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Vintage Advents too big for small room?

In my current house, where I'll be for at least another 5 years, my listening room is only 12' by 12'. I have New Advents, owned since new in 1978, tweeters replaced under warranty by the better ferrofluid ones, woofers replaced about 10 years ago with OEMs from Jensen, who owned Advent at the time. They're still beautiful and do everything they've always done, but they completely overwhelm this smaller room. I have no real choice but to place them in the corners. I've moved them out 6 inches, but that didn't help appreciably.

I've thought of two options: 1) buy some stands for the Advents in the hope of decoupling them from the room a little more, or 2) go with some much smaller monitors and stands that, just because of their size, would be farther from the corners of the room. Are there any other options?

Monitors would probably be something like Epos ELS-3, Ascend CBM-170, Triangle Titus - I would need to keep monitors+stands at $500 or less for now. Also, I've had trouble locating stands for the Advents - any reasonably priced suggestions?

David
armstrod
armstrod OP
618 posts
 
I love Audiogon. No matter where you're going, someone's always been there before.

I'm definitely going to experiment with the Advents first. Rich, those sound like beautiful stands. If I can get the Advents to sound right, glass stands would be great for a permanent solution.

Anybody ready to argue that smaller monitors would actually *improve* the sound in this room? I'm willing to spend the money if I can gain a marked improvement. For those of you willing to make monitor recommendations, the rest of my system is:

Music Hall MMF 2.1/Shure V15Vxmr
NAD 7140 receiver
Adcom GCD-565 CD player
New Advents, updated drivers as outlined above

MMF 2.1 to be replaced by modded Thorens TD 150/Rega RB250/Shure V15 when I can find the time to complete the mods.

Thanks again for everyone's help.

David
tombowlus
416 posts
 
It just so happens that a friend of mine is selling a pair of 8" high stands. They were bought from a local high end audio shop, so they are of respectable quality. I doubt that he wants much for them. They just might be the ticket, if you want the least expensive way to address this issue.

Send me an e-mail if you are interested.
rar1's avatar
rar1
1,809 posts
 
David,

Give stands a shot ... no small monitor will ever sound as rich or as pleasing as a full range speaker that sports a 10" or so woofer. It's just the physics man. It is not that small monitors can't sound good ... they can ... but they will not be as rich sounding as your Advents.

I have two pair of the AR 302's ... these were reissues of the classic AR 5's from the 60's ... very similar to the original Advents. I use one pair in my main system and the other pair in a 2 channel HT system. It is tough to beat their warm, rich, full sound and I have owned many a small budget monitor ... EPOS 11; B&W 302; Wharefedale Diamond 8.1 ... the only ones that begin to approach the AR's are the NHT SB2's ... and I believe that is because they are acoustic suspension speakers ... just like the AR's.

If you want to read more about classic Advent speakers , give the underscored web-site a look.

Regards, Rich
phasecorrect's avatar
phasecorrect
2,013 posts
 
I agree...try to find a monitor that doesnt sound thin or bright....Castle RIchmonds are very rich, musical, spacious, and fairly easy to drive...the B&W 601 is also a good choice...both at around $500 new...well below used...another good choice used is the PSB minis which are around 1k new...very good bass and mellow top end...
armstrod OP
618 posts
 
Rich,

I'm already working on the stands. I agree that physics works against smaller speakers, but obviously the room is part of the physics too. Isn't that balancing act part of why we all love audio and spend so much time debating it here? :-)

One of the reasons I have wireless Ethernet in my house is so I can be listening to music while simultaneously reading and posting here...what could be better? :-)

David
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