Greetings,
I am "The Bottom Feeder". I value value over aesthetics, but not by much. I, like you, want the ultimate bang for the buck. You can see the Audio Room/HT I just finished on Audiogon, under Virtual Systems, Home Theaters, "The 'Bottom Feeder's' HT".
The Maggie MMG's are a wonderful value. I currently am running a pair of them at my office, and using a Rotel integrated amp along with a Nakamichi 7 disc changer and Parasound tuner. Lovely little system.
I had fun a few weeks ago; took my MMG's over to an audiophile friend's place. He's put no less than 25k into his room/system. He's running Rogue Audio tube amps into his Vandersteen 3's. Nice. So, he's not heard Maggies before. We hook up the MMG's (I have 1.6QR's at home, but too big to tote around). We both agreed there were some things the Maggies did better, i.e. widened sound stage, clarity of voices, etc. But, the Vandersteens did have more "presence" and bit more depth.
The fun part was seeing the shocked look on his face when I told him these were $500 speakers! Here they were, hanging in there with speakers costing 6 times the price. It was like comparing a bookshelf to a full floor standing speaker! Should have been "no contest" but it was closer than any $500 speaker has a right to get!
Regarding subs, watch out. We noticed that the MMG's had difficulty filling the gap between the twin subs and the higher bottom end of the MMG's. This probably wouldn't be a problem with a larger Magnepan speaker. My 1.6's have no difficulty blending with my twin Vandersteen subs. For MMG's you might not want to do stereo subs, unless you were immediately upgrading the mains.
As you get going in audio, and as budget, wife, etc. permit, do some room tuning. Nothing super expensive. Just get a couple of sound pannels, and place them critically. Man, what a nice difference in sound! Especially with the front/rear firing Maggies, some sound absorbtion is big benefit!
Also, can't say it enough; POWER POWER POWER... Maggies crave power. I'm using 400wpc into each of my 1.6's. You will see huge improvements in upping power supply.
Enjoy your new addiction; I'm thoroughly diseased at this point! Would welcome your comments, questions on my HT.
Doug
