solidjackson
Active Member
Wharfedale Mach 9 was that company's TOTL in the 80s.
Mission 747 - rare beasts!
Really? The AR3a was AR's TOTL model at that point? Wow...
I'm just surprised to hear that because my W60E's are comparable to the AR3a's (and are from the same era with a similar design), but the W60E was not Wharfedale's TOTL speaker at that point... They had two models that were even bigger. In the late '60's they had the W90, and then they had that W80 Variflex model in the early '70's. I think those were Wharfedale's two TOTL models.
So, when did AR introduce a model that was bigger than the AR3/AR3a? I have to think there was something bigger in between the introduction of the AR3a and the much-later AR9... (like maybe in the '70's or early '80's). I don't know a whole lot about AR's model-history, aside from knowing which ones were the most-popular in terms of sound-quality.
Definitely, but you missed one........Marantz HD-88
Marantz HD-880
Marantz DS-940
Marantz Model 8 MKII
Marantz Imperial 9's
Im a Marantz fan =P
How 'bout my LS-X9's (ca 1989)?C'mon, if Technics, Panasonic and Fisher are mentioned for building TOL vintage speakers, there are some Kenwoods of that era that deserve being mentioned, that's for damn sure! Can't forget the LS-1900's too.:yes:
Charlie, the post is about TOTL models from each brand. If you know the kenwood TOTL models through the years, by all means, mention them. You may want to rethink dismissing technics speakers, the models mentioned were very serious gear. One of the models was about 350 lbs each and around 45k a pair, IIRC. The type of speaker that would probably hold its own with the best ever made.
I'm just accepting nominations at the moment, and will only be updating about once a day from now on.
I expect there to be some debate about specific models. At some point it would be interesting to have a poll thread to rank them all.
The SB9500, 10000, and M10000 were all offered at slightly different times. I think they came in the order they are written, so all three are viable TOTL. I agree completely, about only one. For instance, when the Everest was introduced at JBL it was the ONLY model that could be considered TOTL. Where it gets tricky is knowing what was TOTL from year to year.
I'd say something like teh RS-1A/RS-1B would be considered 1.