I've got two "main" systems. One has ATC active 110s and the other Thiel 3.7s. I love both systems. The ATCs are capable of dynamic linearity. They don't stop getting louder when they need to. Super clean midrange, accurate bass. If you want to attend an AC/DC concert at home this is the way to go. They're fantastic for movies, better than the theater. If I'm listening to small scale classical, jazz, classic rock I prefer the Thiels. They are very tactile at low/moderate volumes. Fantastic imaging. I don't think it's possible for a single system to be fantastic at all volumes. How likely is it that a midrange driver that is optimized to be the most accurate and detailed at 90db will also be optimized to handle peaks of 110db? You've gotta pick one I think.
Active ATC vs Spendor / Pass Labs
I had a lovely demo. of a Pass INT 60/ Spendor D9.2.
Had all the musical flow, engagement at all volume levels that I could ever want. A truly impressive demo.
But……. I have always wanted an active ATC SCM50A is what I always dreamed of owning with say a Benchmark LA4 Pre. about the same $$$ where I am for either combo.
I have heard the ATC - different room and gear. But I didn’t do the all listening levels demo. like I did with the Pass / Spendor. Just at a medium / loud level and was so very impressed. I can’t demo the ATC again, my dealer only orders them as someone wants one from ATC direct due to the current economical environment.
So… will I be unimpressed ordering the ATC at all level listening levels or will it not have the Pass / Spendor engagement factor that we quite frankly very addictive ?
I am really at a crossroad as which way to go.
As mentioned above, this is almost laughable given the common near-field listening distances employed in ATC studio installations. The comment about the midrange driver is utter misinformation. How do people come up with this stuff? In my 20ft long room I listen to my SCM100 actives at a 9ft distance - super coherent and engaging sound. |
As a dissatisfied owner of Spendor D9.2's I'd highly recommend you not get a bright or lean sounding amp to drive them. I find the Spendor's over time are too analytical and tipped up in the hi frequency's, they also do not have much midrange tone and the bass is not as deep as the specs indicate, specially at lower volumes. If you're set on the D9.2's make sure you pair them with a smooth amp, the Pass maybe the right direction for them. I run a Mac C2700 and MC 275mk6 ( all tubes) and its rather too bright and lacks tone and bass depth, in my room. reason I'm selling my D9.2's. They definitely like a well treated room to sound their best IMO. I demo'd mine in the dealers well treated room and bought them, in my room they are disappointing overly bright and lack tone and bass depth. D9.2's in walnut little over a year old if your interested. |
Ive heard many different preamps with ATC and like I said earlier, it seems their differences are magnified on an active system/low distortion driver arrangement. I've tried EveAnna Manley's stuff and thought -hmm too dark me?- but shortly later met an ATC user who used exactly that and found it to be his favorite combo. Brad |
I'm actually happy when listeners find their balance. I tired some very good tube preamplifiers with first the ATC SCM 40As and now my ATC SCM 50As. My personal experience was that the preamps were too slow for the active setup. When I converted to different solid state pre-amplification, Sugden, ATC and now Luxman, the pace seemed to pick up substantially affecting the attack speed. I do not experience aggressive or thin sound. Your mileage may vary. |
Greetings, Yes the ARC pre amps are superb as a way more affordable pairing. we are running Swiss Made Merason Frerot Dac a Rotel S14 as the Pre amp to the ATC SCM 40 As from a musical standpoint I would not want to change a thing Jethro Tull Aqualung sounds incredibly satisfying Try Steve Wilsons Album To the Bone when these speakers have been properly placed the power response timber and clarity are addictive and great at all volumes. JohnnyR ATC dealer NJ
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my two sets of active atc’s are somewhat older models but i doubt the company has significantly altered the tonality of their speakers when i was using those speakers, my trying any top solid state pre made the atc’s too biting in the treble and thinned out the midrange a touch too much to my ears -- so i found happiness in time with the lovely audio research reference 3 balanced tube linestage... it was one of the very best at the time, now surpassed by successor models in the arc reference line as such, i personally would advise against using benchmark or chord tt2 (which i have currently) to drive active atc’s, as i think this would most likely result in ’negative synergy’ in all but the most dead listening rooms |
You will only know in your room. I would first purchase an active ATC speaker. Run it in for several hundred hours. Then audition what would proceed them. Your best best for synergy would be the ATC CDA2mkII (includes DAC and CD transport) or ATC CA2mkII (preamp only). Several folks I know use the Weiss DAC501 much like you would use the Hugo TT2 and are very happy. I have no experience with the Benchmark LA4. I'm currently using Audio Note DAC 4.1x DAC and L5 Mentor preamp with a highly optimized streaming system. |
