In article m, Rob
scribeth thus
On 03/08/2011 15:36, UnsteadyKen wrote:

Jim Lesurf wrote...

But at present I'm
too busy enjoying music to bother. Tried listening to the Honegger Pacific
231 and Pastorale from a recent Prom this morning. Very good. :-))

Jim, what is it about the sound of ESL's that has led to you using them
for so long?
I've never heard a pair but have read many rave reviews, one of the
things that comes across is that they need room to breathe, how are
yours set up?


I had a pair of 988s for a year or two and did find them pretty
astonishing. It's difficult for me to explain, but 'uncoloured',
'unresonant', 'precise', pin sharp' perhaps. Bass more in the 'tuneful'
than 'deep' camp, and I could never pair them with a REL sub I had
successfully.

In the main, two things led to selling them. I did find that I had to
sit still, pretty much on an axis, or else the tone/image would shift to
a much greater extent than I've found with box speakers. The sound
remained consistently good, I just found the effect tiresome.

The main reason was house room. I tried them in my main listening room,
about 14'x11', and that was really too small. They worked a lot better
in the study - 18'x11'. They pretty much swamped that room, needing a
good 3' from panel to back wall, but now I've moved to a smaller home so
they had to go.

I was also unconvinced about their durability. One developed a very
quiet 'fizz', but that didn't seem to put off the guy who bought them -
he drove from Germany and paid more or less what I'd bought them for.

Owing the 6 kV odd HT there is sometimes a bit of static discharge which
is sometimes due to the humidity or damp but usually nothing to worry
about.

What is are loud cracking noises! Not good and expensive;!...

If I had the money and room, I'd get another pair. For now I find ATC
and Dynaudio speakers just fine. Tonally, the Quads were very similar to
some Dynaudio Contour stand mount speakers I have.

Rob


--
Tony Sayer