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Hales Design Group speakers....how good were they?

I started a threat awhile ago http://forum.audiogon.com/cgi-bin/fr.pl?hbest&1125332737&read&3&4&
basically asking people to outline the best home system they've ever heard. A relative (into audio) was most impressed by a friend that once owned Hales Design Group speakers. The setup was unique, with the room being one of the best natural setups he'd heard. This person was from Calgary and used an Ayre K1-X pre with a NAD amp and CAL audio CDP. Needless to say its unusual. But he swears it was best and weirdest setup he'd ever heard. Who spends $8k on a pre and $1k on the amp and source...it drove the owner of a local highend dealer bananas because he himself couldn't build a room that sounded as good, and had no system that could touch it. He had quite the arsenal of speakers at his disposal as well, including Reference 3A, Oskar, Dali, Meadowlark. At any rate I was wondering why I hadn't heard of these speakers before? I realize the company has gone belly up, and they are dated. How would they hold up to current offerings by Reference 3a, Von Schweikert, Gallo Nucleus, Totem etc...
lush
daveyf's avatar
daveyf
2,869 posts
 
Interesting thread.. I have owned the System 2 Signatures for about 15 years. When he came out with them,the system 2 Signatures were the ones that put Paul Hales on the map.
Harry Pearson gave them a mini rave and Robert Harley used them as his reference for many years.
I drive them with a Rowland model 8 and they truly sing; tremendous ability to portray depth, very smooth and incredible mid-bass definition and pin-point imaging are their strengths. Weakness in the reproduction of high frequencies but only in comparison to today's best tweets; also lacking in the bass department. However, I recently listened to a pair of B&W 802 diamonds, which were more extended in the high freq's but did not really blow away my Hales and in imageing and depth were lagging IMHO.
The Hales replaced electrostatics in my system and I think even today they are pretty competetive with speakers up to $8K.
pabrooks
1 posts
 
The best sound I ever experience was from my Hales Rev 3.
The system consisted of the Hales, Perreaux amp and EAD Encore pre-amp processor. The tonal balance was some of the best I have ever heard. I had the impression that I was listening to real music and it was addictively pure.
The way in which I can tell if they are setup correctly, is by listening to music and not hearing the tweeter sticking out. Unfortunately they are highly room sensitive and difficult to setup if you want to maximize there potential. I am still trying to improve them in my new home.
joshcondie
3 posts
 
I just picked up a pair of perfect Hales Rev 3's and would love to hear how people have positioned them in smaller to medium sized rooms. Mine are mated with Bryston 4BST amp; Cary SLP-50B Preamp and Arcam Alpha 9 CDP.

This thread would seem to know.

Thanks!
jaybo
4,478 posts
 
joshconde.....a great system indeed!!!!!! the hales sound great in a small room too. aimed like a nearfield monitor, they will transport you
brawny
51 posts
 
From 1998 through 2001, I owned both the Hales T-5's and T-8's. They were fantastic sounding speakers. Image density and bass quality was fanatstic! In 1999, Paul Hales made a prototype speaker called the Alexandria. It used a ribbon tweeter. It was by far the most musical loudspeaker I ever heard. Paul was one of the only loudspeaker designers that was able to make loudspeakers that not only sounded good but also measured well on the test bench. Very flat frequency response. IMHO Hales loudspeakers were unmatched in terms of musicality. IMHO Hales offerings sounded much better than most of today's offerings.
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