no problems so far these are the greatest speaker in the sub 1000 range

This is a very interesting product indeed, I would not be suprised if Paradigm starts a trend of high end powered speakers. I don't think these speakers could offend anybody...they have a very slightly laid back sound that makes it a flexible and forgiving speaker with many kinds of music, but not so laid back that it would offend audiophiles. They produce a very solid soundstage, reveal a high level of detail, produce amazing bass impact for such a small speaker, and remain unfailingly musical and balanced with a wide variety of recordings. There is a catch, however... these are small speakers, and they just cannot produce the deep bass and the loud volumes that large speakers can, which makes them not for me. However, the nifty low pass toggle switch in back would make adding a sub easy. Good job, Paradigm!

I needed front 3 speakers that would work well on a bookshelf with about 6" of space behind them. I also like a "neutral sound" and one that can be tweaked to neutralize the proximity effects of the enclosure. After listening to about 15 brands of speakers I finally found one that works for me. The lower end is amazing for a small speaker - nothing like biamping to get the job done. I had to turn down the bass control to compensate for the enhancement due to the shelving but it blends in seamlessly with my HSU TN1225 sub. with a 61 hz crossover and the imaging is really nice considering that I did everything to ruin it. It has no sonic signature and is really neutral. I would highly recommend it.

I don't own a pair of these speakers my comments are from a demonstration I heard at a local hi-fi store. I went there to compare the Paradigm studio 60's against B & W's CDM7SE. Of these two speakers both myself and another customer felt the Studio 60 had a better sound. The B & W's where very "boomy" and thick in the vocals. The CDM7SE definetly had a beautiful cabinet (if thats important to you). Getting more to the point of this review, out of curiosity I asked to hear the Paradigm Active 20 and they stole the show! I'd read about them in literature both from the company and "non-biased" articles. Most of the technical info regarding the advantages of matching the amp to speaker and phase-optimization (bla,bla,bla) I don't understand. However I do understandgood sound, excuse me, great sound. These small speakers put out clean, full, rich sound that was extremely impressive. I put on my refernece cd for dynamics (the final three minutes of Firebird suite). This is an HDCD encoded disc and it separates the men from the boys when it comes to a speakers ability to handle high volume dynamic sound. The Active 20's handled even the deep kettle drums with great precision. There was no boomy bass vibration, they were loud but clean. Whatever technological advances where put into these speakers may sound like mumbo-jumbo on paper but not when coming through the speakers. Unfortunately they cannot be used with recievers without a pre-amp output, so my search for a new pair of speakers continues, but check these out i fyour system is compatable, they are a worthy product.

From an engineering perspective, these speakers make perfect sense. And in real world applications these speakers really shine. These are the best speakers I've heard in a long time under $5000 and they are the least effected by their room and placement than just about and other speaker. From the dealer to my room they even sounded a little better. Completely unfatiging to the ear unless played at very high volumes. Only criticism is that it lacks a bit in the upper range compared to my Maggies, but is hard to find fault in them otherwise.

These are excellent sounding speakers. They have great bass for their size and sound very smooth. Female voice sounded wonderful. I am buying a new system in a few months and these will be high on my list.

I have owned these speakers for about 6 months now and I'm very satisfied with them. They have a certain sparkle and transparency not heard with other speakers in their price range that I've auditioned. Male and female vocals sound very smooth and natural. Sibilants are handled quite well. Other reviewers have said the Active/20's have pinpoint imaging which I completely agree with. It is very impressive that a speaker this size can produce such strong bass. The only thing I can gripe about is a slight boominess in bottom-end bass on some recordings.I would have to say that to get a slightly better sounding pair of speakers, a much greater amount of money would have to be spent. They simply sound great.

I can't really add much more than what has been said here about the Paradigm Active 20s performance. They are definitely a great value when you consider you are saving money by not having to buy a separate AMP. This configuration is great for people like me who would like to have the performance of separates (preamp & mono amps) but with as little to clutter my set-up as possible. I really wished other high-end speaker manufcaturers follow this precedent. Obviously, there are better speaker plus separate amp combinations out there but I have not heard "personally" a duo (AMP + Speaker) at this price range ($1600) sound this good. As a final note, these speakers perform pretty well without a subwoofer but if you add a high quality sub like the Servo-15 (like I did); ahhh music nirvana awaits you.
Other Components:
Paradigm Reference: Active 20s/Active CC-450/Servo -15/ADP 450s
Sunfire Theater Grand (preamp)
Toshiba SD-9000 DVD/CD/VCD player
Sony X88ES 200 CD changer
Harmonic Tech Truthlink & XLO ER-4 interconnects

Yeah, what they said. These speakers sound good.
The top is sweet and shows shimmer, which is rare enough.
The mid is warm and slightly forward, which I like. The
bass is as good as I've heard in this size speaker, but if
you are listening to Bach Organ works, you probably want
to attach a sub. No problem, the connections on the back
are dead simple.

I suspect that the 2nd generation of
these has caused a market for the 1st generation to appear.
Even so, these are first generation, and they sound great.
When you have shimmer, and electric guitar grunge still
sounds sweet, you know you are onto something special.

The negatives are, shielding could be a better. You would
want the 16" inches away from the monitor at least. And
I guess the bass could have just a hair more punch, but at
this size speaker, the bass they do produce is pretty awe
inspiring. If you flipped the hi-pass switch, then plugged
in a subwoofer, you would be set for life. Energy 12XL
is not a bad sub if you are looking for least price.
No other negatives I can think of.

First listened with "Genesis Live (remaster)", "Former
Infatuation Junkie", "Living Magic" (trilok gurtu),
"The Mad Hatter" (chick corea). All saintly stuff.

One would think that now that Paradigm has proved what
you can do with internal/bi-amp/active's, the world would
beat a path to its door. I've heard the ADP-90's and
trust me, you will not hear better bass extension anywhere.
But on those, they don't power the top, just the two bass
drivers. They should do an ADP-90 that is powered from top
to bottom! Just a thought. 5 stars.

I recently purchased a pair of last year's Active 20's for just under 1K in black ash. I also listened to the Dynaudio Contour 1.3mkII but they were simply not $1000 better than the Paradigms. After breaking them in over the weekend, I have been listening to them for the past week or so. Imaging is great, sit in the sweet spot with speakers at ear level, close your eyes, and point out the musicians! These speakers simply dissapear with quality recordings. I particularly enjoyed the Brazillian string quartet (?) from the Delos spring sampler, I really felt like they were playing 10 feet in front of me, with a very lifelike texture of the strings. Quite neutral and transparent sound over essentially the speaker's full range. Somewhat lacking at the low bottom end, as can be expected from a speaker of this size, but overall bass performance is extremely respectable. A sub will definitely be my next purchase, although I'm probably better off not having one with my neighbors as close as they are! Was kind of hard to hear Mingus playing on the remastered Ah Um, but this is the only CD where I've felt something was missing. Overall, this is a great speaker for the price, especially if you can find a discounted one. I'd like to hear the new model just for comparison, but I think I'm better off having saved the extra $$. I haven't listened to too much super-high end stuff, but I bet you'd have to fork over a lot more cash to get better sound than you get out of these. Overall a great speaker value, especially considering these are biamped!! Not giving 5 stars here because I bet there's better monitors out there, but for a lot more $$$. 5 stars for value, 4 stars overall (I'd give 4.5 if I could)