With due respect to c27078, while these speakers are wonderful period pieces and striking in their day, with captivating aesthetics if in good condition, they are not exceptional performers in todays environment. They have an average complement of drivers, with no extreme bass extension, so they will not be able to handle well contemporary music with lots of LF. I have not analyzed their internals, but it is likely given the period, that they would have a lot of cabinet noise associated with the design and therefore have a fair bit of distortion from it, occluding the mid/treble. That's just the way it is with such speakers from the past. If there is access to the back, or through the drivers, you could add some dampening material to lessen that ringing of the cabinet. I had the opposite problem with the Ohm Walsh Model F; the thing was SO damped with heavy foam that it was literally killing the beauty, so I removed half of it from the cabinet and the speaker started to shine.
Their magic is if you can put them in the Landscape orientation, which struck many who heard them as impressive. Well, yeah, I have been doing work with Landscape orientation for years. I noticed it first in the studio, where monitors are used sideways, so I thought I would mimic it. Of course it is a great treat to shift the soundstage horizontal vs. vertical. I have written about it in reviews of the Daedalus Ulyssses, Magnepan .7, and PureAudoProject Trio15 Horn1 reviews at Dagogo.com
The irony of that is there are some who by their skepticism and lack of experience discount or condemn such things. Quite apart from actual use/experience they mock, condemn etc. Great for them! They don't have to enjoy the cool experience of Landscape! Let them sit with their impoverished experiences! You, OTOH, have a treasure in that these speakers will give you something that 99% of speakers of any pedigree will not, the Landscape orientation. They are worth working into the mix for that reason alone. It is the Landscape orientation that makes speakers like the Gale 401 special. If your intent is to use them Portrait, similar to regular speakers, then you may as well move on if not enthralled. Imo, it would be a shame to have the capability of Landscape and not pursue it. Then again, I had people telling me that I needed to spend up to $7K to completely overhaul the Ohm Walsh Model F speakers, and that was not my objective. So, do as you wish.
If this is all you can afford in terms of a system, then build it the best you can and be happy. However, it is nowhere near - as typical of the bulk of vintage speakers - what is available today, of course at much higher prices as performance escalates. If this speaker whets your appetite for better, do not think for a moment the Gale is the end of the road. Not even close. People who suggest so are ignorant of the actual performance spectrum of systems.
I place this speaker properly in the category of the Ohm Walsh Model F, which is similarly interesting but seriously compromised in performance. I suggest you spend time with it, enjoy it for all the right reasons, and if that's the ultimate goal, great! It will bring much joy. If, however, in time you pine for more, then perhaps you can keep it as a causal speaker somewhere else in the home and seek a higher performance setup. But, that most likely would differ significantly because most speakers nowadays are not Landscape but Portrait orientation. Imo, you have a potential win/win with the Gale and adding another transducer in time.
