Speakers to hang on to for LIFE

I don't know how much good this will do you since Apogee is no longer in business but... I've had my Stages for nine years and can't think of a reason, besides lightning, to replace them.

Perhaps Sean can help too. It seems like rather than change components, he builds new systems. :-)

Hello,

Hello,

I've owned a pair of Proac 3.5's for 4 years. I still have them and still like them. They are always musically involving and have zero istening fatigue. During that time I've listened to the 2.5's, 3.8's, 4.0's and 5's. The 3.8's are probably closest in sound to the 3.5's, but are a little drier. I've never had a problem of any sort with them.

However, if I was looking for new speakers today, I would probably go with Sonus Faber Guaneris or Amatis--which I have heard but do not own. Like the Proacs they are musically beautiful--but they look better.

Good luck!
Roger

I bought my first pair of Harbeth P3 mini-monitors in 1994, sold them in 1998 and bought a pair of Harbeth HL Compact 7s, which I promise you I will never sell. Lots of reviews available so I won't bore you. To me they are completely characterless in tonality and produce real life-like macro and micro dynamics.

I have had QUAD ESLs since the late 70s. I have actually given some of my pairs away as gifts during this time but have always had a pair. These of course are the so-called 57s. I find as electronics improve eg. Pass amplifiers, they get better sounding. I use surge protection on them and have had the latest electronic protection mods done to isolate them as much as possible from electrical faults, thus hopefully increasing their longevity.

For 10 yrs I lived with a pair of active stats -- AudioExclusiv, a German product. The amps were an OTL design, with adjustable input gain. The electronic cross-over was also adjustable to +/-3db @ 30Hz/12kHz.
The sound was beautiful: soundstage, imaging, and speed were obvious characteristics, as were the natural timbres. Unusually (for stats), I also had dynamics and reasonable transient attack! The lower register was also well developed by stat standards of the time... by comparison to the Quads (THEN, 1990), the A-Es went higher and lower and louder.

They were also beautiful to look at (tall & narrow, art-deco style) with outstanding WAF.

So why sell? I could no longer deal with the constant need for servicing. The amps operated at their very limit (by comparison, class A is polite) and would go beserk (i.e. components were surpassing their limits, & blowing) at any fluctuation in the power supply -- of which, I had many.

Apparently the problems I had have been addressed in newer models.
I do beleive that if this had been the case then, I would have kept these speakers -- "for life", as it were.