Best new loudspeaker

the quad 989 is inferior in purity to the original quads.

the 2805 is no better. the 57 was and is the best midrange and lower treble reproducer. the soundlabs are a distant second.

MrTennis, I have a customer who would disagree with you. He plays, or played, violin in a symphony in either Vermont or New Hampshire (I can't remember which). Prior to auditioning SoundLabs, he told me that the only speaker he had ever heard get his instrument right was his personal pair of tricked-out original Quad ESLs. He brought 90 discs to the audition, and over the course of two days he listened to portions of 80 of them (the other 10 were SACDs and I didn't have an SACD player). When we were through, he told me that not only did the SoundLabs get his instrument right, they also got the cello and double-bass right, which he said he'd never heard any speaker do before.

Duke

ask david chesky the same question about sound labs vs quads. this is the first time i have ever heard anyone suggest that any sound lab speaker was closer to the real think than the original quad esl.

i suppose it is a matter of perception. there is no absolute answer to this question without a reference
to compare to the recording.

the only true full range electrostat loudspeaker is the Big Soundlabs which are excellent .

Indeed Big Soundlabs is what Gordon Holt used for many years until he got his current ATC SCM 50 ASL....I guess he has enjoyed many speakers over the years and reviewed more than most, however he is apparently extremely happy with these particular cones...perhaps its just the ice cream or syrup?

"for example, while i have heard many cone speakers, i am skeptical that i would like a cone speaker that i have not heard, based upon my vast experience"

I wish I had your vast experience MRT. As an admitted lover of panel speakers, I once decided to get out of the house a little more, and surprisingly discovered that what I really enjoy and not enjoy has pretty little correlation with underlying technology; rather, I found some moderate correlation with the 'house sound' of particular designers/manufacturers; yet more often than not, I simply fall in love with one particular model. . . but then. . . my problem is that I may be an empiricist with a strange distrust of inductive thinking.