Narrowed it down to 2...

Acoustic Zen Adagio
acousticzen.com/adagio.html

I found what appears to be a good deal on these from a guy who claims to order them direct from Acoustic Zen. Is there any way to prove if a speaker is not "b stock", refurbed, open box, or anything like that? He's selling them new for less than some people are selling them used. Seems almost too good to be true. Any opinions from people that have bought these?

AV123 Strata Mini
**********/index.php?page=shop.product_details&flypage=shop.flypage&product_id=34&category_id=18&manufacturer_id=0&option=com_virtuemart&Itemid=37

Both the minis and the Adagios get great online reviews. My setup is going to be a ps3 for most of my stuff (cd, sacd, blue ray, dvd) to an onkyo 805 with pre outs going to either my Musical Fidelity A5 or Onix SP8 (will going through the 805 to the integrated amp affect the sound at all...I mean the 805 is preamping/processing the signal before it gets to integrated amp's preamp, correct? Would it basically be the same going from the source directly to the integrated amp?) to power the speakers. Listening will be 50/50 movies/music in a 23x13x12 with two large doorways. The speakers will be have to be pretty close to the wall behind them--the minis have a powered rear sub on the bottom, which would be probably not much more than a foot from the wall. Will this be a major problem? The sub is adjustable in volume. The adagios are front ported. Would they be better suited for this placement becuase of the port position?

Also, what is the general consensus for not having your speakers matching your furniture? My listening room furniture is all pretty much a dark walnut sort of color which has me leaning toward the dark walnut Adagios, which would pretty much match perfectly.

Thoughts?

You're right Nuance, I haven't heard either of these speakers and it's likely that I won't have a chance to, as I live in the middle of nowhere right now. No dealers within less than six hours. Only chance of hearing them is from another owner--guess I'll give that a shot over at the av123 forums. Also, I've been reading your "search for perfect speaker" and "search for amp" threads for quite a few months and was seriously considering the Song Towers, but decided I wanted something that would go just a bit lower. I've taken a lot of my setup ideas from what you guys have been discussing, since you're kind of going for the same type of setup (2 chan with ht integrated) I'm still confused on the A5 setup with the ht bypass though. I have to run hdmi through the receiver first because almost all of my source sound will be coming from the hdmi of the ps3. The A5 doesn't have hdmi input, so I can't take the 805 completely out of the loop for my dedicated 2 channel setup. I will have to use the pre outs on the 805 to connect up to the A5 correct? I was thinking that the ht bypass meant that the pre outs from the 805 would bypass the preamp section of the A5, in effect making the 805 the preamp? Is this how it works? If I'm wrong can you break it down for me?

ClarkeBar, you're right, the minis are definitely a great value, both sonically and aesthetically. It's almost like the minis are too good to be true at that price. I mean it has the goodies of a speaker double that price or more. And althought the look great in the pics and probably much better in person, the minis don't match either my furniture (dark walnut veneer) or my existing speakers (inifity beta series, 4 beta 50 towers, c360 center, 2 beta 20's in black ash), but I'm thinking that could be a good thing cause they will stand out...i don't know, sigh If I were single, I wouldn't care, but I have the spousal acceptance factor to think about. I may be changing the room setup to allow more room from the wall for the speakers. Does the front port on the Adagios make for better close-to-wall placement? Or does it not matter and it also needs to be just as far away as rear ported?

I'm trying to find some info through Zen Acoustics on the seller of the Adagios to make sure it's legit. If it is legit by their word then that will make this decision hard. I read a very informative q&a session with a mag reviewer and Robert Lee (Zen Acoustics owner), and Mr. Lee objectively broke down the speaker performance and design to a level that I rarely find anywhere else. The design of these speakers seems to make a lot of sense.