Music Lovers Speaker vs. Audiophile Speaker

Interesting topic. I would have disagreed with the premise a couple of months ago, thinking that the audiophile approach has the same goal in mind.

But I’ve recently had my audiophile bookshelf speakers bested by a small bookshelf that retailed for about $600. I was floored, and realized that this little speaker has a real synergy from left to right that makes magic with music. The audiophile speakers have ribbon tweeters and have a precision and exactness that can’t be denied, but I prefer the little concentric drivers of the Tannoys and the music just sounds more ’live’.

Both with the 250 wpc amp, and the Nad integrated with 50 wpc, the Tannoys make you want to sit and listen to the music, not the system.  I previously had Paradigm speakers from the Signature line as well as the monitor line.  I think they basically had the same house sound, which was more of a monitor's characteristics.  

Maybe it's just that I don't care for the monitor type sound, I find it too lifeless and boring.

I found at an considerable expense after buying/selling 20k+ of audiophile equipments, that there are two main types of speakers.

Accurate speakers/active monitors. Especially the 2-way horn/woofer designs. You can hear the difference between mp3 vs aac easily with these. You can also hear the difference between resampling vs no resampling. They let you hear what was actually recorded, and how your component actually sounds like. The JBL 3 series is a very good example at an incredible value.

Inaccurate speakers. These are all over the place. Audiophile speaker belongs here. They try to make things sound better than they are. The Pioneer FS52 is one such speaker that is worth a special mention at $120 each, oh boy does it make everything sound so good!

The expensive 4k+ stuffs are in generally not worth mentioning. Oh and btw, the room is the most important piece, a bad room will never sound good, regardless of how much money you throw at it, and an awesome room will make even el cheapo setups sound like a million bucks (and therefore there is no need to spend more).

Last year I had a several month quest to find a new pair of speakers, eventually replacing all my components.  At one shop the salesman asked if I preferred "analytic" or "musical" speakers.  I suspect what some think as "audiophile" speakers is what the salesman characterized as "analytic".  He offered Magico as his "analytics" and Raidho as his "musical" models.

Coli, I guess that explains a lot!  I really prefer sound, or music first.  I've installed Pioneer speakers in my car, and I think they are of the 'audiophile' type.  They sound great too.  

If you are an audiophile and not a music lover, you should shoot yourself because you will just waste a ton of money.