[stevehollx]

I have some Wharfedale Denton 80th anniversary bookshelfs that are quite incredible for low end given their size.

 

[Strat1117]

I've owned many top shelf speakers over the years, Wilson Watt/Puppy, Quad ESL-63 (with all the 'right' mods), Joseph Audio Pearl, Vandersteen Quatro, DeVore Nine, and some other less memorable ones, but I've never been happier than I am with my current Totem Forest Signatures. They're relatively small (for 'towers'), two way speakers with an itty bitty 6.5" woofer, and they simply cannot sound as beautiful as they do. I've set them up with great care, and they match perfectly with my Plinius amp - but it's more than that; they just seem to mate with my room better than anything else I've ever had (with the possible exception of the Quads, but I tired of waiting for a panel to flame out every time I turned them on; it happened only twice, but that's more than enough - same reason I eventually gave up on tube amps). IMHO, the Totems are wonderful speakers, and severely under appreciated. I wouldn’t recommend them for a diet of hard rock or metal, but for the music I listen to, they are pretty close to perfect.

YMMV.

 

[Podster]

I've owned many top shelf speakers over the years, Wilson Watt/Puppy, Quad ESL-63 (with all the 'right' mods), Joseph Audio Pearl, Vandersteen Quatro, DeVore Nine, and some other less memorable ones, but I've never been happier than I am with my current Totem Forest Signatures. They're relatively small (for 'towers'), two way speakers with an itty bitty 6.5" woofer, and they simply cannot sound as beautiful as they do. I've set them up with great care, and they match perfectly with my Plinius amp - but it's more than that; they just seem to mate with my room better than anything else I've ever had (with the possible exception of the Quads, but I tired of waiting for a panel to flame out every time I turned them on; it happened only twice, but that's more than enough - same reason I eventually gave up on tube amps). IMHO, the Totems are wonderful speakers, and severely under appreciated. I wouldn’t recommend them for a diet of hard rock or metal, but for the music I listen to, they are pretty close to perfect.

YMMV.

Was wondering if yours have the BEAK and/or CLAW options? I thought it rather snake oilish until I heard the different positioning in a designed sound room with just their BEAK's first then with both and will say top end imaging really improved with the BEAK's and the CLAW's brought for that size speaker a definitive thump to their low end. With that said I'm not sure if you have not set your room up for sound these options might be a waste!

 

[Strat1117]

Was wondering if yours have the BEAK and/or CLAW options? I thought it rather snake oilish until I heard the different positioning in a designed sound room with just their BEAK's first then with both and will say top end imaging really improved with the BEAK's and the CLAW's brought for that size speaker a definitive thump to their low end. With that said I'm not sure if you have not set your room up for sound these options might be a waste!

A claw up front is part of the design for the signatures. The rear has some kind of stabilizer bar, with little balls for feet. I changed out the oem hard rubber balls for stainless steel, at the recommendation of Vince Brusseze (the designer) - I tried brass too, but didn’t like it as much.

The beaks do work (I’ve heard them on a pair of model 1’s), but these are tilted back by design (adjustable via an integral threaded brass point in the Claw) and have a slippery gloss finish, so no beaks.

My room is carpeted, so the whole speaker sits on a 1” maple board (also as recommended by the designer), and is further ‘isolated’ with a small bdr disc under each of the three contact points.

 

[OnlySoMany]

I love my dynaudio confidence 30 running off the Naim stack. Big difference when I upgraded to the 552. Music sounds so much more delicate

 

[Ilomaenkimi]

Audio Physic Tempo 3i, i have my third pair now.
Never gonna give this pair slips off my hands.
Very fun and musical sound with big and spacious soundstage.

 

[bassb]

Just completely switched to head-fi and gave away my pair of Q Acoustics Concept 20. Very much fun, especially given the tiny space they take. Might be tempted in the future to go for a pair of LS60s.. If I convince the wife

 

[Podster]

Just completely switched to head-fi and gave away my pair of Q Acoustics Concept 20. Very much fun, especially given the tiny space they take. Might be tempted in the future to go for a pair of LS60s.. If I convince the wife

Best of luck on those

 

[Strayngs]

New Speakers came in over the weekend. Voxativ 9.87

 

[reggiegasket]

Wouldn't the room work better with the sofa and the speakers swapping positions? Or put another way, the door is in the wrong place

 

[Strayngs]

Wouldn't the room work better with the sofa and the speakers swapping positions? Or put another way, the door is in the wrong place

That door is not the enterence. It opens to my house water shutoff. Enterence to the room is behind the sofa.

 

[ptodorov0]

I would say anything from ATC, depending on the budget. I have owned SCM 11 v2 and I loved them, I can only imagine what the beasts like SCM150 and 200 would sound like. I am now in the process of building a active crossover, biamped 2way bookshelf speakers and I hope to beat the SCM11 and have a new personal favourite. But they will cost much more than SCM11 including DSP and amplifiers.

 

[Ilomaenkimi]

Audio Physic Tempo 3i, i have my third pair now.
Never gonna give this pair slips off my hands.
Very fun and musical sound with big and spacious soundstage.

BUT Linn Majik 109 with Majik DSM/4 is much more musical set up.
Musical richness is in it's own league. <3

 

[Podster]

After seeing all the Klipsch posted out here I decided to spend the week with my Son's setup consisting of the EL-34 40WPC Yaqin (Yes Chinese) MS-30L, Vincent PHO-8, Rega RP-8, Hanna Green, H&K DVD38, Xduoo XQ-50 BT Rec (no photo since its added) and of course his Industrial Las I'm happy to report PWK always knew what he was doing I think everyone should hear a well setup Tube/Klipsch rig at least once in their lifetime) and oh, might I suggest something with a 300B tube in it

H&K DVD-38 and Wow that Qinpu A3 Inty @ 8.5WPC drove the dog out these Las

Not gonna lie, the H&K 670 Twin was a SS bad boy. (Gifted to a friend who's house burned down) Was my Son's music teacher in middle school!

 

[bagwell359]

Wouldn't the room work better with the sofa and the speakers swapping positions? Or put another way, the door is in the wrong place

Ummm... the door isn't the problem.

Here comes the unsolicited review:

1. No diffusion/absorption I can see.
2. Wall to wall - eats mids and imaging specificity along the lower part of the soundstage.
3. Equipment rack: interferes with center imaging
4. Turntable getting hit by bass notes, but thankfully no flimsy cover to rattle - nice table BTW. Can't make out the arm.
5. Is the side wall longer than the front wall? If so, you are getting extra midbass where your speakers are located. On the long wall you'll get a wider stage, but if you are closer it could be near field listening which the speaker may not be set up for.
6. The speakers are the same distance to the room boundaries. So however one speaker is off of flat w.r.t. room, it's doubled. In bad cases one can have 6-8 db deviance plus or minus somewhere(s) under 350 Hz. The ideal room ratios are 1/1.7/2.3 or 23x17x10 in feet. This looks like a single driver speaker with transmission line loading which is fine, but the back and side wall appear to be equidistant the the driver and port(s). If this is part of the design, great, if not you've got a peak and a dip of probably 5db each if not more 0-350 hz.

Parallel walls, lowish ceiling, probably lots of slap echoing and standing waves.

Just a born critic with lots of professional experience setting up and spec'ing listeng rooms. No insult intended, but I think if you have some leeway you could get better sound, Or actually strayngs.

And of course, love the dog.