Your vintage audio bargains. Show us pics.

[DanielT]

I picked up a pair of the same Tannoys at a charity shop back in the 90s. I was browsing when I saw them being carried into the shop. Followed the chap up to the counter and asked how much. £25 sealed the deal. Have to agree, the 10" 2528 driver sounds rather good. I have a pair of the newer Tannoy DMT10 monitors too, which are definitely more accurate and go louder, but the older T-225s definitely have a certain something.

My rant below is based subjective listening experiences on my part so take them for what they are.

I have a hypothesis about what I find appealing with my Tannoy t225s. They color the sound and for some reason I find that appealing.
Which is little weird if the coloration is due to high distortion, which I suspect is the case. I should get tired of listening then instead, but I don't (note a lot of speculation on my part now, most likely just waffle).

With a couple of 45 year old speakers with compression drivers in the coax the risk of high distortion is imminent.
65 dB is for me a normal almost a bit high normal listening volume with my Tannoys BUT I was at a friend's house yesterday and we listened to his very low distortion Quad ESL-2805 and I felt that at 75 dB (we measured ) they had lower volume than my Tannoys.
We have similar listening rooms in terms of size and furnishings.

Distortion can make us perceive the sound as louder. Guessing my old Tannoy have around 3-5% distortion in the area we are most sensitive to distortion. That if I play them at 65-75 dB level.

Eletrostats can have really low distortion and my friend's Quad ESL-2805 is no exception:

Fig.10 shows the spectrum of the ESL-2805's output while it reproduced a 1kHz sinewave at 86dB SPL at 1m. The only harmonics that can be seen are the second, at –72dB (0.025%); the third, at –76dB (0.015%); and the eighth, at –78dB. And while a subharmonic can be seen at 500Hz—as I said in my Richard C. Heyser Memorial Lecture to the Audio Engineering Society in October 2011 (footnote 1), panel speakers behave in a mathematically chaotic manner, which leads to the production of subharmonics—this lies at –70dB (0.03%).

Quad Reference ESL-2805 loudspeaker Measurements

Sidebar 3: Measurements

www.stereophile.com

Another aspect that can indicate high distortion from the Tannoy t225 is that it makes absolutely no difference what amplifier I drive them with. It sounds exactly the same. I tested the budget Pioneer SA 540 amplifier I showed in #71. A cheap little entry-level amp from 1983. Nope, no difference compared to my other amps. And how could there be any difference heard? The Tannoys are easy to power up and drive with their 8 Ohm and 90 dB sensitivity. I don't drive any of my amps into clipping with those speakers and at the volume I listen to. Thus hearing any difference between my amps IF the speakers have 3-5% distortion is then impossible to do.

Edit:
Of course, I can only imagine everything or remember wrongly.

I might add that my friend's Quad ESL-2805 sounded really good but they are in a different league and price range than my Tannoys.

 

[DanielT]

The condominium association provides a storage room where we who are part of the association have the opportunity to place and pick up stuff for free. A good recycling idea I think.

Now I found these in storage. Plus speaker cable with banana plugs.
I'll hook up the speakers later today. I hope they work. The surface and the drivers look good, although they are a little dusty.

Did you know that Dali speakers have right-left markings. This despite the fact that they are symmetrically constructed. I wonder why?


If they work then damn it's the best HiFi- find I've made.

Used Dali ZENSOR 1 Bookshelf speakers for Sale | HifiShark.com

Used Dali ZENSOR 1 Bookshelf speakers for sale on 400+ second hand hifi sites & shops. Use Hifi Shark to monitor pricing and global availability

www.hifishark.com

This is impressive measured performance for a budget loudspeaker.—John Atkinson

DALI Zensor 1 loudspeaker Measurements

Sidebar 3: Measurements I used DRA Labs' MLSSA system and a calibrated DPA 4006 microphone to measure the DALI Zensor 1's frequency response in the farfield; and an Earthworks QTC-40, with its small, ¼" capsule, for the nearfield responses. (The small capsule doesn't interfere with the airflow.)

www.stereophile.com

Edit:

They work. Good sensitivity. Not quite as much as my Tannoys but they probably have upwards of 88dB sensitivity as John Atkinson measured. Zensor 1 sounds good. I turned the treble tone control down a bit. Of course, not much for bass, but apart from that they are quite ok.