[imcarthur]

True Vintage Audiophile Speakers?

What vintage?

60s – 70s with wooly bass, crunched midrange & shrill but rolled off high frequencies?

Exceptions: Quad ESL, Harbeth HL2, Rogers LS3-5A (absolutely no bass though), KEF 104AB, Dalquist DQ10, EPI 100s (although the HF rolled at 14K but they weren’t alone in that)

80s – The true audiophile decade. A lot of great designs – especially the electrostats. Buy Englsih boxes for midrange & nice warm bass & buy American for boom & tiz rock n roll style. For me, the QUAD ESL-63 won the decade. But they will die so used is not a good thing . . . but there is a guy in VA that can rebuild them.

90s + - The digital age changed loudspeaker design. All of a sudden speakers became dynamic. Real slap you in the face stuff. All of the Brit companies stumbled in the late 80s & others filled the gap. Wilson for sheer dynamics & smack you in the chest bass but they also sear your ears somewhat. JMlab for the best midrange in a box. Martin-Logan or Magneplanar for the size. And on & on.
Of course, many of the above will still command big $s.

But then, I am biased.

Rusnak

QSC – like everybody else in the consumer & Pro industry, sells to audio businesses that retail their whole product line in a traditional fashion or online. Maybe your business model doesn’t fit into this slot so they are leery. I have personally heard a lot of strange marketing ideas in my day. And when it comes to volume, I can pretty much guarantee that what they ship Sweetwater, Sam Ash & Guitar Center dwarfs all of their independent dealers in the US combined. A good product btw.

Ian