Quad ESL 63 In Another League Now


I’ve owned many speakers over 30 years. I now have owned a total rebuilt ESL 63’s with the work done by Electrostatic Solutions. Kent did a wonderful job and the speakers sounded better than stock that I can say for sure. During the last few months for the fun of it I added better power cords, though Kent said they cannot make a difference well I can tell you they do and they do in a big way, so if you own any Electrostatic speakers you owe it to yourself to put better power cords on them even the Signal Cable power cords were a big step up from the stock power cord.

So things were just great then I read in my Furman reference 20i manual that the high current outlets are great for active speakers, though I read it, I never tried it because they sounded so good. Well blow me away, I tried it, and wow, more natural, clearer, bottom end more dynamic, and so forth, but the lowering of the noise floor, brought forth detail, more natural body, warmth, and a pitch black background, i.e. a grayness or veil in comparison gone, and I mean gone.

I never knew just how good these speakers were until I did the power cords, but in addition what the Furman does, with lower impedance, reservoir or current on demand, and of course the isolation between any interaction of the components. I also added some nice ebony cones with a copper tip (cheap) on Amazon, for a nice tilt back of about one inch which opened up the speakers and really made imaging better.

In this hobby, we are always learning something, and the big lesson I keep learning is always try something, even when some may say it will not make a difference, such as power cords cannot impact the Quads, well they do so try it. The bottom end now really go low and tight, I added 2 small Mini Vee subs crossed over at 40Hz for that last bit of bottom end in the 20’s range.

The rest of my system is McIntosh 402 amp at 400 watts, Luxman C800F preamp, and the Esoteric K-01 SACD/CD player with streaming capabilities. All cables are Lessloss Marc-C( the best I’ve ever heard) regardless of cost and that includes the ones with the big network boxes. Power cords the Luxman (for the preamp) beats anything I’ve tried and that is the stock cord, Crystal Clear Opus for the Esoteric, Essential Sound MusicSound Pro for the McIntosh Amp. I use a pair of the Emotivia Power cords for the quads due to their length, they work just fine, the AntiCables reference 3 power cords work well also with a bit more mid-bass and warmth but were a bit too short.

No matter how long you’re in this hobby you can always learn, and improve the system without buying new gear, in fact, I would say the power cords can change the sound of your system as much as a new piece of gear and even the wall plates impact the sound, not just the ac outlet. That also was a surprise to me. Go figure!




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Showing 7 responses by georgehifi

No kalali!!! you need to use geoffs lube on his website, as his can take all sizes using it.


Nothing there, that interests me.
This one needs saving though as Quad ESL57’s are an icon of speakers and any BS being spread around them needs to be squashed, especially from the "directional" power cord B.S.’ers

As Electrostatic Solution’s Kent McCollum said, "they cannot make a difference", he knows it’s impossible with just 5w of current draw for both speakers. It should make the B.S.’ers realize why it’s impossible, that’s why many Acoustat ESL models used wall warts, that had the thinnest twin flex power cable going to the speakers.

Cheers George

Ignore that celander, not one mention that the ac mains running through it changes it’s direction 60 x a second (60hz)
And for you to hear "if" the cable was directional, you would have to reverse the cable 60 x a second in snyc with the 60hz mains frequency!!! Only then would you know if it’s directional.
In other words "snake oil BS" just like direction mains fuses or directional primary and secondary wires in in the ac mains transformers of all equipment.
And what about your house wiring what are you going to do about that, not to mention that it continues all the way back to the sub station as well.

Total snake oil BS that will ruin another perfectly good thread if given the chance!!!!!!

Cheers George
Georgehifi, I am surprised at you.
I’m not and it’s a big negative. "Maybe" ones that have active bass with amplifiers involved.


directional power cords
really!! "there it is"
When ac mains is just that "Alternating Current" that changes it's direction, as bad a saying ac mains fuses are directional, total snake oil.  

Cheers George
During the last few months for the fun of it I added better power cords, though Kent said they cannot make a difference well I can tell you they do and they do in a big way, so if you own any Electrostatic speakers you owe it to yourself to put better power cords on them even the Signal Cable power cords were a big step up from the stock power cord.
Sorry to say this is a "furphy", Kent is absolutely correct.
The current draw on full range ESL’s is so low they can use the thinnest cheapest power cords, it’s so low that many earlier ones are/were powered by wall warts.

Cheers George