Best all around speakers

i think the issue here is :

what is the virtue in suffering ?

it is a poor investment to spend money to suffer.

there will always be "problem" recordings. some collections of recordings can have many of them. it would be nice to be able to enjoy listening to the "problem" recordings.

thus, if one strives toward accuracy, have a second system for the "problem" recordings and listen to the "non-problem" recordings on the "accurate" system, where they can be enjoyed.

if one is to own only one system, let the buyer beware.

beware of what you desire, for you may get it.
this last statement especially applies to high-resolution systems.

i think the issue here is :

what is the virtue in suffering ?

it is a poor investment to spend money to suffer.

MrT - you are missing the whole point of this hobby. Frustration and suffering is where it is at. If you don't have a whip to self flagellate your back while listening to Nina Hagen then you haven't lived.

I with MrT, if you suffering, then get another hobby. Music should be a joy.

Dave

I really like my VSA VR-7s - they play MUSIC. Period.

Although "problem" older recordings don't sound great, thankfully I have very few of them and they have in fact already been remastered to take the "grunge" out (my system is non-vinyl and pretty revealing).

Good thread.

As I said in a different thread, by far the best type of music to use to test a speaker is classical, specifically full scale orchestral music, or perhaps even better, opera. This type of music places more demands on the speaker than any other type, by far - particularly the huge dynamic ranges, variety of timbres, the sheer number of instruments and voices, the greater size of the soundstage to reproduce, the much greater complexity of the music itself - one could go on and on. A speaker that can handle all of this can handle any other type of music one could choose to throw at it. That said, it is also true that no single speaker is going to excel at all of these things more than all the others, and personal preference will enter into it a great deal. But if we are talking best all-around speaker, it's got to be able to handle the biggest challenges, so if it can handle the above things, it WILL be able to handle any other type of music - so I would disagree with those who have said that it is a must to own multiple sets of speakers for different types of music. Set up a speaker system that sounds fantastic for all types of what we call classical music from huge opera to a solo string instrument or voice, and no fan of any other type of music will have any complaints when their favorite type is played over them - I have found this to be true 100% of the time, with different types of speakers, too, though in the experience of myself and many professional musicians and audiophiles, horns will reproduce all of the above with the greatest accuracy overall. The other thing just about all professional musicians would agree on is that this requires floorstanding speakers as well, so I guess that 100% number I threw out there does assume floorstanders - smaller speakers simply cannot reproduce some of the qualites necessary for the reproduction of the very largest scale music.