Moderator's background

I've been into hi fi since I was 15 yrs old, starting with an Akai system and Thorens turntable. One day, I bought an obscure LP (large 45-rpm in fact) by some unknown label called Reference Recordings - the name caught my eye. The recording was Kronos In Formation and it looked interesting. This was my first jaw-dropping experience, ca 1980. In the credits section of the LP, thanks were given to a variety of people, two from some completely unknown company to me, Spectral Audio Associates.

After finally reading about Spectral electronics in the late 80's, it wasn't until 1995 when I finally got a DMC-12 for an in-home audition. The experience was so thrilling I ordered one of their amps sight unseen - that was my foray into the high end. I have been using their electronics since then, although I have no industry affiliation whatsoever, and in fact, I have gladly and promptly replaced some of their products with more worthy ones, like the SDR-2000 DAC for a Berkeley Alpha DAC, and have on occasion been very critical of some of their products.

More details on what sold me on this line of electronics in a bit. Meantime, if there are other Spectral owners out there, we would all love to hear your story.

Continuing on the above, I was sold long long ago on the merits of fast electronics for accurate sound reproduction, transmission-line theory and the fastest rendering by loudspeakers for true articulation. When I first analyzed Spectral's approach it made crystal clear sense to me - ultra-wide bandwidth to achieve the best speed in order to be able to follow the waveform more accurately, coupled with optimally-calculated transmission lines. From a loudspeaker perspective, electrostatics just make sense to me, and their speed is their best attribute. They have their own limitations, but you have to spend quite a lot more to beat them.

I am glad to see that fast ultra-wide bandwidth electronics are now appearing from other manufacturers as well, like Soulution; recent amplification offerings from Spectral and Soulution seem to be sitting at the top of solid state designs, and if one were to take a listen they would understand why. Yet other manufacturers are also big on transmission line theory - see http://www.fmacoustics.com/pdf/audiophilpoweramp.pdf

Another aspect that attracts me to Spectral is their spartan spending on advertisements (just two ads, ever) and using the same industrial design for decades now, which also reduces costs dramatically. Where they don't go cheap is, of course, design and implementation. Reflecting all that on their pricing, which according to their review in TAS in 2009 is based on 3X the wholesale parts cost, it makes their gear a tremendous bargain that competes with the very best (or so I hear). One look at the innards of their products and you can easily tell the quality behind (see my own album's pictures); that type of quality has been there literally for decades.

The Spectral sound has evolved over the years that I've been a customer - from a huge-but-diffuse soundstage, to a huge-walk-around with pinpoint imaging; from the somewhat dark (SDR-2000 DAC) to the live (SDR-4000 Pro player); from the analytical and surgical to purely natural. They have a reputation for producing neutral equipment, but given my experience I don't see what was so neutral about anything they produced a decade or more ago. Today's products certainly do sound like that to me, and there is always the possibility I am wrong But truth be told, they sure sound stunning to these ears.

My biggest quest lately has been the search for better speakers. That will follow later on; for now, on the short list, I have the ML CLX, the Magico Q5, Evolution Acoustics and German Physiks; and the list may grow.

Now it's got me thinking that the Avalon/Spectral/MIT ads which were all about speed, might have actually been more of a disservice

Click to expand...

They were touting that because speed is probably the single most significant factor in being able to follow a waveform as precisely as possible IMO (and everyone feel free to correct me on this), while not discounting many other factors either. Interestingly enough, one still rarely finds ultra-fast solid state electronics even to this day, except probably for Spectral, FM Acoustics and Soulution, and perhaps a couple of others. I am sure it's extremely challenging to come up with such circuits and there must be numerous trade-offs to consider.

Indeed. BTW, there is an amazing thread on agon on negative feedback if you haven't seen it, where Ralph is exhibiting his galactic technological know-how...