My Naim Allae’s have served me well from my first “entry level” Naim system 25 years ago to my current “end of the road” (300dr/252 SCdr/NDX2 555dr/Pro-Ject CD transport) system. I’ve asked my friendly Naim dealer if perhaps my speakers are the weak point in my system, and maybe I should listen to something else? He simply said if you “like em, keep em”, and added that I would have to spend a lot of money to do better than my Allae’s.
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My two pennies’ worth, to achieve 3-dimensional engaging sound in that small space, standmounts do a better job than floorstanders. I can somehow relate to the experience as I can imagine a 2-dimensional sound to be flat and unexciting. An engaging sound is usually enveloping and 3-dimensional. On the other hand, floorstanders do a better job in larger areas mainly in scale and bass.
Good luck.
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From what you have said here, and having looked for a similar type of speaker, I’d suggest auditioning at home the PMC Twenty5.21i, PMC Twenty5.22i and Neat Iota Alphas.
My approach would be to go for standmount and add a REL subwoofer later on. Best of both worlds 
Let’s see what speakers my dealer will lay in front of me on Sunday to start with!
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I think the main issue is the speakers are firing down a short length (400cm) and the sofa is placed close to the rear wall. Have you tried pushing the speakers closer to the front wall, say from 133.5 cm to 100 cm, and the sofa pushed slightly out into the room?
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I have tried many different placements, even including up against the wall (the distances on the OP figure are just one of the many trials). The deep fireplace in between the speakers doesn’t help with imaging either. There was no significant change in the fundamentals. And besides the B&Ws played quite enjoyably at a similar placement.
Even made an experiment to rotate the speakers by 90 degrees. Suboptimal placement due to constraints by the length of speaker cables, but still no fundamental change/improvement. It was probably even worse like that.
This is how the room looks like right now, so you get an idea. @PeterR Would it make sense to cover the (large) TV with a removable diffusion panel or something when listening to music?
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Very nice and neat system. The Dynaudio C1 Platinums look wonderful there. I can’t imagine the music to sound terribly awful there as the speakers have got a lot of space around them. It’s a good speaker placement.
I guess we all have to work with what we have as the room is usually the limiting factor especially when space is limited. With the sofa against the wall, in my experience the listening volume will need to be kept at low to moderate levels to preserve the clarity in the music. The sound will become “messy” when the volume goes above a certain threshold.
My current room is 3.2m x 10m with the speakers firing down the length of the room. I have plenty of space behind me so it’s a completely different setup compared to yours.
The Neat sx2s really do work with naim amps. Down firing port gives plenty of bass and I think makes placement very unfussy. And they just play music. Any music.
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Yes i agree here, especially with a SUPERNAIT, it’s like they were made for each other.
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They do look wonderful indeed. Which will make it hard to let them go… I wish they sounded equally nice…
The sofa was actually a bit forward in the past. Moved it back into the room by 15 cm now, so when sitting back the ears are at ~40cm from the wall. The theory says optimal position at 38% of the room, which would be ~1.5m, but that’s impossible in any case.
I have thought of rearranging everything by 90 degrees, or even diagonally in the next room, but this is practically impossible with all this furniture etc. Oh well…
In demo mode since yesterday… The long weekend helped 
From outside towards inside:
- Sonus Faber Sonetto I
- Dynaudio Confidence C1 Platinum
- Bowers & Wilkins 685
- PMC twenty5.21 (not i)
Many different price points and very different presentation from each speaker. Still listening so I will summarise my thoughts later this week. Can’t say I have converged to a single speaker yet though.
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Nice. Would be interested in your thoughts. The B&W 685 is not listed in the B&W website and I presume it’s discontinued? The 705 S3 looks good though and would be more competitive when compared with the rest of the options.
Based on looks alone, my vote would go to the Dynaudio C1 Platinums with the PMC coming in 2nd although I’m aware that in the end, it’s predominantly the sound that matters. It’s useful that the Sonus Faber Sonetto 1s come with their own stands and have Isoacoustics Gaia fitted below the stands.
The 685 is a pretty old model, I got it second hand pretty cheap for a second system some time ago, and it keeps impressing me with its PRAT! It’s been superseded by 3 generations of 600 Series by now.
The Dynaudios do look the best and their build quality is amazing. Which is to be expected since they cost at least 2-3x the money vs the rest. PMC are the worst looking for my style…
The stands are the matching Dynaudio stand (Stand 6) for the Confidence and I have added Gaia III myself. I just plonk whatever speaker I try on them for now. It’s all in my first post but I understand it’s toooo long to read…
OK, so first round of auditions done.
After listening to the Sonus Faber Sonetto I and PMC twenty5.21 (not i) at my dealer, powered by a SN2, he kindly lent me the speakers to try out at my room and with my equipment for the long weekend.
Most likely the speaker placement was not optimised for each combination, but I tried a couple of reasonable positions which should be enough to give me the main feeling of how the speakers work in the room. My findings were consistent between the two locations (home and dealer), which should at least help with future auditions.
