vintage vs modern speakers

[RTally]

One reason I prefer vintage over new is that I can have speakers that sound as good as or better than new speakers, but at one-tenth the cost. For example, to my ears, my 30 year old Paradigm 5se sound better than my Paradigm Monitors that are newer. And the 5se speakers cost me 1/10 of what I paid for the Monitors when I bought them new.

 

[borus]

rxonmymind is right vintage over new or new over vintage it really depends on when the line was drawn. The 70's is when the math started to be used, but the 80's is when the computers were brought into the design room. Should say early 80's by the mid 80's the dreaded "digital ready" began and the industry knew they could sell without innovating because everything sounded better on "CD". Think of the and plasticized paper, Bextrene and Nomex cones, Nomex formers, flat wound and hex voice coils, Vented pole and re-chamber tweeters. All came wide spread in the early 80's This was also the time of monster receivers, near by highfi stores doing turntable clinics so consumers could get better sound and know that the old speakers were not up to what was available. The industry gave up on being better and went for cost effectiveness. So I think the vintage or new would need some time line thinking, the 5.1 systems to me are new and yet there are 5.1 systems that are almost 30 years old. I'll stop now...

 

[FluxT]

Unlike cars or computers, the difference between a speaker from 2018 and a speaker from 1968 is a bit more subjective. Obviously, your average speaker nowadays can handle a lot more power and probably handle deeper bass and play louder than their 1968 brethren. But music doesn't really follow numbers and graphs, and a vintage loudspeaker could simply be more engaging to listen to, in spite of or even because of it's shortcomings. My late '70s Fishers are wayyy more fun to listen to than my modern Polk monitors. There's just something about the sound that makes the music more compelling and enjoyable to my ears, but the Polks do very well for critical listening and cleansing my sonic palette.

 

[tubed]

Depending on the availability of the coveted classic speakers, one might be stuck buying "new".

 

[roadrunnerx]

Depending on the availability of the coveted classic speakers, one might be stuck buying "new".

For me, not many new large speakers at a real price. I do not like over priced/ Chinese thin cabinet speakers.
It's fun to find a deal and see if it is good or they s**k. Many surprises. I have time, unlike some others, I am retired.
Just me....!

 

[Roboturner91]

To me, the upside of "vintage" speakers is woofer size; as they say, there's no replacement for displacement. It's much much harder to find modern speakers with 8-inch woofer; it's just accepted that people will buy powered subwoofers now and I've never really enjoyed two-channel music listening with a separate woofer. It always sounds like the bass is too detached from the rest of the music.

I have this pair of Celestions - dinky for the time, just a two-way bookshelf with an 8 inch woofer, manufacture date 1985, retail price $250. Adjusted for inflation that would be $570 today. I think it would be very difficult to find a pair of speakers currently that sound this good for $570 without getting into a much bigger floorstanding model.

I recently listened to the Klipsch Icon KF-28 - a floorstanding with dual 8" inch woofers. You can get a pair of those for around $550 now. They satisfied me in the impact category for sure but lacked the "musicality" of the Celestions.

 

[rxonmymind]

Unlike cars or computers, the difference between a speaker from 2018 and a speaker from 1968 is a bit more subjective. Obviously, your average speaker nowadays can handle a lot more power and probably handle deeper bass and play louder than their 1968 brethren. But music doesn't really follow numbers and graphs, and a vintage loudspeaker could simply be more engaging to listen to, in spite of or even because of it's shortcomings. My late '70s Fishers are wayyy more fun to listen to than my modern Polk monitors. There's just something about the sound that makes the music more compelling and enjoyable to my ears, but the Polks do very well for critical listening and cleansing my sonic palette.

Subjective. Yes, at the same time I'll set aside nostalgia for actual performance. In the course of my research I was over on various sites and a poster asked if the Yamaha 1000 was inferior. Several people commented who had mega dollar system in defense of that speaker stating it could "hold it's own" even today. Like you they went on to list their speaker that would be out of reach for mere mortals. Respect.
Which had me asking this question. Take for instance a gent from Russia who has a you tube channel Old player.ru which I'm sure some of you are acquainted with. Now I'm not here speaking on his behalf nor have I ever conversed with him. But in looking at the many, many high end vintage speakers he's acquired I can extrapolate that he has the means to buy any new end high performance speaker. Listening to his gear (via Youtube with all it's fault ) which are MANY I can hear why he like the high end vintage. They sound damn good to this non audiophile ears. Obviously it would be nice to do a side by side comparison with excellent mics of new vs old to really tell. I've yet to find a channel like that.
It would be interesting to compare say, a 1977 Technics SB-10000 to modern horns like the one you see at high end shows. Obviously updating it's caps and so forth to stock status.
Roll a pair into the THE Newport show and do a shootout. Would the mighty JBL K2's leave in the dust?
In a perfect world where we had endless resources of time & money like the Monterey classics car show Concours d Elegance people would show up & we could roll all forgotten vintage Uber high end speakers into a hotel lobby and test them.
It would be a short show for sure. Lol.

 

[FluxT]

I’m always slightly wary of recorded comparisons. They’re good for telling the general differences between two or more speakers, but at the end of the day you’ll be listening to million dollar speakers, as heard by a mic costing a fraction of that, encoded by YouTube, and then reproduced on your speakers that are probably 1/1000th the cost.

Another issue, although I may well be wrong here, is that the super boutique high end market really didn’t exist in the same form that it does now, did it? When I think ultra expensive vintage, I think of the Klipshorn, the EV Patrician, the Pioneer HPM1500, Magnepans, McIntosh anything, or that JBL that looks like a MCM coffee table. Today’s plutocrats are a bit more spoiled for choice!

That being said, as a college student, I’m in a price bracket where I can get good quality vintage or so-so modern gear. If I had the dough and the space, a set of Khorns or MartinLogan electrostats would relegate vintage anything to my B switch, if not Craigslist. But would I have the same satisfaction of running across some hitherto unknown (to me, anyway) gems for a steal, cleaning the cabinets, repairing the crossovers, and own something that’s increasingly disappearing from the modern world? To have the grin-worthy joy of hearing classic designs pound out modern music with the slightest ease? To me, that’s a decent part of the fun here.

 

[mr_light]

The last speakers I bought NEW were my Yamaha NS-1000Ms that I bought in 1981 (I still have them). I auditioned dozens of speakers at the many stereo stores at the time and felt I had done my homework and I've been very happy with them. The effort of tracking down dozens of full range speakers these days would be very difficult these days even the in Washington DC area. Evaluating new speakers is just too much effort for me. I do have about a dozen pairs of vintage speakers that I've picked up through the years based on the recommendations of others.