Electrostatic versus conventional speakers

If you ever get to Las Vegas Nevada look me up.
Vegasears

I believe the OP is one of your neighbors.

This Wikipedia article has a pretty good summary of advantages and disadvantages:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electrostatic_loudspeaker

Among the many advantages discussed in the article, I would particularly emphasize clean transient response, i.e., the ability to stop moving instantly when the music demands it. The article addresses this with the sentence "Musical transparency can be better than in electrodynamic speakers because the radiating surface has much less mass than most other drivers and is therefore far less capable of storing energy to be released later."

I would add to its list of disadvantages the criticality of choosing the right amplifier. As was mentioned above, an electrostatic is, from the amplifier's perspective, essentially a giant capacitor. Therefore its impedance at high frequencies will dip down to very low values, perhaps 1 ohm or so at 20kHz (and a highly capacitive 1 ohm, not a resistive 1 ohm which would be easier to handle). The amplifier has to be able to drive that comfortably, but at the same time it has to avoid tipping up the frequency response at high frequencies, which would occur if the amplifier's output impedance is substantially less than the speaker's design is predicated on.

In other words, the lower the amplifier's output impedance (which equals damping factor divided into 8 ohms, and which is negligibly small for most solid state amplifiers), the greater the increase in current that will result from the speaker's diminishing impedance at high frequencies. If the output impedance of the amp is not a reasonable match to what the speaker designer intended, excessive brightness in the upper treble can result from that increase in current. In many cases, a tube amp will be the best choice.

Regards,
-- Al

The reason that I asked this question was that the new Magneplanar 1.7 was getting very good reviews and at $2,000 are affordable.

To answer a couple of questions that were asked. I live in Henderson Nevada. My listening room is 18X16. My amp is a 300 watt Bryston. My current speakers are B&W 804 Nautilus which are about 8 years old.

I appreciate the replys to my question. I'll probably have to listen to some electrostatic speakers the next time I am in the Los Angeles area. To my knolwedge there are no dealers in my area.

The reason that I asked this question was that the new Magneplanar 1.7 was getting very good reviews and at $2,000 are affordable.

Be aware that the Maggie's are not electrostatics. They have a lot of characteristics in common with electrostatics, due basically to the fact that both are planar. However, among many other differences the impedance and amplifier compatibility issues that I mentioned above are very different for Maggies. See the Technology page and the FAQ page at the Magnepan site.

Regards,
-- Al

Hobbyist_and_reader,

The 1,7 will not be a problem to drive with the bryston and is a real bargain at that price. That said a better amp would work and the sound is a lot different from the B&W , much more transparent natural sounding, with a bit less imaging capability.

They will have to sit 4-5 feet( min) into your room, so make sure your room make up, decor and WAF will accommodate this setup.