Speakers to hang on to for LIFE


After 9 years with my Proac Response 3s, I recently decided to change speakers. As you can tell, I'm not an upgrade fever patient. I want something I can live with for years & I think the best advice I'm gonna get will be from those who have & are still living with their speakers for an extended period of time. Please tell me why too. Thanks.Bob.
ryllau
I am super happy with a pair of Green Mountain Audio speakers. Not planning to sell them anytime soon - definitely a candidate "for life". Very realistic and dynamic. An absolute pleasure to listen to for hours and hours and days and days.... and years and years.
The model I own are the EOS HD with integrated speaker cables (very rare). They are currently being "upgraded" to HX. It is wonderful to communicate directly with the designer and manufacturer and know you can trust.
They really had to twist my arm to disconnect my speakers and ship them for the upgrade. I do not want to live without them for the weeks it takes to upgrade them and I can't imagine that the upgrade will be of any significance. But I trust GMA and was ensured that there will be a significant improvement. Looking forward to it! A keeper.
I am using the speakers in my "listening room", which is ~11'x17'. But they would also work well in bigger rooms.
For large rooms (>20'x20' with very high or open ceiling), there are other GMA models that I am sure would work very well. I have no listening experience with GMA floor standers.
After listening to many many speakers (large and small, more and less expensive) over the last 25 years, I have come to especially appreciate good monitors on stands. The imaging of good monitors - always making sure to match with room size and acoustics - is generally better and more accurate and dynamic and live-like vs "floor standers".
I also have a larger family room with floor standers (Waveform Mach 17), which are also keepers and I have been very happy with them for years and years.
For me with no questions asked it is Apogee speakers (and always will be)! It was my dream to own them once I had heard them back some years ago and I had at the time a georgous pair of Infinity Kappa 8s. I made a deal and have a set of Apogee Slant 6s that have been with me ever since. I've changed the front end electronics a number of times and cables but the Apogees have always been the focal point of a system that continues to grow and refine and thier performance has never disappointed me even as I've adutioned other speakers.
Apogee Centaur Majors in mahogany for me as well. Owned the same pair for approx 16 years and while I have enjoyed others, I always come back to them. I have owned a pair of Centaurs before that and also played around with the Mini Grands.
I've had Spendor SP100's for almost a decade,love them. If I were shopping today, I would start with the Harbeth 30.1 or the Harbeth Compact 7ES-3 depending on the size of my room. The "classic" British speakers do not have the sizzle of some other high end speakers, but I've noticed that many of the speakers listed on this thread can be found for sale on eBay, et al., but if you search for Harbeth, or Spendor, etc., there are few, if any. Which suggest people keep them.