Speaker Recommendations
We're hard-core headphone geeks and we are quite capable of developing very sophisticated evaluations of headphones, but we're not speaker experts so we're gonna give you a little advice and then send you off to your favorite local audio dealer if you want additional information.
The HeadRoom Audiophile Desktop System is capable of using pretty much any small speaker you desire. The speaker stands are capable of holding over 200lbs. and the Desktop Mono-Block amps will put out 170 Watts/ch, so no limitations there. Our experience tells us there are two major areas to be concerned with when putting together a nearfield system; imaging and bass balancing.
Imaging
Getting speakers to image well in a room can take a bit of tweaking to the speaker position. In a near-field system, simply putting the speakers in an equilateral triangle with your head and at ear height will get you a long way to optimal imaging. The biggest difference between normal 'in-room' listening and near-field listening is that there isnt a lot of space for the speakers to "develop" a soundstage image; which means the speakers will either image inherently well, and you'll get a precise, layered, & deep image in the near-field; or they don't and you won't. When evaluating speakers for a high-end desktop system, we recommend you listen to them in the same near field you'll actually use them in -- say at least 3 feet distance or approximate arms' length. Simply ask the salesman at your dealer to position the speakers about 3 feet apart and sit in front of them 3 feet away or so. Try to do this with the speakers on stands and away from the walls of the room; that way you'll be listening to the sound of the speakers themselves. Listen for a nice, clear, coherent presentation and image.
Bass Balance
One of the suprisingly strong effects of where you place the near-field system in a room is how much the bass to mids balance can be affected; if the listening position is located in the corner of the room, the bass will be significantly stronger than if it is, say, on a desk in the middle of the room. The reinforcement of low-end response can be an important thing to tweak when using small speakers with limited bass response. The size of the room can also be a problem with small rooms sometimes acting a little unusually with the lowest frequencies(where half wavelength is longer than the longest room dimension). In most cases we find that using a sub-woofer with significant bass management features and carefully positioned will allow you to produce excellent and well integrated bass response.
Our Suggestions
We’ve spent a lot of time at audio trade shows over the last four years listening to speakers to select a couple that will deliver excellent performance on the desktop. We’re sure there are a goodly number of speakers available with similarly excellent performance, we just haven’t heard them yet. We don’t want to discourage you from performing your own search for a sound you like and you can feel confident that the Audiophile Desktop System will be perfectly capable of driving just about any bookshelf speaker to full fruition. The two speakers we love the most are: the Amphion Ion, and the Harbeth HL-P3ES-2.
Amphion's Uniformly Directive Diffusion technology may be a somewhat incomprehensible mouthful, but your ears will easily get it … big time. The tweeter’s lower than normal crossover point and the front baffles deftly engineered waveguide come together to provide extremely well behaved time and dispersion characteristics. Okay, simply put, they image like no other small speaker we’ve ever heard. The layering in depth and left-to-right specificity is just … easy and natural. The hardest thing to do in high-end audio is produce clear and simple sound, but the Finland-made & designed Amphion Ions do it with ease.
As counterpoint to the pristine imaging of the very contemporary-looking Ions, we wanted to find a lush, warm, and inviting speaker, and turned to a speaker with terrific lineage and classic breeding: The UK-made Harbeth HL-P3ES-2. A direct descendant of the ledgendary BBC LS3/5a (1975) the HL-P3ES-2 has been produced for the last 20 years to the delight of audio professionals and audiophile enthusiasts alike. The sound is rich and embracing; a deep pool of sound; inviting, friendly, comfortable, a wonderful place to be.
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