this level they all sound the same anyway." After I told him I'm very familiar with NAD and Marantz sound, and that I don't like Marantz and have no desire to own their gear, he repeated his "At this level, they all sound the same" line and "What are you going to do without a tuner?" I walked out.
I e-mailed Audio Physic's distributer, and low and behold, that guy's shop was the closest and by far most convenient. I'd have to drive into Manhattan for the others. I convinced myself that maybe he was just having a bad day, or that he'd be nicer if I was buying more expensive stuff (not that that's a valid excuse).
I told him I wanted to hear the Yara monitors and any other monitors he had in the $1000 - $1500 range. He asked why monitors? I told him I had a small room and my current towers are overpowering it somewhat. He said "Big speakers don't overpower any rooms." He took me into his main audition room where he had a pair of Revel Concerta towers (dual 8" woofers, a 6" mid, and tweeter) and B&W 683 towers. I humored him by listening to them for a few tracks each. Then he brought me into another room where I thought he'd have some monitors set up. Nope. He had Maggies. I told him I had neither the room, power, nor desire to buy any of these speakers. I told him that although they were all good in there own way, their sound wasn't for me. His response "Big speakers don't overpower a room. You don't need more power than you've got because you have a small room. The Revels are the best speakers for the price." After a few second blank stare from me, he said "If you want them in black, you can have them today. If you want them in another finish, I'll have them by the end of the week." I asked again to hear the Yaras. His response "You don't want them, you want the Revels. I've been doing this for a long time." This isn't an exageration. Its literally what he said.
It wasn't a money issue - the Revels are the same price as the Yaras and stands. It wasn't that he didn't have the Yaras - They were sitting on a shelf, and he had some in stock. It wasn't that he was too lazy to connect them - he disconnected and reconnected the Revels and B&Ws 3 or 4 times.
He wanted me to buy what he thought I should buy. I can't come to any other logical explanation.
I ended up driving into Manhattan to hear some PMCs and a few others. Luckily, there was an AP dealer 3 blocks away otherwise I would have never heard them.
I can't figure out how he's still in business either. I guess a lot of people need to be told what they like rather than being able to make that decision themselves.
He has some pretty expensive stuff laying around. I'd imagine if he sold a system composed of Mac monoblocks and B&W 800Ds that that would keep his doors open for a few months. There are far too many people with more money than common sense in the NYC suburbs. I guess its pretty easy to get a guy who has an unlimited income to buy that gear on looks alone. Not that it sounds bad at all. He has it set up in his front window.