About 1985, I auditioned a number of speakers, buying an entirely new system. I had a modest budget, looking for bang for the buck. First, I should stress I wasn't kid looking for "impressive" sound, I was 29, classically trained pianist, active musician, I auditioned speakers with choral music, orchestra, and other well-recorded music, not Led Zeppelin.
The local audiophile stereo shop owner like Cantons for the value, the smaller bookshelves were in my target range. But then he played me the CT-1000, I expanded my budget. (I recall the CT-2000 were nice, just way beyond my budget.) I compared these with quite a few speakers, KEFs, B&W, and others, including at another shop. The Cantons were an easy win. I would have had to gone up significantly in price to match them. So at least in 1985, I disagree there were better speakers for the price available. Maybe somewhere in the world, not in the Los Angeles area that I could find.
In case you still think I mean these speakers were just "impressive", and not accurate:
A dozen years later, I was working on an audio product for a company, and the budget studio monitors they gave be were not flat enough for me to do my job. I told a co-worker involved in speaker measurement, who had worked on developing studio monitor for another major company, that I would bring in one of my Cantons, because they were flat. He chuckled, clearly amused, "They're not flat, people think their home speakers are flat, but they're not". I shrugged, brought one in the next day. He came into my office, put some material through them as he listened intently. The music ended, there was a pause of several seconds. Then the words, "They're flat." And we carried on without another word. (The company bought me a pair of Genelecs for my office and the problem was solved.)
I guess those with the speakers in-line are mkII, I have the ones with the midrange and tweeter side-by-side.
, good work and people.
