Beutiful but flawed

puroagave · Jul 27, 2012

whart said:
Quad ESL- the most beautiful and bittersweet illustration of this, untrammeled glimpses of musical reality, with significant limitations in bandwidth, dynamics and listener location. But still my all time favorite midrange reproducer and, with limitations I could gladly live with again (if I ever get my old pair restored).

the esl-57 is like a scalpel, everthing else speakerwise resembles a cleaver. they're the most misunderstood speaker, if you have to expain it to someone they'll never get it. they are the definition of venetian blind effect, have no low bass and cant play much above 100 db, its a one person speaker not unlike giant headphones. im vacilating over what to do with my pair b/c new speakers are on on the way. im going to box them up and store 'em in the attic. i hugely regret selling my first pair and good ones are getting very scarce.

Bill Hart · Jul 28, 2012

Many who sell theirs buy another pair at some point. Did you have yours restored? Mine have been arc'd and apart from that, the whole electrical apparatus is so old I'd be afraid to plug them in without having them gone over thoroughly. The best guy- in Florida- will get mine when we move, and i'll then have him ship them to my new location in Tx.
If you ultimately decide to sell, i may consider taking on a second pair, but if they haven't been restored, I'm not sure that makes sense. I always wanted to have a double Quad set up. Several years ago, some one was selling an ML double Quad rack with the branded adjustment knobs. I should have bought it and thrown it in the basement to store, just as a collector's piece. I still have one pair of Decca ribbons that I used 25 years ago with the original ESL. Those need fixin, too. Not sure how rare they are, and don't know if they would compete with a more modern ribbon tweeter. They are cool looking hunks of metal though and i use them as bookends right now.
PS I also have a pair of Crosby Quad (63) but while they improved on the original in some respects, I don't think they had the same uncanny midrange as the original.

FrantzM · Jul 28, 2012

Hi
As a former owner of the Quad ESL 63 and had the ESL 57 too (I was a young kid then but hey that counts too) .. I have to admit that these were wonderful speakers. I believe they fit perfectly the beautiful but flawless OP.
There is no doubt their midrange was great and on female voice I haven't heard anything that betters thembut and that is the crux of my observation, I have heard two speakers that matched the midrange of the quads .. Two very different speakers I must say..
Magico Q1 and Wilson X-2... The midrange in those speakers are uncanny and on a par with the Quad , not on female voices though ...

Thus my point. Weren't those speakers mid-range so much better than the rest of their spectrum that it forced us to focus on the weaknesses rather than the whole... In the ESL 57 what came at you was the purity of the midrange .. The rest was nothing compelling IMO, thus the listener is drawn to the midrange, there was nothing else to be drawn to... The ESL 63 was lacking in dynamics and extension too and its midrange was and remain great but modern transducers surpass it everywhere else ...
Am I making sense? That is to me the best way to describe what I now hear from other designs ... I respect what they do but find much more enjoyment from other more recent speakers.

Bill Hart · Jul 28, 2012

FrantzM said:
Hi
As a former owner of the Quad ESL 63 and had the ESL 57 too (I was a young kid then but hey that counts too) .. I have to admit that these were wonderful speakers. I believe they fit perfectly the beautiful but flawless OP.
There is no doubt their midrange was great and on female voice I haven't heard anything that betters thembut and that is the crux of my observation, I have heard two speakers that matched the midrange of the quads .. Two very different speakers I must say..
Magico Q1 and Wilson X-2... The midrange in those speakers are uncanny and on a par with the Quad , not on female voices though ...

Thus my point. Weren't those speakers mid-range so much better than the rest of their spectrum that it forced us to focus on the weaknesses rather than the whole... In the ESL 57 what came at you was the purity of the midrange .. The rest was nothing compelling IMO, thus the listener is drawn to the midrange, there was nothing else to be drawn to... The ESL 63 was lacking in dynamics and extension too and its midrange was and remain great but modern transducers surpass it everywhere else ...
Am I making sense? That is to me the best way to describe what I now hear from other designs ... I respect what they do but find much more enjoyment from other more recent speakers.

Agreed. Part of it depends on the program material. Simple, acoustic, strings - can be very convincing; large scale, highly dynamic stuff doesn't work.

LL21 · Jul 28, 2012

Celestion bookshelf speakers...SL6si, SL600 & dipole subwoofer system, SL700. Talk about beautiful, electrostatic-like performance from a bookshelf, and by today's standards, for not too much money. the bookshelves did not have much bass, but setup right, it could be surprising what they could produce. A little fuzziness compared with today's greats...but what a balance on these guys.

puroagave · Jul 28, 2012

whart said:
Many who sell theirs buy another pair at some point. Did you have yours restored? Mine have been arc'd and apart from that, the whole electrical apparatus is so old I'd be afraid to plug them in without having them gone over thoroughly. The best guy- in Florida- will get mine when we move, and i'll then have him ship them to my new location in Tx.
If you ultimately decide to sell, i may consider taking on a second pair, but if they haven't been restored, I'm not sure that makes sense. I always wanted to have a double Quad set up. Several years ago, some one was selling an ML double Quad rack with the branded adjustment knobs. I should have bought it and thrown it in the basement to store, just as a collector's piece. I still have one pair of Decca ribbons that I used 25 years ago with the original ESL. Those need fixin, too. Not sure how rare they are, and don't know if they would compete with a more modern ribbon tweeter. They are cool looking hunks of metal though and i use them as bookends right now.
PS I also have a pair of Crosby Quad (63) but while they improved on the original in some respects, I don't think they had the same uncanny midrange as the original.

mine were restored over ten yrs ago by sheldon stokes and perform like a stock pair. ive heard 2nd hand that waynes picquet's rebuild involves mods shaving rivet heads that make them arc proof and able to play louder. his rebuild also improves the sensitivity by 3 db. im curious if his mods change the tonality, no need to improve on perfection.

my first pair were new old stock 57s still in factory boxes, i was a fool to sell those. it was the barn find equivalent of a mint bugatti atlantic

puroagave · Jul 28, 2012

lloydelee21 said:
Celestion bookshelf speakers...SL6si, SL600 & dipole subwoofer system, SL700. Talk about beautiful, electrostatic-like performance from a bookshelf, and by today's standards, for not too much money. the bookshelves did not have much bass, but setup right, it could be surprising what they could produce. A little fuzziness compared with today's greats...but what a balance on these guys.

ive owned the SL6i and SL600si - both superb. i'm partial to the copper tweeter of the 600 over the 700's alu tweeter - sweetness over trebble extension. the Sl700 ultimately were better overall. the 600 had a sensitivity of only 82 db and couldn't take more than 150w. i used mine nearfield and like the 57s they werent good for far field listening.

i yearn to own a system 6000 one day, SL600s and dipole subwoofers. they come up on 'agon once in a while.

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Beutiful but flawed

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