[Wind Chaser]

This thread is getting old...apology if these were mentioned already: German Braun L1030 floorstander, IIRC 2x 200mm, 3" & 1" domes...I would have considered anything to get a pair of these back in the days of Pacific Stereo stores where they were heard in the high end room...I'd still love a pair.  I think the ADS (Analog Digital System) version were pretty much the same speaker.  Another is the Braun mini-monitor which (again IIRC) stuffed a 130mm & dome mid/dome tweeter into a tightly packed small speaker.  Sooo smooth & detailed, hmmmm...In quality of appearance, finish & aspiration ADS & Braun were similar to Wilson Audio of today's brands.

Yes, of all the speakers that passed through my hands in the yester-years, I am most fond of the Braun / ADS.  I just picked up a pair of L-300s from ebay and am on the hunt for more. 

[Russell Dawkins]

I had these 35+ year old Dynaco A25XL's refurbished with ne cabinets and got rid of all the bad things about the original design. No grill, no edge in the front, made them left and right hand, and beautiful wood all around.




Wayner 

That's really an excellent outcome and worthwhile thing to do with that venerable design. I am curious - does the 10" driver run full range, or nearly so? It must be quite the driver not to have serious mid range colorations and still produce the kind of bass it did.

[James Romeyn]

The differences in speaker design philosophy are all over the map & sometimes appear diametrically opposed: Zu employ 10" driver virtualy fullrange from about 40-10k, then others like one of the manufacturers here who employ a 7" from about 30-1k crossing to a tweeter the rest of the way up...then each company extols that their philosophy makes the most sense.  It's either fun to learn about it, frustrating & puzzling, both...or something else.  Either way it makes the hobby more interesting & fun.
 

[JimJ]

Those are my favorite vintage speakers

Not mine, but some of the most dynamic speakers I've ever heard. Just needed some supertweets....and active bi-amping.

[smbrown]

Sweeeeet! 

[doug s.]

fabulous room treatment!!!   

doug s.

[Wayner]

I'll bet the neighbors really like it.

[Wind Chaser]

I'll bet the neighbors really like it.

Depending on the music.

[Bob A (SD)]

These I first heard at an audio show in Philadelphia in 1977 and then a year later at a springtime show in San Francisco.  They were absolutely amazing with their gut wrenching bass and detailed mids/highs.  Not too surprising as the 18" bass drivers were the same installed in a handful of theaters for the Sensurround movie Earthquake.  They can move a LOT of air!   Keep in mind that this was the era when folks like the Rolling Stones toured with C-V amps and speaker systems.  Cerwinski shifted to marketing monster stage systems for the disco rage that had emerged putting these on the back burner.  As a result they're quite rare.  And as a top of the line home audio system they were much more refined and capable than other C-V offerings of the time, and nothing like what C-V puts out these days.


I ended up with these and they served me quite well for several decades when I replaced them with Magneplanars. 

[Russell Dawkins]

Didn't you miss the dynamics when they were gone?

[Bob A (SD)]

Didn't you miss the dynamics when they were gone?

I cheated   The 320D's 18" 189ES is still in use with my MGIIIa Magneplanars    They integrate extremely well.  As for the dynamics, I find the planars have a pretty darned good range.  But their soundstage and detail make up for the loss of the tremendous dynamics and slam of the 320 system.  Ironically I also just retired  (put 'em in storage) the 320MTBs that I had been using as mains for my HT system.  DefTech bipolars replaced them.  Pretty good run from the venerable Vega's I bought in March of 1978

[ctjetta]

Resurrecting an oooooold thread; if you wish, keep it going. Or let it die a quick painless death.

My favorite vintage loudspeaker, I'm not saying the best, but I love them, is the Infinity Qb. Cabinets are crap, I hate vinyl. Heaven forbid if you need to replace a tweeter. I just adore the music that comes out of them.

[timind]

I love the old Bose 901s. I don't care what anyone says, I loved mine. A great party speaker.

[Mudslide]

Being older than rocks, I've owned or thoroughly auditioned a LOT of these (mostly common) better vintage speakers in their time ('60s-'70s):

Dynacos (various),
JBLs (L100, A250, etc),
Advent (large, small),
Yamaha (NS1000s),
early Maggies (?),
Various Boston and Infinity models when they were the hot choices in their time,
Sundry others, including some unidentified Quads and Tannoys. 

