Hello all, I own a set of 63's, which the 988's are simply a "newer" version, read: now made in China :( version of the 63's. The 989 have two extra panels (6 instead of 4) which deliver more bass.
I believe these electrostatics are usually considered fast due to the light weight of the material that is being driven, there are no wires, coils or magnets attached to the mylar, nothing other than a thin layer of graphite type coating to help reduce charge migration, thats it. Conventional speakers consist of all kinds of materials, from poly plastic, carbon fibre, titanium and now kevlar. All this is MUCH heavier than a sheet of unhindered 2u mylar. (The Quad mylar makes plastic food wrap look like a persion carpet in thickness for comparison) This all equates to no / low speaker intertia, therefore in theory, faster, more accurate response. FYI: I repair ESL's. These speakers are very flat on the EQ, and are very natural and hair raisingly revealing. However, for the rock music fan who loves bass, they simply cannot deliver the SPL. They are also not overly efficient (~86 dB IIRC). Also, amplifiers that don't like strange impedence loads, i.e. drug store brand amps, need not apply, the amp will likely get smoked. (the impedence drops to below 2 ohms at ~ 18K Hz mark and the protection mechanism in the speaker does its job by shorting the speaker inputs, delivering a 0 ohm load to the amp) Simply put, to get more bass out of the 63 / 988, your options are: 1 - Upgrade to 989's (or the newer 6 panel ones w/ the pretty brace on back, cannot remember model off top of head, sorry) 2 - Gradient. If you are looking for a sub, this is it, period. If you find one, make sure you get the gradient crossover also. Now for other considerations which I've tried with no / limited / odd success: 1 - the 63's / 988's are not very rigid, and flex a little with high SPL / bass. You can either use pony up for some Arcici stands or put a stack of magazines on the speaker tops to increase mass, or make your own stands. 2 - Speaker placement. Gradients are dipoles because the Quads are dipoles. Try placing them somewhere in the room / in respect to the wall to attempt bass reinforcement. Play your favourite music and move about the room also helps find the best spot. 3 - With strange success, you can try a crossover like the Bryston 10B and combine w/ a mirage bi-polar speaker, like an OM-200 or 400. With the phase adjustment on my 200, I was able to better match the "speed" of the Quads and make it a little more natural, but I don't have a 10B at the moment and therefore I have overlap of the lower freq, not quite right, OM-200 back to HT room. Thats my 0.02$ worth. Cheers! -- darkglobe ------------------------------------------------------------------------ darkglobe's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=10938 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=33981 _______________________________________________ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