@celtic66 Well Im so sorry to jump to the wrong conclusion. Im glad you like them! brad |
@lonemountain Isn't language interesting? What I obviously failed to convey is that others who have listened to my ATC SCM 50 actives have found them scary GOOD! The immediacy, sound stage, dynamics and slam are astonishing. I see them as my end game transducer. Period. |
I am the US importer of ATC, so know first that I am terribly biased. I won’t disagree with much said in this thread because opinions seem to ring true except @celtic66 - which makes me think he heard them in a terrible room. (They don’t sound like that to anyone I’ve ever demo’d to and I’ve demo’d to a huge cross section of people, skilled and unskilled, at listening). I do think they are clean, which is what low distortion sounds like, but the closer I get to people who actually write, mix or master recordings or are gear reviewers, typically the more they like the ATC sound (which is actually lack of sound of its own). Look up a review done by Neil Gader - passive vs active 50s- its interesting. BUT the thing I can add to the comments above is 50As can do one thing differently than most speakers: reveal more details about what is front of them. I have never heard more difference in cables, DACs, footers, preamps, streamers, turntables etc as I have with ATC 50A-150A. Tube vs solid state preamps are MASSIVELY different. I think active 50s improve the hobby, make a better platform for experimenting as these little changes become even bigger and easier to identify. I don’t miss changing amps when changing anything else before the ATC 50A is such a significant change. I think 50 Actives are a blast to own over time for this very reason! Brad |
Same. My ATC SCM50ASLTs are 9' away and completely coherent. @celtic66 is correct. The very low levels of distortion of these active speakers can at first be confusing to the uninitiated. |
@avanti1960 wrote:
Above highlighted statement makes no sense to me. The 3-way active ATC's I've heard, with their famed ATC SM75-150S midrange dome, have been anything but incoherent sounding - even at closer distances <9ft. And the midrange driver doesn't cover a "limited bandwidth" but rather ~380-3.5kHz, and thus a substantial portion of the lower mids up through the upper mids. Most coned midrange drivers in 3-way setups can't cover this range, mostly because of beaming issues or irregularities in the upper registers. A lower crossover point (i.e.: <380Hz) would sit in the important "power region" - choices, and (different) compromises. A proposed +20ft. listening distance for them to cohere properly seems preposterous. That would make them a stretch for use in many if not most home environments, not to mention being highly impractical for their intended use in close monitoring recording studios. Maybe it's the highly revealing midrange of theirs that isn't your cup of tea? But incoherent sounding? I'd never call them that. |
By all means, do whatever feels right to you. None of us will be listening to your selections, nor should we be emotionally invested in those choices. Positively speaking, I’ve ATC SCM 50 actives and to my ears they do everything quite well and scare others who have engaged them. Same with the ATC SCM 20 passives I run. You’ve choices to make, not mistakes with the pieces presented. |
If you get the ATCs make sure you have more than enough distance to allow the drivers to blend. when I heard them the dome midranges were noticeably incoherent with the other drivers (they have a very limited bandwidth compared to a conventional midrange). This resulted in frequent image shifting in vocals- very unpleasant. I was listening from about 15 feet away, i would recommend at least 20 feet. the Spendors on the other hand are incredibly coherent from 9 feet and beyond.
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my understanding is that in the original d series (7 and 9 models) in time, even the designers came to feel that they overshot on the treble energy, so they dialed it back a bit on the .2 series that said, when i heard the 9.2’s at a friend’s home, i still felt they are pretty hot up top... very reminiscent of upper focals... tuned for effortless treble detail, so you better have some pretty smooth gear, play top notch recordings, or they will bite... |
@rfc, I've run either a Pass X250.8 or XA30.8 with D9s for ~ 5 years. I think it is great match and sold Magico S1s for the D9s. As already mentioned they are not overly forgiving so I found both Pass models worked great with them with the X model giving a little more detail (and dynamics) and the XA is little more relaxed in the high frequencies with more texture/soundstage depth in the midrange. Even with the Pass gear I found highly detailed DACs like the Topping too forward and settled with R2R NOS DACs or now the very smooth Meitner MA3. I have no idea how the 9.2 compares but presumably is better; I've never heard the SCM50s but they are on a list of speakers I would like to hear whenever my upgrade time comes... |
jeffseight446 posts Try a different speaker with the Pass INT.
What speakers did you have in mind ?
