Vintage speakers, are new ones better than the old ones?

I'm still using the KEF 104/2's I bought new in 1986.

For the most I am happy with them though I have a heard a few speakers I really liked in recent years.
(Vienna Acoustics, Spendor, Harbeth) but the price puts me off, especially the Harbeth.

My system needs a change and I'm grappling with the option to replace the KEFs or trying a beefier amp to feed them.

 

The price/performance ratio of Harbeths is, ahem, unique....but not necessarily in the way you'd want. A very okay-middle-hohum product at that price.

 

actually i sold the AR9's shortly after acquiring the MGC-1's. the AR91's pull duty in a secondary system.

 

I'd love to hear those with my system. Someday I'll find some locally I hope.

 

Well, I have gone and jumped into the deep end on the vintage speakers. I had an opportunity to purchase a pair of cosmetically beautiful Quad ESL 57s. I did just that, and promptly Fed Ex'd them to Wayne Picquet (PK) in Florida for a complete restoration at Quads Unlimited. I never even plugged them in.

I haven't received them back yet but I do see from my initial correspondence and memory that they are low 4-digit serial numbers, so they are no later than 1962. Maybe 1959-1962, in that range: 50 year old speakers! How's that for vintage.

Properly refurbished, I anticipate they will hold their own against most of what is out there in the modern offerings. Just yesterday I packed off my beloved B&W Nautilus 802s. I am without sound for now, and in a holding pattern. But if this thread catches my eye when the speakers are returned to me, I will chime back in.

For now, I have voted with my feet and pocketbook for the vintage speakers rather than modern. Although, that is certainly open to interpretation as the refurbishment will put me into an essentially brand new pair of classic Quads, as they will be returned as better than "new" on a classic design.

 

Congrats and good luck.

 

If you like distortion and coloration vintage is the way to go.

 

All of this AR talk inspired me last night to finish the restoration of the 1966 AR4x pair I found at Goodwill a few months ago. I had gotten as far as getting the cabinets looking good, recapping the crossovers, and bypassing the dead wipers. When I discovered that one of the tweeters was dead, I hit a brick wall. I was hesitant to buy replacement tweeters from Parts Express, not knowing how they sound compared to the originals, and so put the restoration on hold.

After reading the AR stuff on this thread last night, I went on eBay and found a genuine, working 1968 AR4x tweeter for $20 BIN and pulled the trigger!

I'm looking forward to hearing what they sound like. I will probably be pairing them with a 150 wpc Carver MXR-150 in the living room. The AR4x is said to be a good speaker for jazz, which is what gets played mostly in that room. It will be interesting to see how they sound compared to the ADS L9e's in that system currently. The AR4x's certainly have more WAF than the ADS. (BTW, I scored the ADS L9e's for $4.99 in a thrift store a few years ago! One of the benefits of living where they made this stuff.)

 

Why would that be the case? Sure some lousy speakers were made in the past, just like today, but a lot of the more "serious" older speakers are actually more neutral than modern "audiophile" brands. These speakers stem from a time when expensive speakers were designed to be as neutral as possible, this practice has largely been replaced with designing speakers to sound "musical", which usually means adding a hefty dose of coloration. (A nice midrange "hump" to make those female voices that audiophiles love so much jump out, or some treble boost to "improve" detail.
I have a lot of experience with the older Kef and B&W speakers and a lot of the better "vintage" models are hard to beat in terms of distortion and neutrality, even at 10 - 20 times their current price point.
(They do sometime need a little attention: replace ageing crossover parts etc)

 

of course. thats why i have vintage speakers, because i enjoy listening to all the distortion and coloration they produce. its not like i can get that with every speaker on the market today.

 

I recently went from 1980s vintage ProAc Super Tablette (bookshelf/monitors) speakers to their latest Tablette (Anniversary). So this is a case where I can compare the same model / philosophical design of a speaker but over a 30ish year period (they have several intermediate models I have never heard).

While the new speakers use more expensive components (taking into consideration inflation), it's not by a huge amount. The new speakers reveal more detail, produce an even better soundstage, have more bass extension and a less colored, more articulate midrange/treble than the earlier model, in my subjective opinion (the bass extension is not subjective, it can easily be measured).

Speakers are one area where I personally would never go vintage. I think you can make a pretty strong argument that the new materials that have come along with time and technology have led to undeniably better electroacoustic transducers. I am sure good speakers from the 50s and 60s still sound very nice but I'll always go new or new used with speakers.

