Best value speakers available

I'm going to throw my beloved Quad's into the list - the
11Ls / 12Ls for a bookshelf cannot be beat in their pricerange. The 12L easily bettered the B&W603 and I've seen others note that it compares favorable to the B&W805 even.
http://www.quad-hifi.co.uk
http://www.tnt-audio.com/casse/quad_11_12_e.html

Three years ago when I was in the hunt for new speakers I listened to B&W, Paradigm, Tannoy, Martin Logan, Linn, Revel 20's, Vandersteen, Sonus Faber, Vienna Acoustic and a couple of others when I finally came across Hales Design Group T-5's. The Vandersteen 5's lit my hair on fire, but at the time I didn't want to spend $9K on speakers. To me the Hales seemed to leverage the finest attributes from the other speakers I had listened to and synergize them into one package (minus the incredible Vandersteen 5 bass).

Hello, I own a pair of german Canton Ergo 900DC.

After reading a great review on this speaker in the may 2003 Absolute Sound, It got me curious enough to seek out a pair for audition. Boy, at $ 2,000 per pair, they are not exactly cheap but they as the Absolute Sound reported, ''a minor miracle'' After shopping extensively,and auditionning to exhaustion, I could only find handicapped-in-the-bass micro-monitors or stand mounted speakers. Here's what you get with the Canton Ergo 900DC. A somewhat ''big'' speaker at 40 inches tall that is wrapped in beautifull REAL cherry wood. I'm tired of whimsy-looking small boxes. A classic design, with rounded edges instead of the all-square square box. A classy METALLIC removable grille. And most of all, a rich, full sound, unlike most monitors in this price range. Fit and finish are just so excellent, and compete with speakers at 3 times the price. Very good quality binding posts, bi-wireable, and 20-20,000 hz specs that are rare in anything approaching this price range. Somewhat harder to drive 86db sensitivity, so make sure you have enough power, because these babies need it to come to life. Just amazing value, it's a LOT of speaker for the money. By the way, I am a previous owner of $ 15,000 Verity Audio Parsifals so I'm a spoiled audiophile. Are the Cantons as good? Of course not, but they sure could put to shame many ''big name'' speakers at twice the price. A few B&W's come to mind..*wink* . All in all, fine German engineering, it's worth to seek them out for a test drive. By the way, in my humble opinion, the Karat line does not sound anywhere as good or as natural, although the imaging is pretty good because of the slim design. So for my money, it's Ergo all the way...
Do they make any money on these?

I bought my Totem Rokks used but in great condition from a guy on EBay after they didn't sell in his auction-- $325 for the pair with Lovan Stands. I drove 1 hour to audition them and bought them on the spot. I'm having a great time with them in my small listening room.

D

The very early AR's have to be on this list. The various iterations of the AR-2 and AR-3 were budget speakers based upon price, but have stood the test of time as great sounding boxes. Of the more modern offerings, I agree that Vandersteen makes good speakers in their price range. However, when I compared them to Thiels, I was universally convinced that the Thiels were worth the extra money. Pretty much the entire Thiel line are good bang for the buck speakers. My father-in-law has some CS.5's, which sound ridiculously good for under $1k. I have a pair of CS3.6's, and I think that they hold their own against speakers costing up to twice their MSRP. A little lower on the price scale, I think that PSB and Paradigm offer good value for the money.

Tom.