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Bought a pair of ADC 303AX speakers

Wrongdog

Wrongdog

AK Subscriber
Subscriber
$70 original owners - Seller bought them on the West coast in 1972 from Pacific Stereo. I am a East coast / Europe die hard speaker fan. Presently listening to a quad of Dynaco A-25's through
different 70's receivers. Sansuai 7070 (the bomb!), Kenwood KR-6600, Sherwood 7100A. Sherwood S7000 (Tube!) and now an amazing (to me) STA-90 Realistic receiver.

Dynaco can't be beat for Phasing and off axis tone but these ADC's are pretty nice when on axis. Great tight bass but phasing is nothing like the A-25's.

What you all think from the Vintage Mid-FI crowd??
 
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You paid up for them but no worries -- I think you'll be very happy. They are a very nice uncolored sealed speaker whose 10" woofer is good down to 37 hz and whose lowly paper cone tweeter produces clear accurate highs.

These have been the workhorses in my main system since 1976 and I really don't think I'd want anything different for my purposes.
 
Thanks for reply.

I think if I wasn't enlightened and enamored by the Dynaco A-25's, I would think the ADC's were the schizzle. The Dynaco's sure sell for a lot more - $300-$400 a pair but it looks like the ADC's are found for cheap. Advent, KLH and AR are even more. I guess it is like having a '55 Pontiac Chieftain instead of '55 Bel Air - everyone wants the Bel Air more.
 
I haven't had A-25s but I have had A-35s (same drivers, larger cab IIRC) and A/B-ed them with the ADCs and to my (admittedly perverse) ear the ADCs sounded better.
 
No denying great tight bass from the CTS woofers. Yeah, it sounds weird but the A-25's are better sounding IMHO than the A-35's for some reason. I think they had something great with the A-25 and thought bigger would be better. The thing with A-25's is the off axis dispersion and depth of the sound field seems to be down right amazing to me. You can be way off axis and still get great upper mids. Admittedly the soft dome mid drivers are lacking great highs a bit but I am in my early 60's and I bet anything much over 10khz is lost on me!!
 
I have both I don't think I've ever compared the two side by side. I do remember being surprised at how good the ADC sounded, especially given that they don't seem to sell for much.
The gold plastic trim around the grills is kind of cheesy, but the veneer is quite nice.

I haven't recapped the ADC, because tar.
 
What's wrong with cheesy??!! My trim is genuine silver metal and not plastic. I think the ADC 303A's used gold plastic. All the vintage Dynaco, KLH and Advent grills look like my mom's drapes! For some reason they are all cool looking to me though!

BTW my crossovers do not have the tar stuff on them and speaker codes are dated from late 1972
 
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That gold trim comes off very easily, and then the grills look like normal grills. Nice looking and sounding speakers. I don't doubt that recapping might improve things, but be aware that many have crossover components at the terminal plate, but also up the wires toward the tweeter. All are encapsulated in that tarry stuff.
 
Wrongdog said:
What's wrong with cheesy??!! My trim is genuine silver metal and not plastic. I think the ADC 303A's used gold plastic. All the vintage Dynaco, KLH and Advent grills look like my mom's drapes! For some reason they are all cool looking to me though!

BTW my crossovers do not have the tar stuff on them and speaker codes are dated from late 1972
Click to expand...
Mine are '73s and they definitely have tar.
 
Yes, I stand corrected, the trim on mine is "gold" metal "drip edge" style like late 60's Fender amps but gold color.

No tar on mine. No evidence of past tar. All seem as MFG'd when I took a quick glance pulling a woofer... I will pull woofers again to re-check and take a shot soon. All caps, with that quick look, appeared like polarized electrolytic and no resistor? Maybe up stream at the tweeter??

FYI - some guitar amp designers did the tar thing to stop reverse engineering and stealing their designs. I think Rivera and Matchless did it as well as others.??

Bottom line: Fantastic speakers that can bought for under a $100 a pair is magic!
 
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I can't believe these don't fetch more money. High quality cabs, okay drivers that happen to sound really good. I'll be lucky to get $100 a pair on a local sale...
 
I picked up a pair of these along with a pair of ADS L520s for $50 total.
The L520s were wrecked but I put some work into the cabs and they are now my favorite speakers.
The ADC had really nice cabs and the bass sounded good but I thought the tweeters were kind of garbage. A recap may have helped but I was not battling the tar to find out. I ended up trading them toward some work on a 7070 and look at it as getting the ADS for free!
 

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I LOVE the Sansui 7070's receivers! Wish I could get another but they are fetching too much for me now. Are you sure the 303AX had the tar? Mine must be later ones without that Tar.
 
Wrongdog said:
I LOVE the Sansui 7070's receivers! Wish I could get another but they are fetching too much for me now. Are you sure the 303AX had the tar? Mine must be later ones without that Tar.
Click to expand...

Listening to the 7070 with some ADS L710s (metal grill) right now. If my hearing was better I'd be in heaven.
I lucked out and scored the 7070 for less than the price of a case of beer.
Can't seem to find the pics I had of the tar crossovers.
 
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