Hi Andrew,

As a formal owner of original Quad ESL 57 speakers, I can say there is no comparison between a conventional speaker as the Penta and electrostatic speakers from Quad.

The ESL63 is a dipole and it drives the room in a completely different way. You cannot really compare the amount of energy pumped into the room between a dipole speaker and a conventional box speaker. The panels spray energy in a almost equal quantity forwards and behind. Although Peter Walker added delay lines to the ESL63 in comparison to the original’s, this was creating a more virtual point about a foot behind the speakers.

Electrostatic speakers are not reproducing deep bass, are tricky to position in your room but the level of inner detail is tremendous. Its one of the best speakers ever produced, if you really enjoy listening to music and not the sound itself. The only conventional speaker that gives me the same experience was the BBC speaker, a pair of Spendor BC1s.

The Penta’s are active speakers. They lack a bit in details and have a tendency to focus on width rather than instrumental individuality. But they have a huge soundstage, nice imaging and a powerful reproduction of the lower frequencies. The highest frequencies could be more crispy and precise, but my BL8000 are having the same lack.

If your having a B&O system, go for Penta’s. They will give you more musical enjoyment then combining the ESL speakers with B&O. To my view, only the BL5 beats the Penta in the whole 2015 B&O speaker line, but at what collosal expence.

Chris

Thanks Chris, that's really useful - the plan was to have two systems - I'm considering using a valve amp to drive the speakers fed from a turntable and AE/DAC and have a speaker switch so that for movies via my projector I could switch to the B&O system and control the source and sound through the link system - in a way sort of combing the two. For music it would be the valve amp and turntable and AE/DAC

The Penta's I have are the beovox ones so wondering if the active might just be a better overall compromise and ditch the valve amp? - I dont particularly like deep bass as it could travel next door and most of the time it would be for listening to music.

ESLs are wonderful speakers but as said above, need dedication! The other speaker compared top them is the BBC LS3/5A , a pair of which I use regularly. They share the lack of bass (I use two sub-woofers with them) and a fantastic rendition of the human voice. The ESL is very fussy as far as position ing is concerned but if set up properly, gives a sound like no other. It is not really for heavy rock though!! I have played with pairs and nearly bought some many times but I am not happy with the compromises needed to fit them in my house. Use the Pentas!

Hi

Thanks both, yes I've done some reading up and the room they would have gone into isn't big and they wouldn't have the space behind them - so I think Peter maybe right and stick with the penta's - well at least until I have heard how they sound in the space and how the BM sounds too - problem is I am having this need to experiment with classic kit! The LS3/5A and the Spondors from around the same period sound like they might be good also, however will stick with Penta's. Thanks again.

Understand your desire to play with the past...I have a little tube amp and, get this, an old Karlson cabinet loaded with an Allied Radio "triax" 12 inch driver (triax meant center horn, whizzer cone, and woofer).

If you can't get the Quads away from the wall they are definitely not the right speaker. Same goes for any dipole regardless of technology, such as the Magnapan types. Dipoles are remarkably placement sensitive, they will tell you where they want to be and sound underwhelming anywhere else. If you want to experiment with dipoles the bottom of the line, cheapest Magnapans are wonderfully good for the price, and are light enough you can push them up against the wall and pull them out when you want to listen.

BTW, Quads won't play loud, and they are very good at telling you how loud is too loud as the panels start arcing with an audible pop on peaks. If you get them, DO NOT IGNORE this, I've seen electrostats overdriven for long periods melt the mylar diaphrams and even catch them on fire. Oops!

I use LS3/5As on AB1s with my 5000 system. This system has a lovely bass to it (the beolab 5000 is quite blousy at times!) and is quite wonderful with the human voice - it is one of those systems that just sound right and sounds good in the next room as well. I do have the Beovox 5000s and 2500s as well but they don't match up to thepathetic little BBC speakers. As Jeff has remarked on with the ESLs, the LS3/5A doesn't cope with being over driven either but still produces a fair volume.  I do still lust for some ESL63s though!

Oh no Peter - what are saying! - I looked at the Ls3's and have always wanted a set - just spent the evening working out where the Quads if I got them would go and how I could move the room around - fortunately I am a bit of a minimalist but the room is even more so! I am tempted as I love the look and thought of them so much that even if I got them and kept them six months I could always sell them if they didn't sound good in the room? - maybe a BL Sub would provide the bass? - thinking connect the quads to the passive outputs of the BM6500 and sub to the Powerlink sockets? Forget the valve amp - problem is that as I get older I find that it is the voices and clarity of midrange than I find more important than bass - and I am just getting into Jazz. It's so exciting to have a proper music room (even if it is 6 weeks away), albeit a small one after 20 odd years of living in a one bedroom flat.

the magneplanners look spectacular but I dont think we can get them in the UK?

What is good is that all this kit that in the 80's you could only ever dream about is suddenly a reality - my love of B&O will probably never cease but my curiosity about what else it out there is suddenly awakened - to partner bits of quality stuff with B&O seems a natural course - still want a Revox B77 too

I was back in london at the weekend and had a chance to listen to my Pentas again - they are so good after listening to music through a BV8, BV6 and BL2000!

I just sold my ESL, absolute nightmare to set up properly in the room, and they take up so much space.

Quite a lot of modern direct radiating (conventional) speakers which are far better in my opinion!

Well, the Quads are one of the speakers that, if you like to swap out gear and play with hifi, you definitely should probably own if possible. Either them, or the Dahlquist DQ10 or a Magnaplanar, but especially the Quads. Even if you don't keep them for long, it's such an icon it's nice to have them at least once. They are hard to setup right though, and pretty picky about amplification, cheap solid state amps that have borderline stability need not apply! Even with the transformers too capacitive of a load for many amps.

I got my exposure at the store I worked at, we had a pair in on trade we used to demo against the DQ10. Even though the DQ10 didn't have thunderous bass it was better than the Quads, but oh my, the midrange on the Quads was something. I loved having the chance to listen to them, but never thought I'd be able to live long term with the compromises, however that depends on musical taste and such. I know many people who lived with them for years and years and could never go to something else.

Speaking of electrostatics, we had a guy bring in a Phase Linear amp, the first Bob Carver company (he started Carver to compete with Phase Linear after his wife ran off with his business partner and took the company away from him from the stories I heard). They were so unstable they earned the moniker Flame Linear. We had some Stax electrostatic headphones, this guy brings in this amp to try with them. Errr, uhhh, we don't recommend hooking them up to these headphones! Nah, says he, it'll be fine, I've researched it! No, we really don't think it's a good idea but if you insist. So he hooks up, and sits there listening to the headphones. Suddenly I sniff the smell of frying electronics, the notice a stream of smoke coming off of the right channel transistor board, and then blam! Amp goes dead with a big stream of smoke. You broke my amp!!! Well, you didn't want to listen to us!

So, make sure your amp can handle the load if you do go with them.