Newbie - looking for speaker advice: Large room / Electrocompaniet gear

Hi all,

Al here. I'm a newbie and I posted this in the welcome section yesterday, but was advised to post it here to get more responses..


I'll jump straight in at the deep end.. I've been thinking of changing my speakers and I could do with some advice. I have a large room to fill (20ftX20ft) and I'm after speakers to give me a bright, defined and large sound when coupled with the following:

(Old!) Logic Tempo TT / Datum tonearm - in perfect working order and setup with an Ortofon black mm.
Puresound P10 phonostage.
Astin Trew AT3500 CD player.
Electrocompaniet 4.8 pre.
Electrocompaniet 2X120 power.
Castle Howard S2.

The castles are great and fill the room, but they are a little laid back for me and I want to modernise the setup a little and get a brighter sound (as my setup will allow). I generally play original 60's garage / soul / rock / avant vinyl and I generally have pretty good pressings. I move from that through to electronic artists on vinyl such as Trentemoller - which are generally newer pressings in good nick. Probably like most people here, I have a broad music palette and I'm after speakers that give me the details from the recording I'm playing.

I currently have a budget of about £800, but I could increase this to ~£1K in a few months or so. I'll leave it longer and save more £ for the right set.

By all means jump in and throw speaker advice at me - I'm a bit stuck at the moment!

I'm totally new to this type of forum, but I'm glad to be onboard.

Cheers,

Al

I see you have had some advice already from your "welcome" post. All I would say is that I would not buy a new pair of speakers. When I say new I mean from a dealer/internet or wherever. There are so many bargains to be had on here and other forums although it may take time to see anything you fancy. You could probably save between half and two-thirds on new price and see stuff that is off mainstream. Some would say that joining just to buy kit is a bit of a no-no, so get involved and have fun. Let us know how you get on re-positioning your Castle's, go wild and stick em in the middle of the room (yes-really!) or nearfield - you may be surprised.

Thanks Puffin - How to convince my wife..

If you're after a more 'modern' sound and not as warm, have a look at the XTZ range of speakers. I haven't followed their more recent designs but the 99 series is superb (I had the bookshelf models but you'd probably want the floorstanders - 99.36). They feature ribbon tweeters and SEAS drivers and give astounding detail but without being overly bright. As they're direct to consumer, prices are very reasonable and if you ask for a quote they usually knock a bit off the listed price.

Thanks Simon - they look very appealing and are definitely on the shortlist.

If your after a lively musical foot tapping sound with plenty of detail kudos cardea c30 I have a pair.I did have a pair of Wilson benesch the actors and for some reason my sound was uninvolved and dull too laid back and I swapped out interconnects plus speaker cable all to no avail then I changed them for the kudos what a revelation my sound now bounces along those Wilson benesch were marvellously detailed but dull as ditch water I Heartly recommend the kudos cardea c30 a fairly easy load for an amp as well will fill a fare size room with wonderfull sound no problem not too fussy on position I found as well.