 

But is this because speakers in general got that much better? Or a relatively small , single designer brand has improved itself? Chances are Stewart
Tyler just has a lot of experience building/designing the tablette series now, that he didn't have 30 years ago. Another problem with Proac in this context is, that Stewart Tyler has always stated he designs speakers for musicallity, not for neutrality, so chances are his personal taste and or hearing (no offence intended) has simply changed over the past 30 years, resulting in a different sounding speaker.

I have completely opposite experience with brands like Kef, Thiel and B&W, and prefer the Kef 105.3 over the 205.2 , or the Matrix 802s2 over the Nautilus 802D for example. A lot of the so called "improvements" in speaker design seem to have to do with using exotic/bizarre materials to construct drivers , crossover components or cabling, often with very little to no evidence of actual functionality.

 

As much as I liked the Harbeth Compact 7ES3, and they typically get rave reviews in the press, I tend to agree with you.

Would be happy to own them but the price to performance ratio is a major stumbling block.

Though not cheap the other brands I mentioned are a better value IMO.

 

I'm still using the Paradigm Compact Monitors I bought new in 1990 or thereabouts. And I'm still happy with them. As long as they're still working I won't change unless I find myself needing significantly more output, and even then I'd probably just add a sub.

So while I don't think about it much I guess I'm a vintage speaker guy. And I do find most newer speakers obnoxiously bright.

Do I think vintage is better? Not per se.

At some point technology matures. A 20 or 30 year old stereo amp (or 50 or 60 year old tube guitar amp) that was good then is still good.

I think the big maturation point for hifi speakers was the late 70s - early 80s, when both the Thiele-Small filter parameters and affordable computers/spreadsheets became available. Most of the stuff before then was lacking in my opinion.

Notable exceptions I've seen are the original Large Advents, especially the active ones, and the Dynaco A25's.

 

...

 

Much of what you say may be right, but I think things like more detail and a better soundstage are *always* improvements, and that had he been able to achieve what he has with the new version he would have done so in the 80s. But, who knows. It's subjective territory for sure.

 

Depends

Many speaker designers rely on computer modeling to design speakers. They find a driver they like and the computer tells them what size box to use, what crossover to use, etc. I don't think most designers understand the physics of speaker design. Some of the older models still sound fine. Some new models (even very pricey ones) still get it very wrong.

 

I wonder how you can make that statement.

 

Yep.

 

Why is that, please.

 

That's very hard for me to describe in detail, the short version would be:
The older models just sound better, and don't have that weird honky midrange bloom that comes with a lot of the later Kef models or the treble spike of the later B&W 800 series. (deviations like this seem to be all the rage for the last 10 - 15 years). A very tell tale sign is the difference between 2 speaker brands: You could put the Kef 105.3 and the B&W 802s2 side by side in a room that suited them both and they'd sound so alike it was creepy, try the same with their curent counterparts and they sound so different that at least one of them can't be neutral.
The older versions are also built a lot more sensible: You don't need 1500$ diamond tweeters, 0.5 inch thick solid silver cabling or cost-no-object cabinets finished in god knows how many layers of special laquer for near perfect performance.
Anyone with a pair of 802s2 , 105.3 or Thiel 3.6 knows this.
For me late 80's and early/mid 90's produced the best speakers: Near perfect performance, with an attractive yet affordable finish that does not scream "look at how insanely expensive I am" at everyone visiting your house, and without most of the nonsense of later models.

 

Find me a modern speaker with less colouration and distortion than say an original Quad ESL or ESL63! Next find me one for the same price.

I use a 40+ year old pair of 15" Tannoy Monitor Golds myself. i'd not argue they are as colouration / distortion free as say the Quads, but nothing is, and even so they make most modern speakers sound strained, screechy and hyped by comparison. There is just something very right about them, and, like the Quads, they can still be had for less cash than a bandwidth-limited and dynamically compromised modern high-end mini-monitor. They won't depreciate in value either.

 

The original Quad esl is not really a good example IMHO: The lack of top AND bottom end certainly qualify as coloration.

 

Lets see the frequency response curves too see how neutral these older speakers are. Actually, since the advent of computer design, I would disagree with your statement. Most manufactureres of decent speakers aim for as flat a frequnecy ressponse as possible. Many audiophile here have admitted to not liking a neutral speaker because they didn't like what they heard. Some of them preferred that the treble be rolled off which certainly isn't neutral.

 

Modern 6" drivers are cleaner and more detailed than ever before
They can handle prodigious power and voice coils stay in the magnetic motor
Active driving defeats xover fog
Tweeters are better too
Subs are catching up
Check out the Illuminator range.

http://www.madisoundspeakerstore.com/catalog/images/userimages/18WU_full size rear.jpg
Modern drivers are far better.