Entertainment For Lively Minds
Old speakers
Posted by Andrew2 on 23 October 2010 - 8:56pm.
I am sitting here listening through speakers that are 27 years old. The maybe cost me 200 pounds at the time - made by AR - they have moved to 7 different homes and crossed the Atlantic. They have been with 3 different "systems". Do speakers wear out? The grills look a little tatty but they sound fine so they are fine right?
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Yup
My main home speakers are getting on for 50 years old and still sound wonderful.
It;s the one
form of technology thats barely changed a bit in 60 years. If you still enjoy listening to them then I wouldn't dream of changing them.
It;s the one
form of technology thats barely changed a bit in 60 years. If you still enjoy listening to them then I wouldn't dream of changing them.
Stereo
Nice!
Bought mine
when I was 21, am now 54. Didn't know much about hi-fi then (still don't), just decided to buy the best set of Wharfedales I could afford and they sound superb.
Thanks
My thoughts also - the technology has not really changed - so why change.
Ar18s ?
Classics if so.
My dad is using my old Mordaunt Short Carnivals from 1981ish-I am using some Mission 770s which were several years old when I bought them in the early 90s.
Keep 'em rolling is my view ...
I have
A pair of 1940s Scheiß-Rundfunk speakers that my grandad picked up during World War II. Amazing sound. Puts a lot of so-called modern speakers to shame.
How the Germans laughed
when they sold your grandad a pair of Shit-Broadcast speakers :-D
Reminds me of a joke
that my norwegian mother likes to tell, from her childhood in Norway during WW2.
The german soldiers are on the hunt for forbidden radios in the home of an old woman. They turn the bedroom upside down and finds a chamber pot underneath the bed.
The woman starts laughing and says;
"There's the receiver, but you won't find the transmitter!"
( There's another joke it reminds me of too, but it's untranslatable to english. It depends on the likeness of "Was ist das" and "Vass i dass" - not sure about the norwegian spelling, but I'm sure you understand it anyway... )
Bah, rumbled
I was trying to stoke a ridiculous rumour as to the superiority of Nazi-era loudspeakers.
Actually, I remember reading a lot of audio equipment and principles were developed by German scientists during the Third Reich.
Yup, they were responsible for the development of
decent quality wire and tape recording.
And here's an episode of Third Reich & Roll with Dr Fry
http://jb_speechification.s3.amazonaws.com/Third-Reich-And-Roll%201.mp3
AR4xa
Still going strong since 1976!
Goodmans Mezzo SL
bought with first Saturday job wage packet savings from McOnomy in the Finnieston Shopping Centre back around 1974. Had to replace one of the woofers as I blew it playing my bass guitar through it in my Speed/Thrash metal 90s.
They still sound glorious with a rich warm bass.
The principles haven't changed...
... but modern materials used today are stiffer & lighter which will make a speaker sound better.
There's a couple of very quick & easy things you can do to make sure your speakers perform at their best - remove the grilles & check that all the screws that hold the drivers in place are nice & tight and make sure the cabinets are rock steady. If they're floorstanders make sure the spikes are tight & the speaker cabinets are level. If they're bookshelf types make sure the spikes in the stand are tight. You'll be amazed at how much of an improvement can be made - especially if this has never been done to a speaker that's 25 or 30 years old.
The challenge still tends to be
finding a sound you like more than the one that you have evolved with over many years.
I have no doubt that there *are* better speakers out there than my Mission 770 Freedoms [late 80s]-but after plenty of dems, esp of good new smaller ones, I gave up. Unless I was going to save space there really didn't seem much point in changing until the drivers finally blow out-and the tradein/2nd hand value was negligible.
BBC Monitors
aka Rogers LS 3/5A's
Served me well since I sold the Quad Electrostatics (when my children were growing up).
20 years of good service
My Mission 700s (the original big fat ones)
were decommissioned last summer after a fairly continuous hammering for about 30 years. The cone surrounds, being made of foam rather than rubber, had finally lost the ability to suspend the big fat cones during a high decibel run-through of Dennis Bovell's back catalogue. They will be returning to active service once I have found the time to re-suspend the cones; a task that is relatively easy to DIY once you've tracked down replacement parts, which are available from a useful little website in the Netherlands.
I had the opportunity to grab some excellent Spendors, which are now installed in the living room, but there's no reason why the Missions, given a spruce up, won't be back in action for several decades more; good speakers (like the brands mentioned above) go on pretty much for ever.
In Maurice Chevalier voice
ah yes, ah reemember eet well ...
http://www.wordmagazine.co.uk/content/can-massive-recommend-some-speaker...
Crossovers
What can degrade over time are the electronic components in the crossovers, especially the capacitors. A local repair shop could replace these and any tired resistors fairly cheaply, and could even upgrade them for a likely sonic improvement. Having said that, if they still sound good why bother?
Mission 700s
When I upgraded my hi-fi about 7 or 8 years ago, I couldn't bear to part with my old Mission 700s (walnut cabinets, not the black ones) that I bought as a student in 1982, so they lived in the loft for a while. They now reside on some bookshelves in the 'study' and look ridiculously large in such a small space. I have attempted to isolate them with some blu-tack (!) and have to turn down the bass a little on the amp, but they are perfectly good for listening to iTunes/Spotify whilst working on the computer. The old foam grilles rotted away years ago, so the woofer and tweeter are on display, together with the rather cheap-looking white board on the front of the speaker.
I didn't feel as bad getting rid of my old NAD 3020 amp, which had a fault. I sold that to a guy in France via eBay for what I thought was a good price. Got more for the NAD than an Arcam Alpha 3 amp, which sounded miles better.
My current main hi-fi has a pair of Mission 782SEs, which I love and work well with Cyrus amplification (as you'd expect - they were once the same company).
Does anyone know what has happened to Mission? I noticed their factory at Huntingdon is up for sale.
Bought out by IAG
http://www.internationalaudiogroup.com/mission.php
who also own Quad, Wharefedale, Audiolab and a few other famous names
Audiolab 8000A
Audiolab? That name is music to my ears. My dad bought me an 8000A inegrated amp 23 years ago, and it's still chugging along very nicely.
Handsome, eh?
You have the same 700s as me,
and bought them the same year, near enough. Bloody great aren't they? Mine are in the loft awaiting a new lease, whereupon even the Spendors will tremble in awe at the filling-loosening bottom end available, and neighbour shall once again speak unto neighbour about the bloody racket.
Mission 700s
My 700s survived my first hi-fi upgrade in 1991. The guy at the shop who sold me an Arcam amp and CD player said that I'd need to upgrade my speakers. I did go as far as taking in my kit to audition with other speakers, but they just sounded harsh and uninviting in comparison to the 700s. I think the bass can be a little boomy and woolly on the 700s in some circumstances, but for the money, they are brilliant speakers.
I had mixed feelings about pensioning them off with the arrival of the 782SEs, but they are a cut above the 700s - 20 years of progress and costing many times more, so they should be!
My Monitor Audio R252s
My Monitor Audio R252s sounded lovely and warm and inviting when I bought them in, oh, 1987? 1988? with my first separates (a Rotel amp and CD player). They sound just as lovely today with a Denon amp. Never understood the drive to upgrade/update for its own sake. "If it sounds good to you then it's the right speaker" is a maxim that's always worked for me.