Honestly, none were as enjoyable or with me for nearly as long as the JBL L100s.  They were completely underrated at the time, but continue to flourish on the nostalgia and vintage sales sites.  And for good reason.  In spite of the technical disadvantage they might have against current, super integrated loudspeakers with space age driver materials, I think would still prefer to spend an afternoon with any good rock and roll OR classical music with the L100s over my other, new, well regarded speakers.  Smooth, top end to bottom, they are that good.  They're personalizable with the mid/tweet attenuators.  Bass forever (very nice 12" woof).  Not the most efficient speakers, and not as detailed or sophisticated as the new batch of SOTA speakers...but give them some power....yeah!  I believe I lost a little hearing because of those speakers.    

Give me the old '60s west coast sound in speakers!   

[rollo]

   Tannoy, Allison, Spica.

charles

[Russell Dawkins]

Being older than rocks, I've owned or thoroughly auditioned a LOT of these (mostly common) better vintage speakers in their time ('60s-'70s):

Honestly, none were as enjoyable or with me for nearly as long as the JBL L100s.  They were completely underrated at the time, but continue to flourish on the nostalgia and vintage sales sites.  And for good reason.  In spite of the technical disadvantage they might have against current, super integrated loudspeakers with space age driver materials, I think would still prefer to spend an afternoon with any good rock and roll OR classical music with the L100s over my other, new, well regarded speakers.  Smooth, top end to bottom, they are that good.  They're personalizable with the mid/tweet attenuators.  Bass forever (very nice 12" woof).  Not the most efficient speakers, and not as detailed or sophisticated as the new batch of SOTA speakers...but give them some power....yeah!  I believe I lost a little hearing because of those speakers.    

Give me the old '60s west coast sound in speakers!   

I often wonder what the L100 would sound like with a proper crossover, like Troels Gravesen's one:  http://www.troelsgravesen.dk/JBL_L100.htm

It amazes me, the difference between the sophistication of the drivers in the L100—works of art—and the miserable crossover they were forced to play through—an 8 uF cap to the mid and a 3 uF to the tweeter, period; nothing to the woofer—it ran full range! The designers of the drivers must have been miffed. It is a testiment to the fundamental driver quality that it sounded as good as it did.

[dB Cooper]

Rollo....I was just going to say, I miss my Allisons. Had the Fours and the CD8's. Don't know why the principles weren't more widely adopted; they sounded the same everywhere in the room. I was even able to open a door in front of my Fours (they were close to a corner) without completely losing the stereo image.

Also had, and loved, Dyna A25's, along with 300,000 other audiophools. They were my first 'real' speakers.

[Russell Dawkins]

I was just going to say, I miss my Allisons. Had the Fours and the CD8's. Don't know why the principles weren't more widely adopted; they sounded the same everywhere in the room. I was even able to open a door in front of my Fours (they were close to a corner) without completely losing the stereo image.

Also had, and loved, Dyna A25's, along with 300,000 other audiophools. They were my first 'real' speakers.

Likewise, I don't know why more speakers were not designed for 'real world' situations, like being against a wall. Most people don't seem to realize, by the way, that the much-maligned Yamaha NS-10 was designed to be against a wall, as was the NS-1000. And people complain about the thin sound of these....!

Dynaco A25s were a brilliant design and deserved their popularity. There is something about the sound of aperiodic bass designs that seems to work for me, more often than not. Fried used to make small boxes, although bigger than the A25, all of which sounded great in the bass and all of which had resistive ports.

The best bass I think I've heard came from the dual transmission line sub of the Fried model H. The AR LST sounded pretty good, too, driven by a Phase Linear 700 playing an uncompressed drumset recording—a Sheffield if I remember.

[dB Cooper]

Against-the-wall placement was a requirement of the Allison formula. Their placement instructions called for the speakers to be no more than 3" from the wall. Except for one model, they were also not supposed to be too close to a room corner. (Mine were about 3-4 feet in, about their recommended minimum,)

Allison's brochures used to have a picture on the back of a guy listening to a pair of conventional bookshelf speakers in an anechoic chamber, with the caption "You don't need Allison speakers if you listen to music this way."

My A-25s served me for something like nine years until I got hit by the upgraditis bug for the first time. Then I got the Allison Fours.

[nickd]

I have a restored pair of Altec model 14’s up against the wall. I’m also a fan of 60-70’s “West coast sound”
Best 12” woofer I have ever heard and makes most of the modern offerings sound broken and lifeless.

40db dynamic swings are not something any modern 6 1/2” two way can hope to muster (even with 2-4 stacked woofers).
Love the design of those classic Cerwins too! Thanks for sharing.