My appetite has been wetted for altec.

[rosypup]

It happened yesterday when I hooked up a pair of edgar wooden horn with altec 802-8t drivers. Using some regular woofer with it. Don't even have a crossover. I don't know much about electronics. My friend gave me a 20uf capacitor, I gather, to put on the wire to the driver.

I could not believe how good it sounded. The sound basically coming from the driver/horn. I played Dylan from the essential cds, and it was so realistic.

I have a pair of valencias that sound good, but I guess I could improve them.

I have a big single corner altec speaker. Anyone know about it? Looks to have amulti-cell horn in it. I need another one.

And I know someone with a extrememly rare Western electric speakers, so I've heard the absolute best in putting sound in a room. He believes altec is about as close as can be had to it.

Where do I go from here? A certain vot? or certain drivers/horns? The best and some affordable options?

[djnagle]

Hi John, glad to see you made it. Just so you know, half the time I use the 300B amp I got from you to drive the Omega 3R at my computer, and the other half of the time I drive 511/515B VOTTs. Dennis Nagle

[rosypup]

Surprise. Hi Dennis,

I meant to tell you that I've been enjoying the speakers I got from you.

I"m using a straight 6sn7/300b, the first amp that my friend built, with the 808/edgar combo. There's more available for trade. Super stuff: 45, 10y, and various 300b's with those special vintage opt's. I just don't think there is anything like them.

I just did a double check listening to the 808/edgars against a few other speakers I have, audiophile speakers. It's definitely better.

I wonder if I need to go to a full vot or just pick up some high quality drivers and horns. Do I go with altec horns or say some wooded horns?

This thursday, I'm going to hear the WE's again, for the 4th time. Besides John and myself, we're bringing someone else who has just replaced his aer drivers with altecs in his horns.

I'm curious to see what he thinks of the we's.

[Mirrophonic Sound System]

<<This thursday, I'm going to hear the WE's again,>>

Give us a report on the sound of this W.E. system as well as component model numbers etc.
- should be interesting

I've just been doing some Western Electric listening tonight too:
Last night it was the DVD of "42nd Street" (1933 Western Electric/Vitaphone recording).
And tonight "Club Nation Ibiza" (2 CD set from the UK 2002) - As usual, W.E. delivers the ultimate for synth
and female vocal with very natural sibilance

[rosypup]

It;s my fourth time listening to these speakers. I find it is a great opportunity for me.

The name Western Electric did not proceed my first listening to them. It was the speakers themselves that taught me how good WE is.

I had heard them first when going to this person's house to hear another set of speakers he was selling. I noticed these other speakers and asked him to play them.

This is my fourth listening session. I came with especially keen ears to try to figure them out.

If I was extremely versed in all of what altedc offers than I could have an even better comprehension of them.

The speakers are the ones in the first pic here. The specs are there. They were "telephone" speakers.

http://www.audioanthology.com/audio2.htm

What was my impresion this time? I can say I am never disappointed in thinking these are the best speakers that I've ever heard. I have stated previously that the whole idea of stereo seems to disappear and they just present the voice and the sound in the room.

This time I could say that I noticed an "effortlessness" in the speakers ability to put the voice of the person in the room, or an effortlessness to put the music in the room.

This time I heard an lp rcording with Ray Charles and Betty Carter. I never heard anything like it. It was like the two voices perfectly apart yet both perfectly present and intertwined in a duo.

I had heard one voice before, and the accapella voices. But this time with two distinct voices , the way it was presented, it was remarkable to me.

The last time I had been there I had brought something with Donald Byrd on trumpet. I wanted to hear Donald Byrd again and he had an lp by him.

What I had posted previously elsewhere was that the speakers put the person or instrument in the room, plain and simple. The put it between and behind the speakers. There are no bells and whistles, imaging or soundstaging effects or whatever. The job of putting the voice or music in the room is just done.

I'd also have to say that whatever the term is: timbre, I can't think of the other word right now, the voice is as natural as I have ever heard.

The speakers are amazing and they have the most potential of any speaker I know. This guy voices them in his own particular way. He has alot of expertise to voice them to play the voice as simple and uncomplicated as possible.

I'm sure I would be voicing the speakers differently. If I did so, they might not quite have the same characteristics of doing voices so naturally well, but they might be doing some other things pretty amazingly well.

[Steve Schell]

It has struck me for some time now that it is a real shame that the U.S. government drove Western Electric out of the loudspeaker business-not once, but twice. A consent decree in 1937 forced the divestiture of ERPI and All Technical. Another in 1949 resulted in W.E. ceasing manufacture of all their fabulous postwar speakers. **** .

I suppose the guv't had their reasons. In the 1930s, W.E. was reportedly tyrannical and monopolistic in their domination of the motion picture theatre sound business. I'm not sure what the problem was in 1949. What is clear to me is that the average quality of sound enjoyed by consumers in 2004 positively ***** compared to what it could be, and I wonder how things may have proceeded differently had not the guv't. acted against W.E. in the way they did.

Enthusiasts in 2004 should not have to collect 55 to 75 year old speakers to enjoy the finest in sound!

[MikeInNH]

WE really had a BIG unfair advantage over other companies who wanted to make speakers. WE which later became AT&T could design and make speakers at a loss for years. Other companies couldn't do that. They'd be out of business.

Remember it was WE that applied for a Monolopy license from the Government. It wasn't forced upon them. With that license meant that they had to give up all other businesses that were NOT directly related to the phone business. Otherwise it was a unfair competition for anyone else wanting to get into those businesses.

[Mirrophonic Sound System]

Consider America's unique place in the world in the 1920s:
You had an unprecedented investment boom; a telecommunications monopoly
with 'unlimited' intellectual & fiscal R&D capital (drawing on the braindrain from bankrupt
postwar Germany - amongst other places); unlimited manufacturing prowess -- it's a mystery where
Western Electric speakers & Amps
were manufactured - in a W.E. plant in New jersey? Ohio? or Illinois?
This of course adds to their mystique - not to mention the limited production
and price-no-object quality (subsidized by AT&T's then bottomless pockets). Is this why
they were (initially) only leased to theaters and carried the label:
"This Equipment Remains the Property of Electrical Research Products Inc." ?

To see this label, click on 'Member Rated'