Auditioned against Monitor, Klipsch, Paradigm and Polk.

Bang for buck - these sounded best to my ears for my price range. While there was a clear difference between these and the high-end Paradigm I listened to at one store, the Paradigm also cost 4x more!! I would say there is as clear a difference between the PSB and your typical cheapo Best Buy Insignia garbage for the same price as there is for the Paradigms that cost far more. That makes the PSB a great value.

They have a solid punch to them and I think they perform very well in the mid-bass region. I cross them at 80hz to a sub. Powered with a Denon 788 in a fairly small space (10ft from speakers) they are really capable of reference movie volume and have far more capability than my Denon can feed them.

The clarity is stunning and the soundstage - while limited by my current room layout is very impressive with just a tad of toe-in. I plan to upgrade to a beefier amp to really tap into the dynamics they are capable of.

They have been great for movies and music - and they look nice too.

The vinyl veneer is not exactly impressive (I have the maple), but it looks respectable from several feet back. Quite frankly, it's hard to beat in this price range and still end up with a good speaker. At this price range, I prefer they spend the money on more engineering and components than a better veneer. They did a good job with it for what it is - vinyl that looks like wood. This is a big reason I dinged them a point in overall rating.

I auditioned the T45s too, and I chose the 55s because they had more punch and bass than the 45s. In my room, I have the T55s close to the wall, so the low end never gets out of control. Audyssey also does a great job of handling frequency response issues with my room.

I’ve owned the T-55s for 2 years now and still find them to be a great value for the price. Paired w/ a tube preamp and class A amp, I found the upper-end to be airy and free flowing while the lower-end is sufficient but not particularly deep. I recently acquired a set of B&W 602s and found the T55s to be a more tighter response.

I listen to a lot of jazz and acoustical material, so loudness and bass response is not as important as accuracy and detail.

Summary: Great performance for the price.

All around great sound (lows, mids, and highs). Superb imaging. Easy set up. Highly efficient.

Carrying them up my stairs (3 flights) sucked!!! No realistic weakness for the price

I've owned these speakers for almost 3 months, and use them exclusively for 2 channel stereo listening. They are connected to a NAD c320bee intergrated amplifier. These speakers have handled everything I've thrown at them with no problems what so ever. I listen to a lot of classic rock and current alternative rock such as Korn, Sublime, and System of a Down. Bass is deep, clean, and tight (listen to Brass Monkey by the Beastie Boys to hear what I mean). Mids and highs are just as good as the bass. No one range over or under shadows the others; they are very neutral. The sound from them is very non-fatiguing. I've listen to them for 3-4 hours at a time without any problems. These speakers image pretty much flawlessly. It seems like 90% of the sound is coming from in between the speakers rather than from the speakers themselves. Singers are front-center, drums behind him/her, bass is everywhere, and guitars are on the sides. In my opinion, speaker placement and room acoustics are just as important (and maybe even more important in exteme casses) as the speakers themselves. Too close to walls/corners = bad bass quality; too close together or too far apart = bad imaging; minimal furniture = harsh highs and echoing; and so on. It didn't take me log at all to set these up and get great performance. 9 feet apart (center to center), 1.5 feet away from corners and walls, toed in to listening position 9 feet away sound perfect to me. I tried a bunch of different placements, but kept coming back to this. I say placement is easy because they did not sound significantly different in other locations, but enough to tell the difference. My System: NAD c320bee Intergrated Amp NAD 523 CD Changer PSB Image t55 Speakers Monster Interlink 400 mkII Interconnects Monster XP Speaker Cable

Similar Products Used:

Heavily auditioned B&W, Paradigm, Klipsch, Definitive Technology & Jamo. All were great, but PSB's were best combination of price and my taste

Lot's of Bass. The high treble was ok.

Over pronounced bass, seemed to have trouble keeping up on complex passages.

Years ago I owned the 4T's but ended up giving them to a relative as a gift. Then I went to Triangle Antal's which were outstanding on music but couldn't do HT that well - which I had to sell when I moved overseas for a year. So, fast forward to January 2005. I was looking for a new home theatre system that could also play music. With a base of a great Rotel RSX-1065 and RCD-1070 to build on, I didn't want to spend a fortune on a complete 5.1 Set. I ended up getting the T55, C60, S50 & 6i. My first impressions of the T55 were, not bad with a lot more base. However, I started playing some more complex passages and when I put on some rock and pop type music it seemed like the speakers couldn't keep up with the material. I also thought the base was a little to over pronounced. I didn't find any clear separation, very muddy middle range, it was as if the 6 1/2 " woofer was trying to do more then it was capable. I just couldn't keep up with the music. In home theatre it seemed ok, but just ok, not that clearly defined sharp sound that one likes in movies. I like to hear peoples forks touching the plate if they eat. I like to hear foot steps, realistic bombs exploxing, etc. Well after 2 weeks of contant running of the speakers to "burn them in" I noticed an ever slight improvement, but they just weren't for me. Perhaps if you are real fan of bass these might be for you, but I'm more of a high and midrange person. I also have a good enough receiver that allows me to lower my crossover to 80 or 60 so I don't need a speaker to do everything right, just everything from 60 or 80hz and up. The sub will do the rest. In the end I ended up exchanging them along with the C60 for the T45's and C40. Wow, what a difference...I couldn't be happier. I realized that when listening to my S50's that their was something special going on. Perhaps PSB has just perfected the 5 1/4", or it just seems to work much better with my Rotel Equipment. From a purely phisical stand point, it takes less energy to move a smaller surface area, so perhaps that's why the T45 is so much more accurarate. I also have to sometimes play low volumes because of neighbors, so perhaps this also caused the problems. My vote is listen to the T45's first before putting your money down for the T55's, especially if you are going to have a sub. I'll give it a 3 only because of the price point, but I think the 6 1/2" woofer has serious problems. Perhaps PSB would consider using the 5 1/4" woofer for the midrange and 6 1/2 for bass.

Similar Products Used:

4T's, Triangle Antals, Energy Veritas.