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I sure miss my Quad ‘57s!

I owned Quad ‘57s and joyfully listened to them for 10 years! Still questioning my decision to pass them on to another music lover. But I do sadly remember the multiple times I blew up amps because of them and the sickening feelings of the many times I arched them before I had them rebuilt.
I did eventually opt for more bass and treble but have missed their incredible mids now for decades.
Guess there are some new rebuilders who have been able to get more bass and treble? But I now have evolved the feeling that good enough is good enough. And man, were they good enough!
mglik

Showing 3 responses by georgehifi

georgehifi's avatar
georgehifi
10,312 posts
 

I find tube amps that only have 8ohm taps usually sound a bit soft and rolled off in the highs with the 57's, as they are a 2.5ohm load already at 10khz and falling to 1ohm at 20khz.
This is why I prefer a good stable 30-40w Class-A solid state that can do the doubling, I built quite a few of these for 57 owners based on the Nelson Pass A40 and they loved them.
http://www.firstwatt.com/pdf/art_a40.pdf

This is why they say they best amp ever for the 57's, was the Mark Levinson ML2 25w Class-A monoblocks, that could double down to 1ohm.
 https://img.ukaudiomart.com/uploads/large/2229206-mark-levinson-ml2.jpg

Cheers George    
georgehifi's avatar
georgehifi
10,312 posts
 
Roger's (rip) RM-200 was the best, as it has 1 or 2ohm output taped transformers, with the 2ohm tap it drove the ESL63’s to perfection, but it’s 100w gets knocked way down from the 8ohm tap figure, but still enough to get decent level out of the ESL 57’s

Cheers George
georgehifi's avatar
georgehifi
10,312 posts
 
Hard to live without ESL's when you've owned them. And yes very unfriendly to amps that had a go at driving them properly. Naim amps would blow as soon as they saw them, they just had to be in the same room, not even wired up!!!😉

Cheers George  
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