I am wondering how many listen to old speakers. I am not looking so much as to how long you owned them but how old are they. Are they your primary speakers? I am listening to a pair of 2003 Verity Parsifal Encores and continue to be pretty pleased with them.
My Infinity RS 1.5s were built around 1980. My backup speakers - Infinity Qb's were built around 1978. I've had lots of newer speakers, but I like the vintage Infinity sound, so I picked these up over the last few years.
I have a vintage system; stereo I sold as a teenager. You know, Marantz 2230, empire turntable with Stanton cartridge, and JBL L100s and ESS AMT 1As. Lamp cord for speaker wires. The speakers have to be circa 1972.
Sorry about the errors in my post above. I hit the Post very quickly before reviewing it. Heck I am seventy nine years old , please give me a pass on this. Sorry. Happy listening everyone.
I have two pairs of AR 3s that I bought at a swap meet about 10 years ago. The outside of the speakers was still in good shape but the crossovers and a coupl3 of bass drivers needed help. I became friends with a fellow that works with Vintage AR and he helped me bring them up to now they sound wonderful. accirding to the serial numbers, they were made in the middle fifties. In the past I have owned B&W 801s and Duntech Princess speakers. I am a retired musician and have played in several Symphony Orchestras and I think that the ARs sound the way music should sound. Carter
Vandersteen 2Cs. I am the second owner. They are in 8/10 condition. They sound wonderful. Based on the serial numbers, Richard Vandersteen guessed they were built around 1979.
My ads L400's are almost 40 years old. I also have a pair of diy Rega Kytes which are 80's vintage as well. Hmmm, so is my Tandberg 3012, Creek CAS3140, Kyocera 811 cassette deck but my Thorens TD125 mkII is from the 70's
I have a pair of altec 604 E. that are from the early 1960s. I have a pair of Fostex T 900 super tweeters to add to the top and a pair of 12 inch subs augmenting the bottom. This is my primary system and the only system. I used to have a pair of Tannoy Yorkminster's that were from around 2007 then moved to Tannoy golds and then moved to these Altecs. They are in custom boxes that are 3 inches thick all the way around and coated with anti-vibration coating. The empty box of one side is over 200 pounds.
Jond - "Guesstimating here but I traded a pair of Alon Lotus's for my current JMlabs Micro-Utopias back in 2006. The speakers were definitely used at that point, if I had to guess 3-5 years old so built somewhere between 2001-2003. I love them and they suit my room and system perfectly they're not going anywhere!"
I'm amazed and impressed to see many people here hanging on to speakers for so long. I've had some speakers for a long time, but my "main" speakers have been a parade of different models over the last couple decades.
My Thiel 3.7s and 2.7s are 5 to 9 years old. But I've had them for a couple years.
Other than that:
- MBL 121 speakers are about 10 years old
- Waveform Mach MC monitors are circa 2000, but I've had them for about 10 years.
- Spendor LS 3/5s - I've had them since 2001.
- Thiel 02 speakers - manufactured late 70's or early 80's. They were bought for my wife by my father in law in the 80's and I inherited them from her. Those old Thiels helped get me back into high end audio and they still sound so great I will never part with them.
bunch of 80s ADS stuff, some more modern Klipsch, Boston, weird old 'one offs' from various makers, mostly 70s and 80s. Had the ADS 1590/2 (2x sets) redone by Richard, and enjoy them very much now. Prices aside (got most of this stuff near free or free except the rework done by various people) this stuff still kicks arse.
Bought my Musical Fidelity MC-4s in 1987, so they're 28 years old. These are Martin Colloms designed two-ways with a see-through TPX 8" bass/mid and Elac metal dome tweeter. I enjoy rotating them through my secondary system where I additionally have Spendor SP-1s (also mid-'80s), Revel Performa M20s and Usher BE-718s. Shockingly, of the listed speakers the MC-4s "disappear" best.
Very cool thread. Great to know many of you have held on to your speakers for a long time. I had my Wilson Sophias for about 11 years until just a few months ago, when I replaced them with Sashas. The Sophias were great, but the Sashas are better. I would like to keep these for the duration.
Newest 1 year old, oldest 55 years old, many in between. My favorites are the oldest, and in reality there has been little progress in state of the art speaker design, but great progress in the science of marketing and getting huge sums of money out of peoples' pockets.
I had been using a pair of the Waveform Mach MC/MC.1 (about 20-25 years old) as my only speakers for a number of years.
I replaced them about two years ago with new old stock, same make and model. If I had to guess, I would say that the old Waveforms had about 85 to 90 per cent of the sound of the new Waveforms. They use Vifa drivers.
I owned Snell Type A ... Several incarnations as well. One of the best speakers ever made, and helped convince me that materials and technology in and of itself is irrelevant. It is about the designers execution and voicing, and personal preferences. I now have quad esl63 speakers, which are amazing.
. My Infinity IRS Betas are 25 years old. They are excellent speakers, but they are showing their age. I am looking to sell them once I get enough money to put together a speaker system that can duplicate what they can do. I'd keep them if I could find someone to totally go through them and make them new again. Parts are impossible to find for them. .
My Spendor SP-100 speakers are 14 years old but they are my "new" speakers. The drivers and horns in my high-efficiency speakers date back to the 1960s and 1970s.
Infinity Rennaisaince 90 from the early 90's. I bought a spare pair just in case. I also bought a spare pair of the EMIT tweeters just in case. I have never had to use any of the spare parts. These speakers are really special to me. The sound is really clear, the bass is deep and the footprint is small. -John
The bulk of the speaker system is 12 years old (cabinet, woofers, tweeter, crossover. I switched out the horn midrange for a much better model which is, approximately, 76 years old.
Klipsch KG4's bought new in 85. You will have to pry them out my cold dead hands; they have been rarely hammered plenty party's - many cops, and have performed faultlessly all these years.
Both 50 years old.... Tannoy GRF Professional ( also called Tudor Autgraph ) c.1965 Tannoy Belvedere Senior c. 1964 As a previous high end importer including Apogee's and Martin Logan's these are it for me. Quick, transparent and wonderful on full scale orchestral music and jazz with a coherency that is seldom matched. Crossovers are updated - revised topology, teflon boards, duellunds etc.
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