foxwelljsly
Me too, I ate one sour too.
Anyone used these speakers from the late 90's and early naughties? How do they compare to their predecessors, the 104.2 and 105.3?
Cheers
Cheers
I’ve had always hankering after one of the 1990s Reference Models. I bought a pair of the current Reference 1s unheard and they are a delight. The DC mid/tweeter certainly ameliorates my R-L hearing discrepancy and attendant imaging problems created by room reflections. They’re also sweet sounding- where I was expecting a contemporary etched HF presentation.
I had the ref 2.2s fantastic speakers in a fantastic finish, rosseta bur- beautiful. Always regretted selling them, but also hunkered after their bigger brothers. Not a deep speaker as I remember so easy to place.
I absolutely loved them partnered with naim amps at the time I think, beautiful in the right veneer. Wouldn't hesitate if I were ever in the market again.Yeah, the 2.2's are the ones I had in mind. A pair of decent stands for my 103.2's would be £180 and that's well on the way to a pair of these.
I was under the impression that all these speakers were 4r and used conjugate load matching, meaning, as Jez says, any amp can drive them to quite high levels, but might get quite hot doing so or clip a tweeter out of existence if pushed a little too far.I used to sell these at the time they were current and they’re all very, very good. They weren’t an easy load though and require lots of grunt to get the best from them. They’re quite revealing, too. Under-rated and often affordable.
I remember that many amps we had, Naim, Linn, Audiolab, Cyrus were OK on the Ref 1 and 2 but increasingly poor in the 3 and 4. Meridian and DV power amps though were brilliant matches. As for the conjugate loads, I can’t comment, other than, yes, they were 4 ohm loads. No reason why a big Quad wouldn’t be OK, although I haven’t heard one recently so can’t comment on its SQ.I was under the impression that all these speakers were 4r and used conjugate load matching, meaning, as Jez says, any amp can drive them to quite high levels, but might get quite hot doing so or clip a tweeter out of existence if pushed a little too far.
A big Quad power, however, will drive them to phenomenal and clean SPLs.
Would a Quad QSP be man enough?The 3's and 4's need grunt as Pocketkitchen pointed out and quality.
I tried driving mine with a Technics SUA900, very well reviewed and a rival to the original Audiolab 8000A, and it ran out of puff very quickly. Sounded more like a transistor radio on AM.