80% of my music bus pop, rock, punk, metal and a bit of Americana/Country |
This is past history so take that into account. I was friends with Gordon Holt from the mid 70s until his death. Gordon was concerned with accuracy, the knid that sounded like the real thing on good recordings. Gordon did a lot of recording including many recordings of the Boulder symphony orchestra. He knew sound and he knew the original sound of his recordings. The last speakers Gordon bought with his own money were ATC 50A active speakers. He considered them among a handful, at most, of speakers that gave back what was on a recording. And this is not second hand. I was involved a bit in discussions with him when he was deciding to buy the ATCs. I'll add I recall speaking to him about a review he did on an 5 speaker plus sub ATC system that he gave a rave review a few years earlier. I asked him if it was really that good. He told me yes. I asked him what he was going to do when ATC asked for the system back. He jokingly said he would kill himself. I was at Vegas CES the next year and in the ATC room speaking to the founder of ATC and told him that story. And he told me the system I was listening to was the one taken back from Gordon. I have no doubt the Pass/Spendor system will be wonderful and you won't be sorry if you end up with it but the ATC system will be more accurate and what really matters to me personally will be more dynamic. I don't just mean it will play louder cleanly, which it will, but it's changes in level from mini to midi to maxi will be more accurate and will make good recordings sound more like live acoustic sound than the Spendor/Pass system. |
You shouldn't notice the large ATCs changing sound character between low, mid, and high loudness levels. They are designed and made to behave that way. Before buying, I'd recommend demoing much more of both of them, listening to music you usually listen to. ATCs are exceedingly low-distorting, linear in frequency, and resilient to power compression. Some people, like me, prefer that. Some don't - ATCs sound too boring and analytical to them. Spendors are more exciting: as I understand, through less linearity in lower and higher frequencies, which are somewhat boosted, and subtle inside-the-cabinet-reverb. Both are somewhat less than ideal regarding horizontal and vertical dispersion characteristics - they may sound quite different depending on your room. ATCs, especially, love well-damped rooms. Long demoing in your room would be ideal. If you could arrange that, perhaps by offering the dealers some "rental fee", that would help you make a much more informed choice. |
@rfc -- Irrespective of the difference in volume levels (and room/gear) between the two setups, i.e.: the Spendor vs. ATC system, what was your main takeaway in terms of the core traits you heard from them? While not an optimal context of comparison it’d still give you an overall bearing on the fundamental sonic differences. The ATC speakers I’ve heard, all of them active iterations (that is, incl. one pair of passively driven ATC SCM100’s, fed by a Crown Studio Ref. II), to my ears are particularly well sounding at "normal" listening levels - say, 75-85dB’s and above. Maybe that’s indicative of both the way they’re balanced and how relatively unflappable they are at higher SPL’s due to their great, low distortion drivers and active config. Which is also saying that to some degree at least their pedigree at "normal" to higher levels isn’t due to them being lesser performers per se at lower levels, but because they’re somewhat more effortless at higher listening levels than most hifi speakers. For sure the brilliant 3" midrange dome of the active ATC SCM50’s will wring out more information, clarity, intricacies, composure and dynamics than the Spendor’s, by a mile - while being an extremely coherent sounding speaker package top to bottom - but that’s not necessarily to say you will like them more overall. The advice given by Erik on a separate preamp vs. DAC-direct isn’t irrelevant. Personally I have a dedicated studio segment DAC/preamp (with a great analogue output stage, PSU and volume control) coupled directly to my power amps, i.e.: via a digital crossover, and the range of separate preamps I've tried haven't yielded a more "meat on the bones" imprinting nor other that would make them the more desirable option. It certainly depends. |
with the atc’s i have found this very much to be the case i still have my beloved atc scm10 and 20 actives, and i have kept an audio research ref 3 linestage, to drive them -- solid state linestages were just too unforgiving of all but the highest quality recordings rendering 60-70% of the music out there unlistenable... the tube magic of the ref 3 were the goldilocks mating |
I like active speakers as well as passives. I think if I were to go with active I'd want a really smooth or colorful preamp to go with it. I've done direct from DAC to amps before and it left me feeling like it was all too analytical. But then, I love Conrad Johnson PV preamps too, so my tastes may not be yours. |
This is a tough one and Good Luck to you in advance. I have not heard the Spendor 9.2. I have listen to (in detail) to a setup comprising of Spendor 7 with some expensive MBL gear. I really liked this demo and this speaker was one of my top 3-4 choices. I then got a chance to listen to the ATC actives at AXPONA playing Daft Punk (Lose Yourself To Music). This combination was very musical and groovy. Unfortunately it was was out of my budget and I decided to not think about it. I will be honest and say - I did NOT get a chance to listen to those speakers at moderate volume. It was the fag end of the show and the music was loud - but super engaging. If this speaker falls within your budget, try finding ATC owners on this and other forums and pose this question to them. BTW, the ATC and Spendors fall in completely different budgets. |
i know all three brands of gear you mentioned quite well, i still own spendors, several pass amps, as well as two pair of atc powered monitors -- that said, i have not heard the exact models you mention, much less head on, in my own space (i have heard them in demos at shows and dealers) my educated guess, but still a guess, is that the spendor combo will produce a more textured lower treble and midrange and driven by the pass amp, while the atc's will deliver a touch deeper (but equally rhythmic) bass i would also guess that the atc’s will play louder will less strain (a tremendous strength of the better atc models), but there will be less midrange 'magic' that is spendor's main strength to be sure, both setups will be rather unforgiving of less than excellent recordings, as either can easily sound shrill and overly forward if fed less than an ideal signal from the source/upstream i suspect if you like the sound of the spendor d9.2/pass combo, you would also be very pleased with the powered atc’s in an overall sense of sonic quality but the atc's may have a bit of cooler more exacting personality in the midband |
