Monitor Audio Silver 500 7g vs ADS L-810 (and other vintage)

[Djm2_98]

I am in the market for speakers and recently demoed ADS L-810s. Wonderful sound, powered by the Rega Elicit-R. This, of course, led me down the vintage rabbit hole, an area of which I was ignorant, only to discover my father’s generation of high fidelity was actually pretty good.

That said, I hesitated and someone else purchased the L-810s. And, these and others are becoming increasingly harder to find. Even if the prices are not crazy yet (the L-810s with original metal speaker stands sold for $1,300 + tax within a week), search costs (our precious time) are high for those elusive great bargains.

Reason dictates there must be many good, modern speakers that can perform as well or better than the L-810s. I did demo Monitor Audio Silver 300 6Gs, liked them, but leaning towards the Silver 500 7Gs as understand them to be a step up in performance, and more room filling sound.

Have others experience with these speakers (or any modern speaker in the <$3,500/pr category) and how they compare with the L-810s or other ADS larger variants?

 

[Govany]

I haven't heard any of the monitor audio models but when I brought my ads l810s home a couple years
Ago it really opened my eyes as to how good a vintage speaker could sound, I've had dozens of sets of speakers over the years new and old, the ads have a smooth detailed sound with no harshness that I love,

Keep looking a nice pair will turn up when you least expect, and they usually go for less than 1,300

 

[justjed2]

I haven't heard many ADS speakers, and none in my room, so I have no real frame of reference as to their sound. As I recall, the sound quality was about as expected for the systems driving them, but nothing really stood out, to me.

That said, the first-gen Kendalls, from the new KLH Audio, are about as good as anything I've heard that didn't cost 5 figures. I think they were a bargain, at $1500 new, but, they're discontinued. However, the big river site has them, in walnut, for just over 1K/pr.

There is a new model, the Kendall 2F, but it's a completely different speaker. And it's $2K/pr.

 

[blademan13]

Interesting question and one which I hope brings a lot of input. I have 2 pairs of ADS, 620’s and 1290/2’s. I do not get the chance to listen to many new speakers, but I did listen to a pair of Monitor Audio Silver 100’s paired with an SVS SB1000 sub at a buddy’s house. I estimate this as a $2k system? He was quite proud of the system. From what I heard it was simply ok. It was similar to my 620’s, nowhere close to my 1290/2’s. Just not as involving. I am sitting here typing this listening to some Marshall Tucker through a pair of Polk Monitor 12’s that sound more impressive to my ears than that Monitor/SVS system did. My advice is to be patient and wait for a nice pair of ADS
to surface. I am sure the 500’s are very good, whether they are 5x better based on price only you can decide.

 

[Tom Brennan]

I had a pair of 6th generation Monitor Audio Silvers and I think they're first rate cone and dome type speakers. They had excellent tone balance and clarity and could throw a large and deep soundstage. Bass was surprisingly robust for a small woofer and the midrange and vocals were very good. Throughly modern speakers and if you go small cone and dome from what I've heard I think you have to go Harbeth to significantly best them. Oh, but don't forget the PSB Passif 50, that speaker is something else and definitely worth seeking out and giving a listen. The JBL Studio 698 is an inexpensive tower speaker that impressed the Hell out of me but that's cone and horn, not cone and dome.

My MAs were replaced by Altec 604Es which are a whole different type of speaker.

I didn't care much for ADS speakers back in the day--they were zippy on the high end and though not obnoxious were on the edge. I haven't heard the things in years.