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Who actually heard the Infinity IRS?

I've been looking at the very high value Arion speaker and it's called to mind a vintage speaker, the Infinity IRS.  They are not the same speakers, but honestly I never actually got to even see an Infinity IRS in real life, let alone hear one.

I'm wondering if anyone has or even owns a quad (pair would be wrong) of them could talk about the sound quality and compare to anything today.

erik_squires

Showing 4 responses by cleeds

cleeds
6,086 posts
 
bdp24’s avatar
bdp24

 

... The Servo-Static 1 and 2 does not contain ribbons, but rather are electrostatics with a dynamic woofer ...

I stand corrected, thanks @bdp24. It must have been the QRS that used the Strathearn ribbon drivers.

cleeds
6,086 posts
 
russ69

 

They are aluminum mounted on a substrate. Not true ribbons but I believe Infinity called them ribbons,

Infinity was careful to not call them ribbons, because they'd used ribbons in some of their earlier speaker models (such as the Servo-Static) and those drivers were problematic.

cleeds
6,086 posts
 
doyle3433

... we had a customer who owned them. I recall he blew out the mid size ribbon drivers frequently.

There are no ribbon drivers in the IRS system. They're planars.

cleeds
6,086 posts
 

I've heard the Infinity IRS system in two different setups, but I can't recall what series either one was.

The first was a demo by Mike Kay at Lyric in Manhattan, probably around 1980. He was using all ARC electronics and the big Goldmund Studio turntable as a source. It sounded fantastic. That experience got me hooked on Infinitys, and it didn't end  until I bought the IRS Beta system that I'm still using after all these years.

I've also heard the big IRS system in a private home. He used a mix of ARC and Levinson gear, with a SOTA Sapphire turntable and SME V. He also had a big Ampex ATR 2-track with special electronics that I can't recall. That was back in the '90s.

 

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