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One of the characteristic traits, I have found, that defines the loudspeaker designer is that they are loners—they seem to avoid one another's company as if on purpose. But if ever you sit down with a designer, all you need to do to open him up is to ask him what he feels to be important in loudspeaker performance.

"Why no review of the Ayre V-3?" queried Stephen Slaughter in July's "Letters" column, echoing several urgent posts to my e-mail address. Word of mouth on this remarkable 100Wpc amplifier was reaching fever pitch. Show reports over the last several years had sounded a consistent note—rooms that demoed with V-3s kept getting mentioned in "Best of Show" overviews. Naturally, this also meant that the pendulum had started its backward swing. "It's not really as good as people are saying," one WCES attendee confided in me. "That's why they won't give it to critics."

<B>CYRUS CHESTNUT: <I>Earth Stories</I></B><BR> Cyrus Chestnut, piano; Steve Kirby, bass; Alvester Garnett, drums (on "Cooldaddy's Perspective," add: Eddie Allen, trumpet; Steven Carrington, tenor sax; Antonio Hart, alto sax)<BR> Atlantic Jazz 82876-2 (CD only). Yves Beauvais, Cyrus Chestnut, prods.; Joe Ferla, eng. AAD. TT: 48:54

Let's say you play a CD on a poor-quality CD transport and store the digital audio data in a massive computer memory. You then repeat the process, but this time play the CD into the memory from the finest CD transport extant (say, the Mark Levinson No.31). A week later you feed the two sets of data from the massive memory into a digital processor and listen to the music. Would the CD transports' sonic signatures be removed from the signal? Could you hear a difference between the transports a week later?

<B>EDUARDO PANIAGUA GROUP: <I>Danzas Medievales Espa&#241;olas</I></B><BR> Eudardo Paniagua, flautas de bisel, nay, fujara, psalterio, tromba marina, darbuga, tar, c&#237;mbalos, caraqueb, cascabeles; Cesar Carazo, canto, viola de brazo; Wafir Sheik, la&#250;d &#225;rabe, darbuga, pandero, sonajero; Jaime Mu&#241;oz, axabeba, kaval, chalumeau, dulcimer, sonajas; Enrique Almendros, flautas de tres agujeros, gaitas, gaita charra y tamboril, tar, c&#237;mbaols, campanas; Luis Delgado, zanfona, la&#250;d, dutar, vihuela de p&#233;&#241;ola, santur, fujara, c&#225;ntara, darbuga, zarb, bendir, pandera, tambor, tar<BR> M&bull;A M034A (CD only). Todd Garfinkle, prod., eng. DDD. TT: 72:05

<B>CASSANDRA WILSON: <I>New Moon Daughter</I></B><BR> Cassandra Wilson, vocals; Brandon Ross, guitars; Kevin Breit, guitars, banjo, Irish bazouki; Charlie Burnham, violin; Lonnie Plaxico, bass; Dougie Bowne, drums; others.<BR> Blue Note CDP 8 32861 2 (CD only). Craig Street, prod.; Danny Kopelson, eng. TT: 61:59

While large, floorstanding speakers appear to offer the most material for the buck, I feel that small stand-mounted speakers both offer the best value in sound quality, as well as standing the best chance of sounding good in moderate-sized listening rooms. In recent months <I>Stereophile</I> has reviewed a varied group of such speakers. In order of descending price, these include the Acoustic Energy AE2 Signature ($5495/pair, November '95); Dzurko Acoustics Jaguar ($4500/pair, reviewed elsewhere in this issue); <A HREF="http://www.stereophile.com//loudspeakerreviews/462/">Totem Mani-2</A> ($3995/pair, February '96); Platinum Audio Solo ($2498/pair, November '95); Coincident Speaker Technology Troubador ($1495/pair, January and February '96); <A HREF="http://www.stereophile.com//loudspeakerreviews/615/">Joseph Audio RM7si</A> ($1299-$1499/pair, February '96); <A HREF="http://www.stereophile.com//loudspeakerreviews/445/">Acarian Al&#243;n Petite</A> ($995-$1195/pair, January '96); Phase Technology PC80 II ($699/pair, December '95); and Spectrum 108cd ($399/pair, December '95).