The age old question - my ears vs my wife's eyes...

[Al1979]

I am struggling to meet both demands.

We moved in December, our old house had a spare room which we used as a full on AV room - it was new, so the room was square and made it easy to plasma wall mount etc etc.

The new house is Victorian, has chimney's so the TV is tucked in the corner. I have persuaded the wife that speakers would fit either side of the chimney so this opens up the options a little. The right hand speaker is tight agains the left side of the TV and the cabinet. I have about 24cm of floor width and 20cm speaker width - front firing is a must or sealed. The room is probably 25m squared.

There are a set of focals for sale on here but according to the wife (if it carries on she may not be any more) they are too big...

Amplification wise I have built my own, based on the musical fidelity mono block design, so power isn't an issue.

I really do not want a style system, but the more I think about it the more I think it might be the olny option to satisfy the demands of the boss...

I have a quad sub, which could assist small boxes.

Ideas welcomed... I'm happy to spend up to £1,500.

 

[muljao]

I think the neat Iotas are supposed to be good for situations like this

Neat Iota

 

[Mark.Yudkin]

I was always lucky - my wife also has ears, and I also have eyes. As a result we were always able to reach a compromise - I even got away with Quad ESL 63s, which I admit are rather wide. My wife likes the look of our current ML Spires, which we bought together. Needless to say, my wife was involved in all auditioning and therefore knew up front what the compromises were, and the cost. Interestingly, the greatest argument I had with her over size concerned the TV, where she wanted something a lot smaller (40" was her limit, and I took a lot of persuading to get the 55" UHD).

You didn't mention which Focals you saw for sale. For example, If it was the Utopia, then I would agree that they've been designed to "maximize ugliness".

 

[Paul7777x]

The leema zeros are a mighty speaker despite being diminutive.

As are the Xens.

Xen Micro Monitor

Botha are absurdly impressive. It should not be possible to get the size and quality of sound that these tiny boxes produce.

That are so counter intuitive that a listen is a genuine revelation.

 

[Ugg10]

For small mid-high end I would look at sonus Faber or acoustic energy. They have been doing quality, great sounding stand mount for many years.