Right! I feel you have been heavily implying it isn't a trait worth considering, which it obviously is. Transients do matter, and any mixer worth his salt will recognise when the speaker is fighting against them in this regard.
I personally think the tight transient response coupled with the mid forward character is what makes it a solid tool worth considering. Remove either trait and the speaker would lose its usefulness. My suspicion would be that the transient handling plays an important part of why people like working with these speakers.
As to why they are popular: I'm totally on board with calling it hype reaching critical mass. The NS10s sounds terrible, but they are pretty consistent between rooms given their sealed nature. If you can count on it being everywhere it is worth learning as a tool. The speaker also being revealing of transients and a critical band of frequencies is the icing on the cake here.
I personally think the tight transient response coupled with the mid forward character is what makes it a solid tool worth considering. Remove either trait and the speaker would lose its usefulness. My suspicion would be that the transient handling plays an important part of why people like working with these speakers.
As to why they are popular: I'm totally on board with calling it hype reaching critical mass. The NS10s sounds terrible, but they are pretty consistent between rooms given their sealed nature. If you can count on it being everywhere it is worth learning as a tool. The speaker also being revealing of transients and a critical band of frequencies is the icing on the cake here.