So, the PMCs are quite an impressive speaker! They present music in a completely different way to the rest of the speakers that I’ve heard. Very good detail retrieval, amazing and authoritative vocals, nice 3D image and very fast. I didn’t get perfect bass integration in my room, but still they could show what they can do. Now, I don’t know how they do it, but they have a “metallic” timbre in the midrange, which gives a lot of power to string instruments. I listen a lot to Greek music (as a Greek guy ) and the clarity and strength of bouzouki at some songs was something I don’t think I have heard before.
So, all good then? Hmmm, my issue is that this “metallic” timbre was always apparent, which did lead to a bit of headache after a few songs at “decent” volume 
. I tried them with and without toe-in but their presentation doesn’t change that much. So I cannot see me living with them as I would definitely get listening fatigue pretty quickly. Which is a pity, because I really liked many of the things these little fellas can achieve… I don’t know how different the “i” edition sounds, but I assume the overall tonality and character is probably similar.
The Sonus Fabers, on the other hand, were quite pleasant and easy to listen to. Which is funny, because the dealer told me that I would probably find them brighter compared to the PMCs in the long term… They gave me some decent imaging (definitely needed a bit of toe in) as well as the rhythm that I am missing with the Dynaudios. I don’t see any issue living with them in the long term, plus their design is quite nice. For some reason, though, I feel that they are a bit of a compromise, as I don’t recall anything too impressive from them. So I am afraid that if I get them I will still have doubts at the back of my head if I have made the best choice… . Yes, I know I am hopeless sometimes .
The demo speakers are now back at the dealer and I will spend some time with the B&Ws to see how much I can extract from them and understand if they have any significant limitations that would bother me. And from there on we will see…
Thank you for your patience with me, this journey will probably take several months until I figure out what works best for me…
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There were a few comments about the sound of the twenty5.21 that echo yours. I’ve got the 21i version, which has a new tweeter I believe, and which is improved quite a bit, so they may be worth trying. PMC stands make a worthwhile difference too.
Given that you seem to be wedded to small speakers, it might be worth trying to track down some secondhand PMC Fact 3 speakers: It was the bottom of the Fact range (that model now discontinued), their range above the TwentyfiveXXX. I haven’t heard them, nor the 25.21, but on the basis of how much better the Fact 12 sounds compared to the Twenty.26 (both tops of the two ranges when I compared), I would anticipate that the F3 is noticeably different, and better than, the Twentyfive.21.
I may be shouted down, though being a tech, I look at the materials used in the speaker.
I love good audio, which is equivalent to the size of my wallet and nothing more. My baseline now is Kevlar woofers and ribbon aluminum tweeters. I know there are far better materials today, though this is what I could afford after a speaker rebuild.
The cabinets are the same, the bass drivers are now kevlar than polymer (plastic of some sort), and the round aluminum tweeters are now ribbons. The dBSPL had not changed though a new cross-over was engineered, and now I can hear cymbals shimmer and not just a ting of a tophat or other cymbal.
I would be interested in what speakers you preferred and what materials those speakers were made of.
This might help with any headaches going through oodles of speaker selections. Set a make, you like then evaluate speakers with similar or better technology in the parts used or how they are used, and implemented.
Just on specs alone, I would love to hear a pair of Focal Kanta II speakers. Maybe for another lifetime or when I sell the Harley.
Warm regards,
Mitch.
To me if choosing speaker drivers the materials themselves used in the drivers are totally irrelevant:to the choice, as what matters is the performance of the driver (e.g. response range and evenness) and other parameters relevant to the type of cabinet loading, such as given in Thiel-Small data. It may or may not be that a particular material, e.g. kevlar, gives the best, as other factors in the design and construction of the driver are also critical, and those show tgrough in the performance and T-S data.
And at the bass end what is at least as critical as the driver is the loading (sealed box, reflex, transmission line, isobarik etc), and how well it is implemented. Personally I have found transmission line to give the best to my ears, though it is also the most complex and difficult to get right, hence the cost, but then I require speakers to go deep in the bass.
But does transmission line really have a “sound” ?
AIUI it’s just a way to make the cabinet virtually larger, so you end up with a smaller speaker than if you’d tried to accomplish the same with a bass-reflex (ported transmission line) or sealed cabinet (non ported TL).
But I didn’t look into TL that much, so might be wrong here.
Interesting discussion on what makes the “sound” of the speaker which I enjoy as an engineer. I am pretty sure though that the loudspeaker design is so complex that in the end everything has a role, not just the driver materials. For what is worth, the B&W 685 that I am enjoying a lot currently has got a kevlar woofer and aluminum tweeter. But for now I keep an open mind and will try to compare as many different designs as I can.
Regarding the PMC, I don’t know if it’s the TL design that makes the most difference, but it was definitely the most unique (and capable dare I say) speaker that I have heard so far. I’ve noticed a couple of audio shops around that seem to have the “i” version available to audition, so I’ll try arrange a visit soon and see how I feel about it.
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