Is It Possible?

Not too surprised by myaudio168’s experience.


It’s not for nothing that so many speaker designers, including those who design dynamic speakers, have held the Quad up as a sort of paradigm for the type of sound they are going for, in terms of midrange transparency.


That said, there’s a reason so many designers aren’t just trying to re-design versions of a Quad. They are great at what they do, but they aren’t the full package in terms of what can be had in reproduced music.


I lived with the Quad 63s for a long time, and also paired them with the Gradient dipole subs made for the 63s (still the best stat/sub pairing coherency I’ve heard). In *some* aspects, despite all the speakers I’ve owned, that may have been some of the best sound I ever owned.


But....as great as the midrange transparency was, I ended up craving more density and palpability. The Quads seemed to cast beautiful sonic images that didn’t really move air, or seem in the same room as me, so it became something of a detached-from-the-music experience for me. I moved on to dynamic speakers and would not go back to the Quads, or any electrostatics. Electrostatics for me are a wonderful place to visit; whenever a pair is around I have to sit and listen. But it’s also immediately apparent that I could never live with one again because the don’t do some fundamentally satisfying aspects of music that I really crave.  (Though I would absolutely LOVE to have a pair of ESL 57s, which I prefer over the 63s, in a second system).


But...yeah...after listening to box speakers and then hearing Quads, it’s hard not to notice that amazing boxless factor in the Quad sound.

@prof-- your comments are pretty on the money. Listening to the original Quad is in some ways like sitting in the balcony. I never had double or triple panel set ups, and was never happy with woofer integration on the old Quad; I didn’t even try on the ’63 when I ran them.
The detached experience-- sort of a portrait in miniature--drove me to horns, for a greater ’in the room’ experience, dynamics. But, those posed a similar problem in sub-woofering.
I currently run the restored 57 unadorned-- no special stands, woofers or auxiliary tweeters. They are what they are-- magnificent in some ways, fundamentally flawed in others. Their coherence and their ability to get out of the way of the music is still pretty stunning, though, more than 60 years later. In discussions with other owners on another board after I revitalized this pair, we agreed that though there have been strides in speaker design since the introduction of the original Quad, it’s pretty amazing how good they are this many years later, making you question whether throwing tens of thousands of dollars at the high end really does return value. (It does, but hearing the Quads will make you question it--i hadn’t heard my ’57s for since around 1990, though I have heard other pairs in years since).
Robin Wyatt did a nice job several years ago demo’ing them with tape at the Waldorf show-- It was like old home week for me, I hadn’t been to an audio show in at least 20 years- the elevator doors opened and I saw the same guys I used to see from the NY audio mafia-- just 20 years older! (Me, I’m ageless) :)

May I ask where in Sacramento?  I live here and I take some things to Skip’s Music for service.  I wonder if there is a good high end electronics guy?

myaudio168,

It is possible to like something relatively obsolete (no, I have nothing against Quad speakers, but they are not the newest model) more than a brand new one. Having said that, enjoy your new old speakers, but keep Focals for a bit more. Infatuation rarely lasts a lifetime, no matter how pretty the subject is. If it is a love of your life, you got double lucky. Not only was it affordable, but also "the right one". Or two, I guess.

No surprise. After listening to one for awhile - there's Quad stats ...and everything else.