Just an update for anyone who's interested.
The Doc's amps (pair of A80's + pre-amp with clicky knobs) are waking up nicely now, after about six weeks or so, and I did get the pair of Monitor Audio 1200 Gold Reference speakers of Ebay for £65 - silly money really.
The speakers out perform the Spendors quite nicely, though fettling was a real pain. They have a cavity in the plinth that needs to be tuned to the environment by filling with sand. Too little and they bloom like a field of lavender on a summers afternoon, too much and the bass all but disappears completely. It's a really fiddly job, and I finally settled on a method of filling small bags with sand and adding or subtracting as necessary. Once the correct amount of bass was achieved there was still a problem with "chuffing" from the rear ports, which was sorted by placing some sound absorbing material loosely behind them. Toeing them in proved to be critical too. Most speakers I have owned seemed to prefer a fairly sharp toe in angle, either pointing towards the ears or even, in some cases, more at my nose. These however are pointed at the wall behind me, angled in only a very few degrees. Took me a couple of weeks before I stumbled on this, but the difference was quite remarkable for such a simple adjustment.
The final result is a pair of speakers that deliver a far superior sound stage to the Spendors, and are sonically very acceptable indeed. Led Zepps' "Whole Lotta Love" really rocks, and the sound effects in the psychedelic central section rotate around your head and literally come from directly behind you. Not strictly about the music I know, but great fun, and a very graphic illustration of the ability of a speakers ability to project sound from outside the box. Same goes for the guitar in Stings' "All This Time" from his "The Soul Cages" CD. No longer am I assailed by the two dimensional effect of the Spendors - what a relief! I had truly wondered whether I'd just been imagining all of theses things, or even whether my ears had just had it.
Classical music too is nice, especially smaller scale pieces such as the Beethoven string quartets that I'm listening to a lot at the moment. Nice separation between the instruments, and a sweet tonal balance with realistic sounding instruments. Large scale orchestral works, however, are harder work, with denser passages starting to show signs of the speakers struggling to keep pace. Truth is, I've yet to discover the speaker that can do this really well, so I'm not too disappointed by this. That'll be the next thing on my shopping list when the Spendors are Ebayed in the next few weeks.
Will I keep them? Probably (OK certainly) not, but that's not to say I'm in any way disappointed with the first steps on my journey towards the perfect speaker for my system, and I can certainly live with them until something better comes along.
Conclusion - MA's £65, Spendors currently £1700 rrp! You do the math :D
Oh, and to the Doc, love the amps
Am I imagining it, or are they still getting better? Had them a couple of months now.
Bi-amped A80's, P90sa, LS6, AP10h, Phono2/2 PSU's, BMU, SSC, SSP2, Raspberry pi/Durio Sound Dacs, Rega RP6/Dynavector 10x5, Royd RR2.
Even smelt nice, patchouli oil I think.
