Thiel CS3 Without The EQ

With the EQ they are capable of outstanding bass, without not so much. Considering their age the 3's show up fairly often, especially on e-bay for very reasonable prices. Without the EQ I'd pass.

I would as well, given Unsound's point about these showing up every now fairly often. I owned the CS3s for a while, and without the EQ they sounded about the same as the CS2s that I passed over to get the 3's. The EQ was always criticized in the rags, but I felt that the extra bass extension was worth the slight degradation of the sound caused by the EQ's circuitry, and there were aftermarket modifiers who could improve on it if you really wanted to.

Thanks guys.
Do you ever see just the eq for sale and if so what should I pay for it.
Thanks again.

I haven't seen any for years, not since the days of the Audiomart magazine, when they would occasionally show up. In stock form they should command very little, I'd think (a JPS Labs "Golden Flute" modded box might be a little more). I think Unsound's suggestion of checking ebay for the speaker with equalizer is a good one.

The EQ's show up on e-bay every once in a while, figure roughly about $100-125. Even then I'd suggest you have it shipped to Thiel for an overhaul. If you were to go that route, I wouldn't let the worry of a few dollars of overpayment get in your way. These are old units and it might take several months for another to appear. Odd thing is they seem to show up in bunches, but, I wouldn't count on that. Furthermore, if there's a choice, consider spending more on the cleaner lookin one. FWIW, when Thiel still had new replacement EQ's for the 3.5's, they were asking $600 each for them.