Russ Button (December 2000): Jason began his work on curved diaphrams before he became aware of Martin Logan. The technology and techniques Jason used to build the XStatic were all of his own design. To date there have been over 50 pairs of XStatic loudspeakers sold commercially. There is a dealer in the Santa Cruz area who was stocking and selling the XStatic. His last order two years ago was for 10 pairs. I do not know if he has any more stock or not. Jason no longer produces the XStatic loudspeaker, but he does service them on a time and materials basis.
Hugh Mandeson (December 2000): The Xstatic speakers are incredible to behold. They create such a huge window into the musical event. The response is smooth (resonance-free) with very pleasing bass and unbelievable midrange and treble. They also appear to be pretty efficient, the most efficient electrostatic from what I could find out about them. I was not able to find any specific information on these. There are also a pair of fabulous hand built tube amplifiers that came with these that are being auctioned separately. The Orion Bluebook shows these as being made from '89 to '93 and having an original cost of $5,200 a pair.
They are a very nice quality and beautiful wood nicely finished. The design is clever, the casters a great feature and the transformer mounted in the bottom rear really balances the speaker so they are quite stable and easy to move. The EC3s are euphoric, addictive even. They can make you forget you are listening to speakers and let you into the music.
Russ Button (December 2000): I'm still as thrilled with them as ever. They're the most efficient electrostatic I've ever heard. The only other electrostatic I like as well are the Quad ESL-63s, and they cost about twice as much. The model I have are the EC-X, which is the smallest of the X-Static line. Being they are a curved diaphram they have an even dispersion and sound good everywhere in the room, unlike typical flat panel ESLs. I find that they image wonderfully and have a smooth mid-range. Frankly, my system is one of the better one's I've heard and it's due primarily to the loudspeakers. Much of my system is pretty ordinary. These speakers make everything else sound better.
They mate very well with the home-brew sub-woofers I built, project detailed at http://www.button.com/Russ/audio.shtml
Joseph Facer(June 2003)(contribution is shortened by The Audio Circuit): The Xstatics were made in the late 80's and early 90's by Jason Daniels, in San Francisco. Jason started with the basic homemade electrostatic plans from the Audio Amateur (pre Speaker Builder) and eventually copied the Martin Logan construction techniques for the screens.
The Xstatics greatest strength was their solid weighty construction, which allowed the screens to produce low frequencies without canceling them out by moving in opposition and also obviated the need for dynamic drivers for the bass. That and the lack of the associated crossover/driver blending problems were very significant. If I wanted to reproduce something similar today, I buy some full range panels from ML, overbuild a totally rigid, streamlined, and weighty chassis framework ala Hugh's pair, and find/commission an ARC tube amp quality stepup/down transformer to drive them. The results would be amazingly good. To my knowledge, Xstatic was never associated with an electronics company.
