Looking for the best high quality Studio monitors I can find. Unfortunately we are looking toward the lower end of the price scale, I cant afford to spend thousands or anything. But the quality is more important than price. Its got to do the job and do it well.
Looking to see what you guys use or could recommend? Is there any that you’d advise steering well clear of?
First advice: don’t trust in recommendations you’ll get at any forums like this. Most of the people recommend the equipment they have bought (come on … they want to believe they made a perfect choise when buiying their stuff).
Second advice: fix your price range, find out the ones which fall into this range and go out and listen to them at your local (or maybe not so local) music store.
Third advice (don’t trust me on this one … this is highly biased opinion): M-Audio BX series sounds a real bargain on my ears. I bought a pair of BX5 as my TV/DVD speakers, but while moving to the new house I temporarily used them as my studio monitors and found out my Genelec 1032s definitely are not worth 15x of $$ they cost compared to BX5.
But anyway … for most of the readers it would help to know what’s your budget. “I cant afford to spend thousands” isn’t quite clear. Is your budget $1900, $999, what? and now I’m even expecting you to talk about $US, since American people are the only ones in the net, who forget to mention their currency 
Nice one Jarno, thanks for the advice. I hate to say it but im also a member of GearSlutz and with that experience in mind, Im more than used to all the fan boys of various products coming out each time there gear gets a forum outing. I take it as good advice not to take it on their word alone, but still, im hopeful that when im not exactly sure where to turn, these places can shed some light as to which direction I should be looking.
Setting a budget is perhaps a sensible place to start though. £300-£500 (English im now afraid to say) and that would be for a pair.
SO far ive been considering the Yamaha HS80M and KRK Rokit8G2.
I have a pair of the KRK Rokit 5 monitors and have been really happy with them. I did a lot of reading before buying and couldn’t find anything too negative. I wish I had the 8" version and the matching 10" sub but money and space won’t allow it right now. They seem solidly built and have every input you should ever need. I haven’t really compared them to many others but for the price range they seem to be a pretty decent product.
In your price range KRKs are a very good options. Personally I wouldn’t touch Yamaha ones. But again … completely biased and uneducated opinion … never liked any Yamaha analog gear while loving a lot of Yamaha digital stuff.
Eh … and thanks for clarifying we’re talking about “not thousands of” £UK … and not for example Rp (IDR, Indonesian Rupiah) or ¥ (JPY, Japanese Yen) 
… and my apology to all US people too … it seems it’s not only you who forget to mention your currency 
sort your room out first. In a decent well treated room average monitors will sound better than great ones in an un-treated room.
MC
I use Quested’s by the way 
Try and go for 8 inch if you can, regardless of what brand. I would also suggest investing in something like the really small behringer 2 inch powered speakers, they aren’t great but that kinda why. I use yam HSM 80s, as well as the small behringers which i also use for mono testing/ mixing. It doesn’t end there though… mix on as many speakers, headphones you can fit into your room!
Agreed. I reference my cheap RCA bookshelf speakers right along with my Genelec’s when I’m mixing.
Tannoys!
Having written that, let me write this. The main thing is to get speakers that do not have too much colouration (I know it’s a basic contradiction in terms).
When we did our CD, we were fortunate enough to be able to audition our mixes in a large overly reverberant hall and a large room with hefty JBL monitors. By the time I had done a few mix on my Tannoys and listen in those rooms (and our loungeroom and car) cycles, I got to know exactly how the mixes would sound in those rooms without having to go there.
It is the training of your own ears that is the important thing, but the speakers you mix on must be of sufficient quality for you to be able to clearly hear what is going on in the mix when you make small adjustments.
Just know that for tweaking individual tracks, you should listen to a single speaker, but it doesn’t have to be at mix levels. Listening to mono through stereo speakers isn’t as accurate, as it is more likely to be coloured by room acoustics. Simply use only one of your stereo pair with a mono signal.
If you want advice on how to set up your studio without expensive measuring instruments, try reading Michael Paul Stavrou’s ‘Mixing with your mind’. He also has great recording tips, especially his trick with vocal reverb - magic!
yamaha hs80m win hands down , i have 3 pairs of them and im perfectly happy with them ,they are a good all rounder .
you will not be disappointed !