New speakers ordered

So I had bought a new 50" plasma (thanks to Jeff for helping to get it to my house from Kent) and moved my old 42" into the bedroom. To go along with the plasma in the bedroom, I needed a receiver and speakers. Jeff had some contact that got me a good deal on the Yamaha RX-V659. I didn't need anything particularly fancy, so I'll be using the new Yamaha in the living room and moving my old RX-V800 to the bedroom. It took awhile to decide on speakers, but finally decided on a pair. Details follows...

The plasma in the bedroom currently sits atop my wife's dresser, which is the perfect height. I wanted to get some "lifestyle" speakers to go along with the plasma. "Lifestyle" speakers are generally ones that are relatively thin and shallow. My Mirage Omnisat v2 FS speakers would be considered "lifestyle" speakers. Anyways, I had been reading AvsForum trying to get some ideas on brands and models to check out. I'm familiar with the Paradigm brand since I own the Monitor 7 series for my home theater so I thought I'd check out their new Millenia 200 speakers. They were the right size for floorstanders. Jeff and I checked them out last weekend at Definitive Audio in Bellevue. We did a comparison between the Millenias and (I believe) the B&W XT4 speakers. Between the two, I thought the Paradigms were much more detailed and forward while the B&Ws may have had slightly better midrange, but the high end sounded muffled. Which is the opposite of my previous experience with B&W which I typically found too bright.

Although I didn't like the salesman (I actually had to ask for assistance even though there were probably 3 or 4 salesman behind the desk and not busy), I decided to see what kind of deal I could get for the Paradigms. He offered 10% off which was an ok deal, but it certainly didn't make me want to make an impulse buy. I asked for 15% and he wouldn't give it to me. So we left. I did some more research online and was looking at the Athena WS-100, Energy Take TWR, Aperion 533-T, Totem Arros, and NHT Classic Fours.

Although the Athena's have gotten good reviews, I wasn't really too interested in them. I had Energy Take 5's before and considered the TWRs heavily, but the only local place that carried Energy is no longer in business (GoodGuys). The Totem Arros were the right size (although perhaps a little bit short) and look great, but the only dealer I knew that carried Totem is in Oregon. They were also on the more expensive side (although not much more than the Paradigms). Jefff suggested Aperion, which I had heard of. Aperion (an internet direct company) provides free shipping and if not satisfied, you can return them in 30 days and they will pay for return shipping. Their brand has also gotten good reviews and I thought about getting a pair for demo, but forgot all about them when I looked into NHT.

NHT (Now Hear This) is a pretty well known company even though they aren't a very large company. Jeff has a pair of their older bookshelves that he praised and I believe Joel used to have NHTs as well (T5's?). I had been reading some recent reviews about their Classic Three bookshelves. They were being described as "the perfect bookshelf speaker". However, the Classic Threes would have required speaker stands, which adds to the cost and I would eventually want to get a subwoofer with them (although they go pretty deep for bookshelves). NHT also had floorstanders, the Classic Four. The Classic Four is basically a Classic Three built as a floorstanding model, but also includes a 10" woofer which negates the need for a subwoofer (except for extremely deep or loud bass, which is not needed for my application). So I seriously considered the Classic Fours, but when I went to measure them in my bedroom, they were WAY too big and probably would have overpowered my bedroom. They were basically the size of my current Monitor 7's. So that left getting the Classic Three's or perhaps the Classic Zero's. The Classic Zero's were much smaller than the Classic Three's which meant I could just put them on the dresser next to the plasma and not need speaker stands.

Since this story is long enough already and most of you reading this have already lost interest. I ended up ordering a pair of Classic Zero's and a Classic Ten subwoofer to go along with them. I bought them from J&R which currently has a $10 off by using Google Checkout. I made 3 separate orders for each speaker saving an additional $30 off their discounted price. The total ended up being just a bit more than the Classic Three's by themselves and less than half the cost of the Classic Fours. So I'm pretty happy with my purchase, even though I had not actually listened to them myself. But given their reputation, I'm pretty confident I'll be happy with them. Now I just need to wait.

Here's a pic of the NHT Classic Zero in piano black: