Tas volume 1_issue_1

the absolute sound
volume1 number1 spring 1973

Volume 1, Issue 1
The Absolute Sound is edited in Sea Cliff, New York; published and mailed from
Euclid, Ohio, each February, May, August and November.
Subscriptions available at $8 a year (four issues) from The Absolute Sound, Box 115,
Sea Cliff, New York, 11579. All foreign countries (excluding U.S. possessions and
Canada), $10 a year, in U.S. currency. Subscriptions cover current publishing year,
including back issues.
©Harry Pearson, 1973
All Rights Reserved
No part of The Absolute Sound may be reprinted without the written permission of
the publisher.
Publisher Harry Pearson
Manager David A. Black
Editor____ Aurelie Dwyer
Music Her bert Sucoff
Cover Gary Viskupic
Layout Design Fred R. Clark
Consulting Editors John W. Cooledge
Harry F. Lavo
Consultant Theodore W. Black
·2·

Viewpoints _
The Sound
Components in Review _~__ ~_~~ __~~ ~ _
ADC XLM
Dayton-Wright LOlldspeaker ~ _
Citation 11a
Double Advent System _
Phase Linear 700
CapSllIes _~~~~.~ ~~ _
4
6
6
10
14
18
22
25
The Reference System ~ ____ 25
The Music
Stefan Wolpe: A Musical Unicorn 28
Records and Tapes __
The Ampex Dolby Tapes __...
CREDITS & SOURCES
_ 33
33
• In preparing this issue, The Absolute Sound interviewed Larry Zide, editor of "db"
magazine; Bert Whyte of Audio Magazine; Mike Wright of Dayton-Wright; Robert Carver
of Phase Linear; and Lee Kuby and Dick Auerbach of Harman/Kardon. We shamelessly
plucked their minds for technical information. None of the men mentioned above are, in
any way, affiliated with this magazine, nor are they responsible for any errors we may
have made. Likewise, they are not responsible for any of our judgments. They have their
opinions; we have our.,.
• The equipment reviewed in this issue was purchased by the reviewers.
POINTS OF INFORMATION
• The manufacturer's comment from Dayton-Wright was received too late for
publication in this issue.
• We could not find space for the London-Decca cartridge review in this issue. We
opted not to run reviews of the Sony TTS-3000 and 3000a because both turntables have
been discontinued by the manufacturer. The SME 3009 II tone arm has been improved
to achieve lower mass and, accordingly, we decided not to review the older version.
- 3-

• Reader want ads will begin in the next issue, at a cost of 15 cents a word (zip code,
telephone numbers, box numbers count as one word). The want ad deadline is April 1.
Dealer classified ads will also be accepted at a cost of 25 cents a word.
• Letters to the editor are welcome. Be advised: We will not correct the grammar and
spelling. We have enough difficulties with our own.
PREVIEWS
• The next issue will be largely devoted to an analysis of speaker systems. Among
others, we shall review the Hl3geman I, the JansZen 412 {hpj, the Audio Research
Magneplanar, the I<LH 9 Double System. This schedule is not set in concrete. We may
substitute components of new vintage and delay reports of older equipment for a later
issue.
• In the music end of the magazine, we shall in the next issue publish an essay on the
present {and lousy} estate of the orchestral musician. Or non·musician, as the case may
be. We shall also continue with our assessment of the Ampex open·reel Dolby tapes.
['/iewpointl ]
The title of this magazine is part of what
it's all about. The absolute sound is the
sound of music itself.
It is far from easy, though, to discuss
this subject rationally. Because you have to
assume that there is, philosophically or
otherwise, an absolute in the reproduction
of music. A referential reality.
Unfortunately, we are all lost in a sea of
relativity and a world without absolutes,
which is what, for better or worse, we wind
up calling modern. But just because we
assume, or even believe, there are no abso-
lutes doesn't necessarily mean there aren't.
The audiophile ought to know this
better than anyone. That he doesn't is a
triumph of numbers and measurement over
sense {in this case, aural sense, or the ear}.
How many times has High Fidelity assured
us that the speakers it tests are "utterly
transparent and neutral, without a hint of
boxiness" and yak·yak-yak. The answer is,
too many times. Because it is to High
Fidelity's commercial advantage to be rela-
tive, instead of absolute - Absolutes are
Offensive.
We have no brief against measurements
and numbers. They are sometimes revealing,
but, just as often, they are confusing. The
ear is an infinitely more subtle and sophisti·
·4·
cated measuring device than the entire
battery of modern test equipment. Some-
times even the best of the laboratory people
aren't certain of how to correlate what they
measure with what they hear. All of this is
to say that audio measurements are, at this
point, rather like the Minnesota Multiphasic
Personality Test, which may give you inter-
esting insights into a person (in the same
sense that astrology does) but don't come
close to giving you the sense of what a
person is like.
We will, of course, use numbers and dis-
cuss theory when we feel like it, but, by and
large, the ultimate reference point is how
well the components, or records, or discs
reproduce the sound of music. Since all of
our reviewers are inveterate concert-goers,
they are familiar with th'J absolute sound of
music in all of its personas (bad halls, good
ones, and in between l.
All of which brings us to certain guiding
principles behind this magazine:
• In the Reference System, we will also
list our consensus on what makes up the
state of the art in components.
• Obviously, we aren't going to list
what we haven't heard. We at The Absolute
Sound have a profound distrust of instant

analysis and careless AlB switching arrange-
ments. There is a difference between what
sounds good on a quick listening and what
sounds natural over the long haul. Many
reviewers, for example, profess to hear no
difference between certain highly esteemed
pre-amplifiers and basic amplifiers (e.g.,
Julian Hirsch on the Phase Linear 700).
What such assertions show us is either a tin
ear (Mr. Hirsch} or someone who doesn't
know how to listen to music. We do not
pretend to argue that it is easy to develop a
golden ear, since that takes time and experi-
ence, but we think anyone can, given the
will and a bit of patience,
• We will, among ourselves, disagree
from time to time and annotate those dis-
agreements. (At the end of each equipment
review, the audio reviewers may choose to
add addenda to the basic review, supple-
menting, complementing or shredding.)
Such disagreements are likely when you
consider the fact that all components are
imperfect and that the real subjective choice
in assembling good high-fidelity systems
comes with the choice of which particular
imperfections you can bear over the long
run.
We anticipate that the magazine will
carry, in forthcoming issue, a full battery of
letters to the editor, that there will be COn-
siderable diversification in the kinds of
equipment we review and that we continue
our policy of searching out either the most
lifelike or, just for fun, the most spectacu-
lar-sounding discs and tapes to commend to
your tender mercies.
The subject of accepting advertising has
caused some soul-searching here. And not
for the reasons you might think. Our staff is
composed of professionals from many walks
of life, We are well-paid. We are not pub·
lishing The Absolute Sound for profit, but
for love. Its expenses are being met by the
sale of subscriptions. Now this is not true of
High Fidelity, Audio, Stereo Review, or, for
that matter, any newspaper you can name.
In most cases, subscriptions barely pay the
cost of circulating the average magazine or
newspaper. The advertising actually subsi-
dizes the cost (your cost) of getting the
magazine written, published and mailed
(plus, of course, a small profit). Since the
advertisers then become investors in the
magazine, they are essential to its continued
publication. Audiophiles, like most others in
this country, have an instant distrust of
advertising. It somehow corrupts and so the
magazine without advertising is, by defini-
tion, somehow purer and more honest than
the one without. It is a lovely selling point.
- 5-
It isn't true, though, that advertising
itself corrupts. It is the need, or the greed,
for advertising that does the corrupting. We
don't need it, and we really can't imagine
why any advertiser in his right mind would
want to buy space in The Absolute Sound,
since such an offer would probably make
our iconoclasts doubly critical of his prod-
ucts (just to make sure we were not, in fact,
being soft where we should be hard). We see
no special purity in rejecting advertisements.
Either you will sellout or you won't. The
ads are not the determining factor anymore
than, say, the absence of legal liquor is a
barrier to alcoholism. We noted, with more
than a little amusement recently, that J.
Gordon Holt's magazine, The Stereophile,
which does not accept advertising, would
henceforth be accepting dealer advertising -
something it had been doing in its want-ad
columns for some time. But, for the record
and for the time being, we intend to let the
subject rest in peace and play whatever
there is to play by ear. What this means, in
plain English, is that we will not accept
manufacturer's advertisements. Pax.
•
And now for a few words about what we
are not. We do not intend to compete with
other publications. For example, we com-
mend The Stereophile, J. Gordon Holt's
publication, to the attention of any of our
readers who are not familiar with it ($5 a
year, P.O. Box 49, Elwyn, Pa. 190631. It is
an excellent if somewhat occasional On its
publishing schedule) magazine for the audio
perfectionist.
We have set about, in this issue, spelling
out our biases and preferences. Our main
concern is with music - its performance, its
politics, its reproduction. We see little pur-
pose in pursuing audio as a goal in itself
(although many people do just this), but
only in pursuing audio as a goal along the
way toward our increased appreciation of
music.
Therefore, we expect the music section
of this magazine to be just as iconoclastic as
its audio section. We will introduce you
(perhaps) to little-known composers and
sometimes little-known compositions. Our
bias is toward the music of our time, since
we feel that too few music lovers really live
in this century. We also intend to tell you
how to make intelligent judgments about
performances, compositions and critiques of
music. We do not at present know of any
publication about music that will tell you as
we will in upcoming issues how Stokowski
murdered the American Symphony Orches-
tra; which conductors the musicians respect

and which they don't; which music critics
composers and performers would like to
eliminate.
Because there are other publications
adequate in reporting what is going on in
certain divisions of modern music (Rolling
Stone for rock, for example!, we shall not
compete. In other areas, we will. Jazz, for
example, We have, with purpose, set out to
present the viewpoints that commercial
magazines, for one reason or another, will
not present, and to tell you the truths they
will not tell you.
The component reviews are subjective.
The editor's intent is to tell the person
interested in the reproduction of mu sic
what he might well expect from any given
piece of equipment under home·listening
and use conditions.
Each of the staff's aud io reviewers is
asked to com ment on the basic rev iew of
any component. The presumption is, of
course, that the reviewer has had consider-
able experience with the component being
reviewed. Our reviewers are extremely
independent peo pie - they are free to dis·
sent or agree as vigorously as they choose.
The content of their comment is not edited,
although their grammar, rhetoric and spel·
ling may be. Manufacturers are invited to
comment on the basic reviews lif only in the
na me of fairness); they have been advised
that promotional prose - as opposed to
informational - will be edited out of their
response. If we choose to do such editing,
the following punctuation (. J will
indicate excisions.
Since we will be describing cOlnponents
used in the reference system in this issue,
the reviews will undoubtedly reflect a
certain enthusiasm, which may run afoul of
your Own notions about the reproduction of
sound. The magazine welcomes dissenting
(or agreeing) commentary from its readers.
The staff is particularly interested in the
reliability of components and welcomes
accounts from readers of their joys and
woes with their own equ ipment.
We are disinclined to write extensively
about components which do not meet our
standards. Capsule comm~ntary on such
components, as well as components which
rep resent good (though not necess<1rily
superior) values, may be found at the end of
the review section. These component
reviews are not sent to the manufacturer or
. G·
to the other reviewers for comment.
In each case of a com ponent tested in
the home, we will use listening rooms that
are fairly prosaic - that is, rooms that repre·
sent conditions of average usc for most
listeners.
To insure lourselvesl that the reviews
have validity, we also test each component
in other acoustic environments. We are,
however, primari Iy interested in how com·
ponents sound in average or typical listening
rooms - few of us live in mansions or design
our own music rooms. We are well aware of
the difficu Ities involved in this approach.
Most components are used in less·than·ideal
circumstances and, we feel, a review con·
ducted under optimum conditions would
actually distort the results. A relatively
simple·minded example of this would be a
test of a theater·type speaker in an audio
torium rather than in a number of typical
rooms·in·the·home, Likewise, a test of, say,
the KHL Model Nines in an auditoriul11 or
baronial hall would be equally silly and
useless.
ADC XLM
Manufacturer: Audio Dynamics Corp"
230 Pickett District Rd., New Milford,
Conn. 06776. Price $50.
Cartridge sampling has alw"ys been, for
some of us, a bit like wind tasting. Assuming
that the cartridge is nOI, in some way,
grossly deficient in roproducing the musical
signals engraved on discs, w.: find ourselves
listening for the eharaetnr of " cartridge, for
the WClY it soasons tho sonies.
Some, likc! tlw EnHlish·nlildo Goldring
800 Super E, ;)1''' h<lsic<llly r,ltlwr mellow,
not unlilw a (;1"(J(:k ftHI winn. Others, like
Bank 8, Ollllson's SI' smil!', arn rather dry,
,IIHI whilO almost to till! point of h"relness -

rather like an Italian wh ite wine.
There is even, a sort of characteristic
flavoring - a family semblance - among
cartridges with the same kinds of electrical
generating systems. In the past we have
found ourselves leaning toward the induced
magnet, the moving coil and the variable
reluctance designs just lor sheer sound, and
relying upon moving magnet cartridges for
day·to-day dependability. These differences,
and they are there, were much more
apparent back in the wild old days when the
first and second generation of stereophonic
cartridges were making their appearances.
That the differences were more apparent
then is obviously a function of the aber-
rations of early stereo technology - most
assuredly the result of high-frequency reson-
ances that mercilessly exposed the inherent
sou nd of any given design. Now, of course,
in our present state of enlightment, the
differences among families of cartridges
have gotten just subtle enough to be obliter-
ated by a playback system that isn't.
As some of you may recall, it was ADC
that, in the early '60s produced the first
really good-sounding stereo cartridge (the
ADC1), one that tracked at considerably
lower pressures than most of us thought
possible. ADC said one gram. Call it 1.75.
It wasn't long before the company's
resident genius, Peter Pritchard, announced
a new design for his cartridges, the induced
magnet, and the ADC Point 4. ADC had,
from its very beginning, exhibited a mania
for achieving ultra-low tracking forces and,
to this end, the company tried 2verything,
from extremely small stylus tip sizes (thus,
the Point 4) to very high compliances_ The
induced magnet design was the break·
through that allowed ADC to go even further
in lowering the effective mass at the stylus's
tip and in achieving almost astronomical
orders of compliance. It turned out to be a
blessing and a curse (as do many technical
triumphs). The blessing was the sound,
which was, for the time, incredible. The
curse was the compliance, which was so high
that no commercially available arm (includ-
ing ADC's ownl could help but eventually
twist the stylus shaft into Saarinen curves,
From the company's original 10E (Mk 11
all the way to its S100·wonder, the ADC 25,
its to p-of-the-line cartridges have been
notoriously land inevitablyl susceptible to
stylus·shaft twisting. Most of the time ADC
replaced the stylus - without charge. and
without much courtesy either. Still, the
audiophile who wanted the best in sound
had to put up with a product that simply
did not work for very long.
- 7 -
Over the years, ADC's inattention to
quality control coupled with its wildly com-
pliant cartridges that broke down had the
predictable results: fewer and fewer high-
class audio establishments were handling the
ADC Iine. (There are other reasons as well,
not the least of which is what it takes in the
way of an initial order for a shop to open an
ADC account. And, as we said, ADC is not
the easiest company in the world to do busi-
ness with. Some of their people are infuri-
atingly "sophisticated.") And so, if you
want to find the ADC XLM, you are going
to have to work at it.
For our testing l>lIrposes, we compared
the XLM against the Empire 1000 ZE/X,
the Goldring, the Stanton 681 EE, the
Shure V-15 Type II, the Grado F2, and the
B& O.
Right off the bat, we found that :ADC
had (damn theml come up with a new type
of phono pin on the back of the cartridge,
one that does not - naturally - fit any
known type of clip. It tal<es considerable
ingenuity, if you're careless of finger land
some of us arel to come up with a good
connection to the cartridge shell's lead wires
and particularly SO if that shell belongs to
the SME arm, whose lead wires are no more
substantial than cotton candy. We'd recom-
mend glue. Yes, paste the clips to the phono
pins_ Once you're past that point, you're
ready to listen {Better yet, use the clips
supplied by ADC.}
No, you don't have to worry about the
mass of the SME arm (if indeed you own
one). JWC of Atlanta has, in according with
Mike Wr ig ht's recommendations, pared
away a good bit of the unnecessary metal on
the SME shell, thus effectively lowering the
mass of the ann. ADC says the SME is much
too massive for the XLM cartridge - but we
don't think they know what they're talking
about, since one of their representatives
suggested that the Japanese-made Stax tone
ann would be ideal. The Stax has three
times the effective mass, at stylus tip, that
the SME has. And even if the Stax (which
looks as if it were designed by Japa~'s
answer to the late Rube Goldberg) is cor-
rectly balanced - which some people will
find impossible to do - its effective mass is
reduced only by half. The truth is that there
is no commercially available (separate) tone
arm in this country that has a lower effec-
tive mass than the SME. JWC reports that
the ADC does not bottom the grooves as
notoriously on warped discs once the SME
shell is operated upon, though it still
bottoms, he reports, on the very warp-edest
records (such as RCAI.

For One reason or another, we found
that the new ADC sounds quite unlike any
other cartridge we compared it with. It has
none of the considerable coarseness and
graininess of the Stanton. It does not
exhibit the low end rise ot the Goldring.
Nor, for that matter. does it give strings the
Technicolored warmth that the Grado does.
And, the XLM is quieter than all of these.
What the XLM really does sound like is
the original 10E - a cartridge so perversely
compliant that ADC itself had to come up
with an entirely new land considerably
tougherl stylus assembly, designated the Mk
II. The 10E was, in all probability, the most
pellucid sounding phonograph cartridge ever
made. The XLM might, by comparison, be
called both lean and lush. Wonder of
wonders, the new ADC cartridge has been in
the reference system nOw for four months
and it has survived, quite adequately, some
fairly rough handling from the listening
panel. The only qualification we have -
after all this time - is that, subjectively
speaking, the separation isn't quite as good
as it was when the XLM was new. In the
XLM, ADC has given us a cartridge with
extremely high compliance (yes, it can track
at .4 of a gram), but not one so fragile it
breaks down the moment you look at it
cross-eyed.
We chose to use .6 and.75 of a gram in
our playback tests. With the newest London
discs, which have staggering dynamic range,
the higher force was ideal. Surprisingly, the
XLM tracked those grossly overmodulated
orchestral bells on Shure's indispensable
Trackability Record - the first cartridge, in
our exper ience, to have done so. Bu t that
tells us something about relying On test
discs. For the XLM wou ld not track the
opening passages of Bach Harpischord Con-
certi on Nonesuch {H-710191_ Both the
Point 4 and the Shure Super·Track have
negotiated the wicked opening measures of
that particular disc. Increasing the pressure
made nO difference. The ADC did not sound
clean but rather frazzled.
Still, the XLM sounded appreciably
cleaner than any other cartridge in our
experience on just about every other
monster disc in our collection, including the
horribly difficult Stokowski/London record·
ing of Ives' Second Orchestral Set and the
highly problematic Dorati/Mercury record·
ing of Respighi's "Pines of Rome." This
"cleanness" was very much in evidence on
more subtle and less heavily modulated
record ings such as the Previn/RCA accou nt
of Vaughan William's Ninth Symphony and
the Dorati/EMI account of Sibelius's "En
·8
Saga." There are, on the Vaughan Williams
and the Sibelius, subtleties in the high end
that we had never known discs could repro·
duce - the sort of delicacy in sound that
demonstrates that recording engineers know
something nOw about getting down the
sound of an orchestra that they didn't just a
few years ago.
The XLM's low·frequency response is
absolutely flat (by ear and by test~. The
absence of any sort of warmth (due to a
rise} in the lower regions results in a truly
prodigious reproduction of bottom notes {if
and when you can find them on commercial
recordingsl. This, of course, has always been
a speciality of the house at ADC. But, be
forewarned that this absence of coloration
in the mid-bass region can, at first, make the
XLM sou nd a little less glamorous than
rna ny other ca rtridges - but when it repro-
duces a fundamental, you know it's a funda-
mental. There is no mush there to conceal
the bottom notes. From the mid-range up;
the sound is quite suave, liquid and unbeat·
ably transparent. It is not "transparent" in
the high end as a result of little damping,
oscillation and resonance. The ADC is liquid
and transparent in the real meaning of those
often·abused words, that is, the way the real
thing is liquid and transparent. It is trans-
parent because the instruments of the or·
chestra sou nd rounded, three·d imensiona I,
as if there were a cushion of air behind and
around them. Now the word "suave," in the
sense we find ourselves using it, may refer to
a touch of velvet in the reproduction, some-
thing, we think, you will know ought not to
be there. Perhaps what we mean is that the
ADC is a touch more lush than the real
thing - a touch less alive.
There is a surprising amount of defini·
tion On the very hard, very loud transients -
not brightness, nor that electrostatic edge,
but simply detail that when combined with
the sense of air about the instrumer>ts,
reproduces a surprising fascimile of transi·
ents in a good concert hall (say, Carnegie
rather than Alice Tullyl.
We might add that this sort of Carnegie
sou nd, wh ich helps most cI iscs to sou nd
their best, disappears if you use an
arm/cable/pre,amp combir11ltion of very low
capacitance {try 300 pFl. The sound then
becomes brighter, Illore sharply defined,
indicating, to our cars, that a high-frequency
resonance has come clown into the 15 to 20
kHz range.
The price of the XI..M is half that of
ADC's own Maciel 25. ADC informs us this
is because they are GominH out with a mare
expensive XLM that will sct the audio WOrld

on its ear. We're already on ours, and
frankly, ADC not withstanding, we think it
will be difficult for them to improve on
their cartridge until sonleone issues a tone
arm that helps the XlM to optimu m per-
formance and until we get the new breed of
pre-amp that can take advantage of its
astonishing signal·to-noise ratio. In the
meantime, the XlM will be the standard in
our reference system.
---HP
Manufacturer's Comments:
Since it is almost entirely a subjective
review, it's hard to take issue with, and I
must say that your comment with regard to
the sou nd characteristics of the cartridge
pretty much represents our own opinion.
We do not know who the "representa-
tive" of the company was who provided you
with various pieces of "informatio n" con-
tained in this review, but we would make
the comment that the price of the XLM was
determined by (a) its basic cost of design
and manufacture and (h) by what we believe
to be a fair market price for a top·of·the-Iine
cartridge, many of which we feel have in the
past been grossly overpriced. It does not
represent leaving room, as it were. for the
addition of a later higher·priced cartridge.
When in the future we introduce such a cart·
ridge, as I suppose we inevitably will, its
pricing will be determined by the above
formula.
We quite agree with your comments with
regard to the Stax arm, and the information
that you received should be attr ibuted to
the person involved and not to this com-
pany. In fact, the latest "low mass" SME
would seem to us to be superior. Ironically,
many tone arms incorporated in the top-of·
the·line record changers today have lower
mass and consequently are more compatible
with our high compliance cartridges.
Peter E. Pritchard
President
ADC
Reviewer's Postscript:
The point of the review is that it is almost
entirely subjective. Mr. Pritchard probably
knows only too well that the tests run by
High Fidelity, Audio, and Stereo Review
(which are supposedly objective since they
give you numbers) revealed nothing particu-
larly extraordinary about the XLM, which
is, we suppose, predictable, given the
tinker-toy intellect of most testers.
The editor of The Absolute Sound inter-
viewed the ADC sales representative at the
New York High Fidelity show last fall.
- 9·
There was no confidentiality involved and
so we wouldn't mind revealing our source, if
only we could remember his name. But any
inclination we might have had to remember
vanished in the face of Mr. Pritchard's stern·
ness. We would like to note, though,
without (we hope) seeming quarrelsome,
that ADC was one of the very first to hit the
S100 mark in the price of the ADC 25, a
price only sl ightly mitigated by the fact that
the buyer got three separate styli along with
the cartridge body. We do consider the
pricing of the XLM much more realistic, and
for this the company is to be congratulated.
We know just how much padding goes into
the $67.50 Shure, the S80 Ortofon, the $75
Stanton {etc.) and the padding is excessive,
status or no status.
We agree with the irony of the low-mass
arm in the high-priced changer and pnly
wish Mr. Pritchard would design an up·dated
version of !;lis own ann.
JWC Comments:
I agree that the ADC-XLM is a genuinely
extraordinary cartridge. In fact, I would call
it and the Decca·London ("Mk V") the two
best pickups I know. These two, however,
are remarkably dissimilar in their merits and
a comparison is instructive.
Right away one is struck by the XLM's
astonishing freedom from tracking prob·
lems. This, to me, is its greatest glory. The
XLM will make child's play of records that
inevitably make every other cartridge I
know sou nd frazz led. Just listen to a big
chorus·with-orchestra disc, and you will see
what I mean.
On the other hand, the XLM does not
have the extraordinary clarity and definition
of the Decca-London. The XLM is more
than satisfactory in this regard, to be sure.
In fact, I rate it second only to the Decca·
London in this regard. Nevertheless, the gulf
between the two is rather wide On this
point. Bass response of the two is fairly
similar, the XLM seeming to go a bit deeper,
a nd the Decca-London, a shade better
defined.
One other thing about the XLM sound; I
feel that there is a slight high-end colora·
tion, which, for lack of better terminology,
I liken to a sort of gray-velvet effect. This
coloration does not bother me in the least,
but it is there.
Finally, I think it should be emphasized
that the total mass of the XLM is much
lower tha n previous ADC cartridges, and is
nOw among the very lightest of cartridges. It
was their heavy weight, combined with a
very "floppy" stylus mounting that made

the earlier ADCs virtually useless on records
having any degree of warping. The XLM also
has a "floppy" stylus, but, if used in a suf-
ficiently low-mass arm (such as an SME with
finger-lift and excess metal removed from
the shell, it should behave well on all but
severe warps.
HFL Comments:
I have owned and used as my primary
cartridges ADC models ever since the Point
4. While other cartridges have had their
chance, I have constantly returned to the
ADCs for their natural, warm, unstrained
sound. Yet it has been a love-hate affair for
all the reasons HP points out. As my experi-
ence exactly parallels Harry's description, so
any additional comments on my part are
restricted to building on what he says. These
fall into three categories: what to do if you
already use a ADC 10E or ADC 25,
straight-line tracking, and square wave
response.
First, to owners of older ADC cartridges:
It is ADCs best-kept secret, but you can
upgrade your ADC 10E or ADC 25s to the
new XLM stylus/dampening system simply
by ordering new styli directly from ADC.
The latest styli use the XLM principles (it's
mostly all in the shank/dampening) sound
like the XLM, and don't get damaged after
three months of use like older styli. My
"new" ADC 25 has been used a year and
still sounds as good as new when compared
with an auxiliary styli bought at the same
time. While the XLM is already a bargain at
discount, the styli change at approximately
$20 is certainly the cheapest way to go. Be
sure you get the new styli though, or send it
back - the new ones have a larger fl;Jtter
stylus mount, are shinier metal and are more
conventional looking than the older,
soft-gray rolled aluminum shanks.
Second, a wOrd on arms mentioned as a
limitation by Harry. The Rabco arms (I use
the ST-4l are perfect for this cartridge.
There just is no advantage to tracking over
.5 grams when using the ST-4/ADC XLM or
25 combination. The bass line firmness,
with this arm also seems better than any
others I have heard the cartridges in - in
fact, approaching the clarity of 15 ips mas-
ter tapes in this respect. Over the years
previous to the XLM styli 'series, my ADCs
always sounded sub-optimum; when used
without skating compensation, they were
underdamped and would "shatter" and lose
their separation, and when used with even
slight anti-skate compensation, the square
wave attack was destroyed, the cartridge
sounded a little too "lifeless" for complete
naturalness. And, of course, the stylus dis-
placement or "twisting" was increased in
severity. With these earlier cartridges,
straight-line tracking was needed in order to
realize their full potential in sheer sound
quality. With the XLM this is no longer the
case, although straight·line arms still per-
form best from a tracking standpoint.
Wh ich brings us to the third subject,
square wave response. Very few cartridges
have really good square wave response with
a fast-rising wavefront, a "sharp" plateau
with no ril1ging, and a sharp drop-off. Most
supercompliant cartridges tend to be over-
damped, with a rou nder front edge than
they should have to get a "sharp" square
wave attack from records (the reason being
that cutters cannot cut perfect square waves
themselves). Underdamping slightly can help
create a sense of attack, presence, sharpness
by creating a small, artificial overshoot that
"creates" a sharp wavefront transition. This
is often done by manufacturers (the Orto·
fan SL-15 and the B & 0 12 for example).
but it destroys the ability of these cartridges
to catch the subtle nuances of sound {echo,
phase, etc.) that the superbly compliant and
damped ADC XLMs obtain. To get subjec-
tively perfect "presence" on a percussive
transient, the ADCs must await better
cutters. As Harry points out, they lack ulti-
mate "liveness." But meanwhile, they repro-
duce what is on the record perfectly to
deliver what Harry calls that velvety
"Carnegie Hall sound,/I
Dayton-Wright XG-8
Manufacturer: Dayton-Wright Associates,
50 Industrial Rd., Richmond Hill, Ontario,
Canada. Price.' $1,980 (includes full-range
Electrostatic Speaker System and ST-300
Matching Transformer).
The stereo market has recently seen a
proliferation of speaker systems employing
electrostatic elements for the higher freq-
uencies: to the familiar JansZen line, we can
now add entries from such companies as
Infinity, SAE, Soundcraftsmen, B & W
E.S.S., and Crown, The ranks of full range
electrostatic systems, however, has long
been limited essentially to three units, the
KLH·9 the Acoustech (now discontinued)
and the British-built Quad.
Most of our readers will be familiar with
the main reason for the scarcity of fUll-range
units: Electrostatics are notoriously ineffi-
cient transducers, especially in the low-
frequency region. Electrostatic woofers have
therefore traditionally had to be large and
expensive, ilnd even then capable of pro-
·10 -

dur:ing only relatively modest levels. Now
we have the Dayton-Wright fu II-range elec-
trostat ic system. which employs some
decidedly unusual approaches to these
problems.
In simple terms, an electrostatic speaker
consists of a Iight-weight, electrically-con-
ductive diaphragm (usually a thin plastic
film with a microscopically thin coating of
colloidal graphite or a similar material held
between two parallel, screenlike electrodesI,
forming something like a sandwich whose
outer layers are separated from the inner by
layers of air. The inner diaphragm is then
attached to an external D.C. voltage supply
that charges the diaphragm through a very
high-value resistor {typically 1,000 meg-
ohms) to produce a constznt charge density
on the diaphragm tnnsformer to the power
amplifier, causing them to apply push-pull
electrostatic force to produce metion of the
diaphragm. In such a sy~tem, amplitude
response {"loudness"l is limited by the
spac ing between the two electrode screens,
which form the mechanical limits of the
diaphragm excursion, and by the tendency
of electrical arcing to occur between dia-
phragm and sound-signal electrodes as prog-
ressively higher voltages are applied.
Attempting to design around these factors
becomes problematic: Increasing the spacing
decreases the electrostatic force between
diaphragm and electrode; raising the voltage
to compensate for this brings back the
problem of arcing.
To remedy these limitations, Dayton-
Wright have devised an elegantly simple
ploy. Borrvwing from other areas of high-
voltage technology, Dayton-Wright have
completely filled its speaker system with
sulfur hexafluoride, a nontoxic inert gas
having a dielectric constant far higher than
that of the room air found in conventional
electrostatics. In other words, the XG-8
speaker is completely fi lied with an electric-
ally insulating gas, This has permitted (1)
raising the diaphragm polarizing voltage to
around 10 KV {as compared with around 3
to 5 KV in the KLH·91, and (2) spacing the
electrode screens considerably farther apart
than usual. In practice this gives the XG-8 a
moderate efficiency advantage over conven-
tional full-range electrostatics and a marked
advantage in attainable volume levels.
The importance of the sulfur hexa-
fluoride is not limited to its electrical prop-
erties, however_ In the KLH-9 (for
examplel, approximately 80 to 90 percent
of the radiating surface is devoted to low-
frequency reproduction, while the mid-
range and highs in each panel are handled by
-11
an element having about the size and shape
of a single JansZen tweeter element, KLH's
promotional literature for the 9 speaks of "a
systematic reduction in (radiating I area ...
at high frequencies to preserve allpropriate
directivity at each frequency." While the
point about appropriate directivity at high
frequencies may be valid (this would, of
course, depend upon the spatial and
acoustic properties of the listening room), it
does not tell the whole story.
Lo w f requenpy reproduction is the
m~jor problem of electrostatics, requiring a
great deal more power and radiating surface
than do mids and highs (hence the recent
proliferation of hybrid designs using cone-
type woofersl, Now, as our readers are
likely to know, the lower limit of a cone-
type speaker's response is essentially limited
by its own inherent free-air resonant .freq-
uency, and many types of speaker e'"clo-
sures are designed to "lOud" the woofer
cona with air to improve very-low-frequency
performance (the old bass-reflex and
modern acoustic suspension design are
examples of different ways of doing this!. If
an electrostatic speaker cou Id be similarly
loaded, its low-frequency performance
could also be ilTlproved.
As it happens, the sulfur hexafluoride
used in the XG-8 speaker system has a den-
sity approximately eight times that of room
air, thereby lowering the diaphragm
resonant frequency and providing much
greater mass-loading (while avoiding the
problems of cabinet resonance that plague
ordinary enclosure-type loading designs!. In
turn, the increased mass-loading leads to
much greater low-end efficiency (we are all
fumiliar with the phenomenon of a decent-
sounding cone woofer being removed from
its enclosure and allowed to operate in open
air, whereupon its bass all but disappears!.
The low-end efficiency of the diaphragm
becomes so much greater, in fact, that it
approximates that of its high and mid-range
efficiency, thereby permitting tf1e XG-8 to
be designed as a crossover/ess electrostatic,
producing a full frequency range from all
parts of its radiating surface.
To summarize, then, the unusual aspects
of the XG-8 design; filling the speaker
system with a heavier-than-air gas producing
greater mass-loading of the speaker dia-
phragms; raising their low-frequency effici-
ency and permitting a crossoverless design
unique in commercially available electro-
statics; permitti:1g the use of greater-than-
usual voltages on the speaker elements
thanks to the electrical insulating properties
of the gas, and th is in turn permitting use at

much greater volume levels than is possible
with other full.range electrostatics.
Physically, the XG·8s are not small; the
design innovations outlined above are obvi·
ously used to achieve all·out performance,
rather than to permit tailoring the speakers
for the apartment· dwelling mass market.
The current production units (known as the
XG·8 MK II) stand 39·3/8 inches tall,
39-3/8 inches wide and 9·1/2 inches deep.
Like most electrostatics they are dipolar
radiators: 50 percent of the sound emerges
from the rear, so that they must be placed
at least a foot or so away from any rearward
wall.
Each speaker unit contains eight radiat-
ing cells mounted so that the sound of each
is aimed slight Iy away from the front-center
of the cabinet. The top, bottom and sides of
the cabinet are formed by a single heavy
continuous aluminum extrusion finished a
semigloss black. Inset into the top and sides
of this aluminum surround are pieces of
Oiled walnut (optionall so that the cabinet
actually appears to be constructed of wal·
nut, with conservatively styled ebony mold-
ing around the edge. The back and front
openings of the cabinet are sealed with large
sheets of Mylar film, which serve to contain
the insulating gas (according to the manu-
facturer, these are acoustically transparent
at aud io frequencies!. The standard grill
cloth applied over the Mylar is, at last
report, a rather heavy, coarse-weave black
material.
The two speakers (they are sold as pairs)
are connected via heavy mu Iticonductor
black vinyl-covered cable to the ST-300, a
panel-mountable "black box" (front dimen-
sions, 19 inches by 10-1/2 inches!. weighing
about 90 pounds, which contains the polar·
izing source for the speaker diaphragms, and
two immense transformers for matching the
amplifier output to the high-impedance
speakers. A pi n-connector is provided at the
speaker end of the interconnecting cables,
and an interlock shuts off both the d ia-
phragm polarizing voltage and the audio
signal should either connector accidentally
come loose. The ST-300 also contains three
front panel fuses, for the polarizing voltage
supply and for the two signal leads from the
amplifier.
How do they sound? First, let it be
clearly stated that anyone accustomed to
the power-handling limitations of other elec-
trostatics (including the hybrid designs), will
be completely bowled over by the sheer
volume that XG-8s can produce. A pair of
these speakers can easily absorb the output
of a Phase Linear 700 amplifier driven into
continuous clipping; in an average size
listening room (say 18 feet by 25 feet), the
sound levels in such a situation approach the
threshold of pain. Although the speakers are
nominally rated at 350 watts (RMSI each,
and supplied with 7-1/2 amp signal fuses,
the manufacturer has assured us that this is
primarily based on the nominal capability of
the Phase Linear amplifier, rather than
actual limitations of the speaker.
In a verbal communication, the manufac-
turer has estimated the actual power-hand·
ling capacity of a single XG-8 to be in excess
of 2 KW; for the power-hungry do-it-your-
self man, Dayton-Wright will gladly provide
a diagram for a simple phase-inverter circuit
that will permit the entire output of a Phase
Linear 700 (both channels) to be fed into a
single XG-8. {Such applications naturally
require re·fusing the speakers with higher
values.)
Listening at normal concert-hall levels,
we have reached several conclusions about
the XG-8 sound. First, it appears that the
one-way crossoverless design has paid off in
unusual freedom from crossover network
coloration, musical timbre remaining
remarkably uniform throughout the audible
range and significantly more so than in the
KLH-9. Second - and this I find surprising
- the speaker really doesn't sound like a
typical electrostatic, particularly On the high
end.
Tom years, t he most consistently
apparent characteristic of "electrostatic
sound" is a certain silky sheen imparted to
highs, particularly on massed strings or
brass. This sound is most prominent in cer-
tain hybrid systems I have heard, but is also
present in KLH-9 and Quad systems. I do
not hear such a quality in the Dayton·
Wright sound; neither, moreover, do I hear
it in live orchestral performances. Having
been long accustomed to a double pair of
KLH-9s as my reference standard, I thought
at first that the D-Ws were high-frequency
shy _My feeling nOW is ~imply that the D-W
is more honest about upper-register timbre
than other electrostatics - and that, obvi-
ously, is a high recommendation.
Mid-range performance of the XG-8 is
superb. No conventional speaker in my
experience has been able to match any full-
range electrostatic in the area of mid-range
clarity and definition. Although I rate the
KLH-9 somewhat higher than the Quad in
this regard. I have always been aware of a
subtle mid-range COloration in the 9 - a
COloration I would describe as something
between an "ah" sound and an "aw." The
XG-8 outpoints the 9 in this regard, and I
- 12 -

have found myself hearing details that even
on the 9s were muffled. This characteristic
was, incidentally, the first thing that 1
noticed in comparing the two speakers, so
the improvement must be rated as qu ite
prominent.
Before commenting on low-frequency
performance, a bit of a digression is war-
ranted, in order to expound a viewpoint.
When confronted by a full-range electro·
static speaker, many persons oriented
toward conventional speakers comment that
electrostatic bass is "thin." 1 submit that
this is simply not the case - at least, not
compared with live music.
Characteristically, conventional (cone-
typel woofers, as they descend into the
fairly deep bass region (say, 75 Hz and
below), begin to show aberrations, of
motion which, by definition, constitute dis-
tortion. Distortion figures for speakers,
because they are so dismayingly large, are
seldom quoted. There is even a polite term
for the most prominent form of such distor-
tion: "doubling." And "doubling," lest we
forget, actually means "harmonic distortion
at the second harmonic." Thus, when we
read in some equipment review that such-
and-such a speaker "doubles cleanly below
40 Hz, what we are actually being told is
that below that frequency, harmonic distor-
tion may actually be louder than the repro·
duced signal - that distortion is on the
order of 30 to 100 per cent. Such distortion
is not a sudden phenomenon that occurs
only below 40 Hz however: It continues, at
progressively decreasing levels, right on into
the mid-bass.
Now, because such distortion is notor-
iously difficult to cure in cone-type
spea k e rs, and because second-harmonic
distortion is compatible with the harmonic
structure of music, we are generally able to
tolerate it, as long as it occurs in a fairly
uniform manner, varying at a rate not
exceeding six db per octave over a relatively
wide range of frequencies (for it to do
otherwise would result in intolerable
amounts of boominessl. Once we begin to
tolerate it, however, we begin to value it, for
it is this phenomenon that causes conven-
tional woofers to have a satisyingly "full" or
"rich" sound - but note: Live concert
music simply doesn't sound that way.
Electrostatic woofers, on the other hand,
are so linear in their frequency response that
they can do very little doubling or tripling.
Doubling cleanly below 40 Hz is not some-
thing an electrostatic can do; once its lower
limit capability is exceeded, it simply falls
off to inaudibility, and distortion in electro-
static bass is mainly a matter of spurious
resonances in cabinets and supporting
structures.
So, one man's magnificent bass may be
another man's gross distortion. To my ears,
the truest bass I know of comes from full
range electrostatics, and here again we find
mainly the KLH-9 pitted against the XG·8.
A double pair of KLH·9s is capable of
reproducing, at adequate volume levels, all
except the biggest·sounding music you can
throw at it. Within that dynamic range, such
a pair will come closer to telling you exactly
what is contained in the low end of a piece
of program material than any other speaker
array I know, both in depth of'frequency
and in volume. A well-recorded rock band
or pipe organ can have literally stunning
bass under these circumstances. At similar
volume levels, XG-8s seem to go slightly less
deep, but have somewhat greater impact,
while preserving the sense of greater defini·
tion previously noted in the mid·range. If
you realty want volume, of course, the
KLH·9 simply will blow fuses, while the
XG·8 is capable of shaking floors with the
cleanest loud bass I have yet encountered.
What about performance at modest vol·
ume levels, or of chamberlike pieces? I have
been unable to detect any difference in
qualitative performance of the XG-8 at dif·
ferent volume levels. These speakers seem
completely at home in all kinds of music, be
it solo lute, chamber orchestra, or full
symphony with chorus.
As implied above, most of my listening
to the XG-8 speakers has been done using a
Phase Linear 700 amplifier. Dayton-Wright
make no bones about their feeling that this
amplifier is the best currently available for
the XG·8s, largely because of its power
reserves. Switching to a Crown DC·300 pro·
duces, at moderate levels, somewhat less
deep bass, and a slight general opacification
of the sound, though there is nothing
seriously wrong with the overall result. I
have also tried an SAE IV·S; this proves
satisfactory at quite modest levels, but
readily shows signs of strain over any
attempt to approach concert volume.
Curiously, the XG·8s are rather less
tolerant of differences in pre·amplifiers than
in amplifiers. For some time after acquiring
the D·W speakers I was u$ing a Sony
TA·2000 preamp that had worked quite
well with double KLH·9s. On changing to
the XG·8s, I began to be annoyed by a dis·
tinct harshness in the upper midrange.
Switching to the Crown IC·150 and the
SAE MK I did not relieve the harshness; at
this point, Dayton·Wright sent a small cus-
- 13-

tom-built unit of its own design, which
dramatically improved matters. Since then I
have tried the Citation 11, which is equally
lacking in harshness, and seems to have
somewhat better high-frequency definition
than the Dayton-Wright pre·amp. I have not
tried an Audio Research preamp in the
system, but suspect on the basis of other
reports that it might he the best of all.
Room placement of the XG·8s is fairly
critical, particularly with respect to opti·
mum bass. In my 15 foot by 18 foot listen·
ing room, best placement seems to be about
four feet from the end wall, angled toward
the cerlter of the room by about 10 to 15
degrees_ High·frequency directionality seems
moderate, and substantially less than that of
the KLH·9.
Reliability of the XG·8 system seems to
be of a high order. t have used mine heavily
over the past 11 months, and have been able
to inflict no damage, even with a Phase
Linear 700, beyond having to replace fuses.
Shou Id a pu nctu re of a Mylar diaphragm
accidentally occur, it can be repaired readily
with Scotch Magic Mending Tape; refilling
the unit with sulfur hexafluoride gas is a
simple matter, the gas being commercially
available in most metropolitan areas. Should
a Mylar diaphragm requ ire total replace·
ment, that, too. is simple, using materials
available from the manufacturer.
The current U.S, retail price of the com·
plete Dayton-Wright system. including two
XG·8 Mark II speakers panels and one
ST·300 Mark II Stereo matching transfor·
mer, is $1,980 (five per cent higher in the
South and West). Should anyone wish to
run double pairs of XG-8 (in parallel, that
is, not as a quad system), all fou r speakers
can be handled by the single ST·300. The
cost of the extra pair of speakers, minus the
ST-300, is about $1,100 (slightly lower if all
four speakers are purchased at onceL I have
heard such a four·panel system, and can
only describe it as stupefying!
In summary, it appears to me that the
Dayton-Wright system represents a giant
step forward in electrostatic speaker design
technology.
---JWC
A FootnOIe
The manufacturer's explanation of the
10 w-fI' e q uency load ing of t he Dayton-
Wright: "Because the radiating load of a
"free-piston" (without enclosure) is propor-
tional to its area and the radiating load of an
enclosure {with a smaller piston·speaker in
the center) is proportional to its diameter -
it is vitally important to obtain the largest
actual piston area in cases [like electrostatic
speakers} where there is no restriction of the
back wave from the speaker.
"I n our speaker, we use sulphur hexa-
flouride, which, since it is more dense, has a
much lower speed of sound transmission
than air, As far as the coupl ing of the indi-
vidual (electrostatic) cells to this gas is con·
cerned, each cel! appears to have an area 20
times larger than it does in fact. This results
in a tight coupling between the cell dia·
phragms and the SF 6 gas.
"This is also true for the coupling
between the front and rear outer dia-
phragms and the gas (within the hermetiC-
ally sealed enclosure). As a result, the
moving piston area is not the aggregate of
the individual cell diaphragm areas but of
the total area of the f rant sealing
diaphragm.
"Because of the need for supporting
structures within the cells themselves - all
of which limit the moving or active area of
each cell - the effective piston area can
only be made to be approximately 2.3 times
the cell diaphragrn areas.
"This does result in a considerable
increase in the low-frequency radiating load
and consequently reduces the frequency at
which low frequencies falloff because of
cancellation. Since cancellation results from
unrestricted out-of·phase rear waves, one
can, by reducing the coupling efficiency of
the rear of the speaker section also reduce
cancellation effects. This allows an extended
low-frequency response beyond that wh ich
could be achieved with a simple velocity
coupled enclosure."
HP Comments:
My experience with JWC's Dayton-
Wrights is rather superficial. I find them
similar in overall balance to a single I<LH-9,
that is, shy at the bottom octave and in the
uppermost harmonic overtones. I am mysti-
fied by the fact that the Dayton·Wright
reproduces some low notes and not others
that would seem to be in the same approxi-
mate range. If I had been blindfolded and
unaware that the Dayton-Wrights were elec-
trostatics, I would have never guessed. As
JWC says, they do not sound like
electrostatics - at all.
Citation 11Cl
Manufacturer; Harmon/Kardon, Inc., 55
Ames Court. Plainview. N.Y, 11803_ Price:
$295.
The Citation 11a has, for some reasOn
known only to the editors of High Fidelity
and Stereo Review, failed to get the sort of
review in keeping with its sonic distinctions.
14·

Perhaps it is because the Citation pre·
amplifier is such an ugly duckling. It seems
to have been outwardly packaged with the
mass market in mind - there are no micro·
phone inputs, there are no meters to
measure its output, and its equalizer·like
tone controls are set at frequencies mOre in
keeping with tailoring the performance of
an EI Cruddo Superba system than the
system of a perfectionist. (The low-freq·
uency slide control is, for example, set at 60
Hz, wh ich may be nice for reducing hum
but which is of little interest for the man
who wa nts to trim the response of his
system at the very low frequencies. The
uppermost high-frequency control at 12
kHz is far below the point at which a good
system begins to roll off.)
The Citation is also a temperamental
beast. After a little use, its push·button
switches begin to do strange things - they
either pop hideously, or short out, or create
hum fields. Even if, say, you wanted to use
its rather awkward tone controls, you would
find the Citation rebelling, adding bits of
audible distortion and, under the right
circumstances, actually oscillating.
We haven't even fou,)d the signal·to·
noise ratio ideal on the low·level inputs (for
magnetic cartridges). On our 11a the specs
supplied by the factory with the unit say 70
db for one channel, 71 for the other -
which is almost precisely the same as the
measured specifications for the Sony
TA-2000 (a pre·amp that is, to our ears,
quieter). What this means in practical terms
is that you will hear some thermal rush (like
FM wh ite noise) when listening to the 11a
at very high levels, using discs with can·
siderable dynamic range.
(While in fairness we ought to say that
on most discs you won't hear anything at all
from the Citation 11a, still, there is, with
the best discs, just enough "rush" in the
very quietest passages to let you know there
is a pre·amp in your system.)
You will also know there is a pre·amp in
your system on the high-level inputs that are
somewhat Techni·colored.
Despite a qu ieting device built into the
Citation, there is an annoying thump when
you first turn it On - a thump that can,
with a direct-coupled amplifier, either blow
your speaker fuses or your speakers. (Of
course, you may simply prefp.r to leave your
equipment turned on all the time, a nice
way to waltz around that problem.)
But when all is said and done, the
Citation 11 a, despite its ugly duckling out·
ward appearance, has the heart of a swan.
That's because it sounds better than any
other fully transistorized pre'amp we have
ever heard.
A word abou t the "a" we have added to
Citation's 11. Harman/Kardon has modified
the pre-amp without any fanfare and with-
out any intention of changing the 11's
name. We changed it to make it clear that
we are not talking about the original 11,
which sounds somewhat muddy in compari-
son with the 11 a. You can identify the
11a by the absence of a brown finish
over the tone-control section (and by look-
ing at the serial numbers, the "a" series
begins above 98,000,0001. The manufac·
turer tells us that the company's engineers
have tampered around with the sensitivity
of the phono inputs, raising that sensitivity
a bit since it now appears that cartridge
mam.facturers will not be trying for lower
and lower outputs. The company has also
made improvements in the phase·linearity of
the pre·amp, wh ich may account for the
increased clarity and definition we hear.
There is a dichotomy in the 11a (its
functional awkwardness versus its musical
sound) that suggests schizophrenia afoot at
Harman/Kardon - the engineers at one end,
the designers and packagers at the other.
The 11 a, as we suggested, measures very
well. It seems to us, though, that where it
comes into its own is in the reproduction of
discs. (What we are suggesting flies in the
face of reason, namely that the Citation
11a's superb sound is a function of the
design care that went into its low· level
inputs. In other words, this is the pre·amp
to use for playing back discs. We arc assum-
ing, perhaps incorrect Iy, that the serious
audiophile will bypass the pre'amp when
listening to tapes or FM.)
We had, by the way, abandoned hope for
the Citation line when Stewart Hegeman, a
grand master of high fidelity, severed his
association with Harman/Kardon in the
middle '60s. Hegeman, as many of you may
recall, designed the original Citation line for
the company_ He produced wide·band
amplifier and pre-amplifiers that set a new
standard for high·fidelity reproduction in
the home.
To be sure, Hegeman's original Citations
had their peculiarities. But the sound they
reprodl.ced was often awesomely like the
real thing.
Since the original Citations were classics,
we had a sort of inherent prejudice against
the new Iine. It was a why·bother attitude,
reinforced by the perfunctory nature of the
commercial magazine reviews. Sure, we
thought, they probably sound better than
the average run of equipment, but they
15 -

won't sound extraordinary.
It took no more than seconds in our
home system to convince us otherwise. Up
until that point, we had used the Dyna
PAS-3X and (more often) the Sony
TA-2000 as the reference pre-amplifiers. We
had tried and rejected a number of pre-
amplifiers as inferior to the Sony, including
the Dyna PAT-4, the Mcl ntosh C-26 and the
Crown le-150. (One of the hlndamental
principles of The Absolute Sound's staff is
this: We do not believe in substituting a new
piece of equipment in our own systems untit
we can find one that is audibly better - that
is, more musicaL And to hell with measure·
ments and convenience controls.)
As we said, from the measurements of
the Citation 11, we had little reason to
believe we had another classic on hand. And
it is still hard to reconcile the measurements
of the Citation (which aren't all that much
better than the Crown pre· amp's) with the
glorious transparency and naturalness of the
sound. We inquired of H·K, and learned
from Lee Kuby, the guiding genius behind
the new Citation line, that he had, in addi·
tion to wide-band response, been up to two
things with the l1a. One was phase
linearity; the other was the reduction, if not
elimination, of the higher odd orders of
harmonic distortion.
On the subject of harmonic distortion,
there are a good many people in the avant-
garde of audio who will tell you that the
reason transistorized equipment sounds
rather hard and brittle when compared with
the best tube-type equipment is this:
The higher orders of harmonic distortion
(the 7th, 9th, and 11th orders - always the
odd-numbered ones) are much more irritat-
ing to the ear and readily identifiable, even
in the tiniest amounts. Tube type equip·
ment, by the nature of its circuitry, usually
does not reproduce the higher orders of
harmonic distortion. Kuby insists that the
superior engineer can, with a little inspira-
tion and a lot of care, reduce the amount of
high·order harmonic distortion. This is, he
says, why the Citation 11a sounds so
superior. This, and phase linearity. Phase
linearity is something that few manufac-
turers pay much attention to. Kuby claims
that the Citation 11a is able to keep phase-
relationships untangled (again, not an
accurate word, but one that will do! almost
down to d.c.
The results?
The first thing we noticed was the high
end, which had become (in comparison with
the Sony) unbelievably detailed, unbeliev·
ably clean and rather sweet (at least on
honestly recorded works like Turnabout's
recording of Rachmanioff's "Symphonic
Dances" - which is, by the way, one of the
most remarkable facsimiles of a real orches-
tra you're likely to hear.!
Some of our reference recordings
sounded a bit "glassier" and more brittle
than we had ever heard them, a fault we at
first attributed to the Citation. It turned out
not to be so, but rather the function of the
capacitance loading of the ADC XLM and
the pre·amp. After some experimentation,
we increased the loading on the cartridge to
about 330 pF and eliminated a small high-
frequency resonance (measured with the
CBS 150 test record) at about 18 kHz.
At first we also thought the 11a was a
touch bass-shy. But what we, in fact, found
out before long was that the Citation actu-
ally reproduced lower notes through the
Advent speakers (two per channell than we
had heard before. It was as if the low·end
response of the Advent had been effectively
dropped to just below 30 Hz. And the
Advents were, suddenly, sounding remark-
ably like I<LH Model Nines. So radical was
the effect that we could have sworn some·
one switched tweeters on the Advents. The
sound blossomed.
Later, we conducted a much more
revelatory test. We recorded a professional
chamber orchestra in a small but acoustic-
ally neutral hall near Oyster Bay, New York.
The piece was aile of the Brahm's Ouintets.
After the recording {made with the latest
Revox A 77, the Advent Dolby 100, and
Beyer M·260 mikes!, we all returned to the
music room and the reference system and
listened to the tape through the Sony. It
sounded quite unlike the performance. So
much so, that the musicians and the listen·
ing panel simply assumed that it was a bad
job of recording.
But it wasn't. Simple substitution of the
Citation into the circuit made the recording
sound much as the performance hdd
sounded in the hall - very clean, somewhat
warm with a lovely "bloom" on the strings.
The strings had that "resinous," almost
gutsy, feeling on the massed passages and; in
the more melodic passages, a somewhat
silky sweetness that we adjudged very, very
close to the real thing.
(It is only fair to say that our chamber
recording sounds better yet without the 11a
in the circuit.)
On pre-recorded material (disc and
tapes), the listening panel observed, subjec·
tively, that the Citation exhibited better
separation and a bettN sense of placement
of the instruments when reproducing the
·16·

full orchestra than any other pre-amp we
had used. What the Citation did, through
the low-level inputs (on discsl, was equa Ily
notable: There simply was no sense of
strain, no increasing hardness as orchestra
passages (with a good deal of percussion I
got louder and louder. Try the Boulez Ravel
recording On Columbia if you wallt to see
just how very clean the Citation can be
vis·a-vis your present pre-amp,
We are not so certain, however, that the
Citation can stand huge amounts of gain
without exhibiting some audible distortion
(but not hardness!. Used at moderate set-
tings with the Phase· linear 700, the
Citation 11a has adequate output, There are
circumstances, however, when we could
imagine (say, with less efficient speakers like
the Dayton·Wrightsl that pushing the
Citation might not be entirely wise. For
normal use with normal speakers - and this
includes the inefficient acoustic suspension
variety - we can foresee 110 difficulties.
You may be interested in knowing that
the manufacturer can slightly increase the
performance parameters of the Citation 11a
by decreasing the rise-time characteristics of
the pre-amp. Kuby suggests that this is not
altogether wise because most commercial
recordings thell become simply unlistenable.
If, however, you elect to go this route then
you ought to expect some recordings to
sound "glassy" (particularly rock and
popular recordings} and "shrill" (in the case
of classical recordings with goosed up high
ends}.
Until better recordings and tapes are
available, perhaps it is wise to have the plain
old Citation 11a.
If you have access to live recordings or
to the new-Dolbyized Ampex tapes, you
ought to set up an A/B comparison with the
Citation 11a and the pre-amplifier of your
choice. For disc purposes, we'd recommend,
in addition to the RachmaninOff and Ravel
recordings, any of the deleted Mercury/
Dorati Beethoven recordings or the
Boult/EMI recordings of Vaughan Williams,
save "Pilgrim's Progress," which sounds
awful. If you can find a better transistorized
pre-amp, write and tell us; we want to know
what it is.
Manufacturer's Comment:
A musician/engineer commenting on the
complexity of test instrumentation required
for audio analysis once wrote, "There's still
the problem of the electronic component
which measures well, but sounds bad."
Isn't this statement basically the ma in
thrust of your new publication, The
- 17 -
Absolute Sound) (Editor's Note: Yes.1 It is
a point of view that I have held for over 15
years. I am convinced that a well·trained
ear, educated in the concert hall and studio
sound room, can detect nuances in sound
and balances so subtle in nature that not
even the most sophisticated test instru-
mentation can measure them. "Not so," say
the engineers, anything you can hear can be
measured." But until they can prove to me
that they pick out these subtleties with test
equipment, I'll continue to believe that the
ultimate judge in choosing high-fidelity
equipment is the trained ear,
I wonder how many times I have audi-
tioned a new design in our sound room and
how rna ny times I have returned it to the
laboratory because it sou nded honky, or
muddy, or veiled? The specifications, wh ich
a Iways accompany a new design, ,were
usually quite satisfactory, but somehow
they did not reveal the true nature of how
the component would sound. Why?
Engineers become annoyed and frustated
by non-technical terms like "bloom,"
"honky," "gritty," "muddy" and "wooly,"
They show genuine panic when a listening
analysis is made of their design and the com-
Illent is made that the "trumpets sound
muted," (You really can't blame them,
because most engineers - and this holds
true for test reviewers as well - have never
heard a live trumpet.)
I'm pleased to report that things have
changed at Harman/Kardon during the past
year. Our engineers and technicians now go
to concerts and probably sit squirming in
their seats for three hours as the New York
Philharmonic pours out Mahler and Bartok.
Poor fellows, but for their own good. When
asked for his initial reaction to a live con-
cert, one of the technicians whispered, "It's
amazing! No hiss!"
As a point of information for your
readers, it took H/K a year to design the
Citation 11 pre·amplifier and seven mOnths
to approve it sonically, A volume can be
written on the interplay between the mar-
keting people and engineers as the pre-
amplifier evolved from a bunch of wires to a
finished product, I lived in our sound room
for weeks at a time until final approval was
given on features and sound quality, After a
while I could whistle the first movement of
Mahler's Sixth without losing a single note.
This ordeal almost destroyed my love for
Mahler's music.
More power to The Absolute Sound for
telling it the way it is. Of course, don't
expect for a moment that your readers will
agree with everything you write. We all react

to sound differently, but I'm certain that
when a piece of equipment is really excel·
lent, there will always be an overwhelming
majority in agreement with the accolades
presented in its favor.
My only regret is that The Absolute
Sound did not like the outward appearance
of the Citation 11. I personally feel it is one
of the most functionally styled pre·amp Ii·
fiers ever produced. I can operate it in a
dark room without missing a control.
P.5.: The Citation 11 user should have
nO fear of driving the pre·amp too hard,
even with full range electrostatics, etc. At
six volts RMS output, the distortion is still
low enough to be at the residual of the test
instrumentation. In any event, gain, as you
described it, is not the function of the pre·
amp but of the power ampl ifier in relation'
ship to its input signal. Most power ampli·
fiers can produce full·rated output with an
input signal of 1.3 to 2.0 volts RMS.
lee Kuby
Vice President
Hannan/Kardon, Inc.
Reviewer's Postscript:
A few words of warning. The Citation
11a, if modified for a faster rise time, may
come to grief. We do not, therefore, recom·
mend this modification if you are using (a)
electrostatic speakers and (2) a high·
powered amplifier and the Dyna Quadaptor.
JWC damaged his Citation when he boosted
the unit's tone controls in the presence of
the Dayton.Wright's electrostatic field.
Using the Phase linear 700, the Dyna unit
and a modified 11 a, I managed to set up
some very high·frequency oscillations that
considerably colored audio signals going
through the Citation's high·level inputs.
And, under no circumstances should anyone
consider using the speaker-output jacks on
the back of the Citation 11 a if the unit is
connected with a Phase linear 700. There is
a very practical reason for this. It is ridicu·
lously easy to short the speaker leads, which,
in our case, also blew several feedback
resistors in the Phase linear. (All of which
goes to show you that Phase linear's pro·
tective circuitry doesn't necessarily work.}
If you are getting the idea that the
Citation 11a is tempermental, then you are
correct. The staff of The Absolute Sound is
very fond of this pre-amplifier because it
sounds audibly better than any other solid
state pre·amp we have heard, not because it
is a marvel of convenience (which it isn't)
and not because it is laid out with the
serious user in mi nd {which it isn't!'
JWC Comments:
My comments on the Citation 11 a must
be prefaced by the information that my
sample developed problems necessitating
return to the factory. This was caused by
modifications of the pre·amp that proved
incompatible with the Dayton·Wright
speakers. I may therefore have been listen·
ing under adverse circumstances, and will
confine myself to favorable impressions.
1. Transparency is the name of the game
with this pre·amp, This thing does indeed
remove veils that I was not previously aware
needed removing.
2. low·end Performance. The Citation
11a will reproduce the musical timbre of
things like tympani and bass fiddles better
than any other pre·amp in my experience.
Which means, I suppose, that the trans·
parency noted above just goes all the way
down. I a m a bit surprised to see so Iittle of
this in the ma in review. Perhaps it is more
evident on electrostatics than on conven·
tional speakers.
HFL Comments:
My comments are short and sweet. The
Citation is my reference pre·amplifier. It
was chosen on the basis of its sound over
the Crown IC·150, and over all others. The
b I0 sso m ing, detail, t hree·dimensionality,
sweetness of the high end all were heard.
When it was brought home and placed in my
system, my wife rushed into the listening
rOOm and said, "What did you do?" It was
that noticeable (the earlier pre·amp was
Acoustech, no slouch when it came to sound
quality!. All other pre-amplifiers sound flat
and two·dimensional (in stereo) compared
with it. I expect it will be in my system for
a long time to come.
Other comments: the buttons on my
H/K have not shorted or popped. The pre·
amp can handle three tape decks, a conveni·
ence for the tape nut. And the tone controls
are garbage - not only for the reasons HP
mentions but because they work through
induction coils and can't stand much boost
without affecting transient response. They
sound muddy, shrill, etc. The Metrotech
with a similar five·tone control set·up has
better chosen "hinge" points and no ap·
preciable distortion over a wide range .. of
settings.
The Double Advent System
Manufacturer: Advent Corp., 195 Albany
St., Cambridge, Mass. 02139. Price: $120
each (walnut veneer); 5105 (Walnut·Grain
Vinyl}.
18·

The Advent Loudspeaker, which has
been around for several years, has several
things going against it with most cultist
audioph iles. First, it has been a huge com·
mercial success. Second, it is easily available.
Third, it is not back-breaking, either in cost
or in weight. Perhaps worst of all, it con-
tains no "radically" new principles.
All this demonstrates. really, is a certain
snobbism that permeates the upper reaches
of the high·fidelity sound business, the sort
of follow-the-cultist attitude that, at one
level, makes a man choose Mcintosh over
Citation, or, at another, the British Decca
cartridges over the American ADC.
It is very difficult to take a $120 speaker
system seriously, since the very fabric of the
American experience teaches us (endlessly)
that you pay for what you get. In all fair'
ness to the snobs, someone has gOt to say
this about the Advent: It doesn't sound very
much better than any other bookshelf
speaker in the typical showroom demonstra-
tion. It doesn't sound nearly so good as it
can when it is used with equ ipment in a
comparable price range linexpensive amps,
pre·amps and cartridgesl. It is an appallingly
difficu It speaker to classify as to the way it
sounds - the Advent is something of a sonic
chameleon, sounding more like the program
source, deficiencies and all, than itself.
But the larger Advent is sort of the artis-
tic summation of designer engineer Henry
Kloss's thoughts about loudspeakers. Kloss
is the man responsible for some of the most
successful acoustic suspension speakers of
modern-day audio, inCluding, among others,
the KLH MOdels 4, 5 and 12. And if the
Advent has a kinship with any of Kloss's
past creations, it is the KLH Model 4 that it
most resembles.
There are differences. The Advent exhib·
its none of the hardness in the upper-mid
range that characterized the 4. Its high-end
response is far more transparent than the 4s.
On the other hand, the Advent is, like the 4,
able to make the celli and double-bass sound
as if they are being played slightly in front
of the speakers.
We should make it clear, though, that we
are not talking about single Advents per
channel. Formally, this probably should be
called the Double Advent System review
lour name I, since it is only when you
double up on the Advents that you begin to
get the sort of authoritative performance
that comes strikingly close to the real thing,
When we first sampled the Advent
speakers, at home, we had JansZen Z-600s
on hand for comparison. At the time, we
used one Advent per channel. The JansZen's
had, quite simply, one of the most romantic
high ends we had heard·- it simply sounded
very sweet and rather glorious (but not on
rainy days!. The bass end was quite muddy,
rather like the bass end produced on the
older Wharfedale woofers. Wool-like. The
JansZens did not respond at all well to high
volumes. {During the comparison, we lost a
woofer in the JansZen - "lost" means blew
it ouLl By comparison, the Advent (single}
sounded somewhat white and very, very
tight on the upper end - rather dry. The
bass end was different, tight but well
defined. We had the sense of a mid·range
deficiency and roughness, in the cross-over
range, which we attributed to deficiencies in
its crossover. We cannot say that the Advent
won the comparison, but the JansZen had
to go off for repa irs. In the interim, the sin-
gle Advent became, by default, the system
we had to live With. Weeks later, we still
weren't sure about the Advent. There just
didn't seem to be enough "space," enough
air about the sound. Everything was too
ana lytic, too X-rayish.
About this time, we heard, in an Atlanta
stereo shop, a pa ir of Advents on each
cha nnel. The store, The Stereo Center, had
set up a convenient switching arrangement
so their customers could switch from single-
to double-Advent operation at will. IIell, we
started switching and on the basis of what
we heard there, bought ourselves a second
pair of Advents on the spot. Double Ad-
vents eliminated the problems of single
Advents. The spaciousness of the two work-
ing in tandem suggested that of a huge
Bozak system, but without its considerable
frequency deviations. The bass, if anything,
had that certain low-end sock you hear in a
good hall, and the upper strings, massed
violins in particular, began to sound like
massed violins. IUp until that moment, the
only time we had heard massed violins
sou nd Iike a huge section of individual
violins playing together was on a Bozak
B·305a.1 This is not to say that the Double
Advents sounded perfect - there was still
something of a "curtain" between the
listener and the sound, a curtain that,
cur iously, was more apparent at low
volumes than it was at high.
We soon discovered that the Double
Advents were temperamental. Through care-
less handling and through super-power
a mplifiers, we managed to exhaust six
tweeters on the Advents. In part, this was
because Advent did not, at the time, have
adequate protection for its soft-domed
tweeter, something they have since rectified
with a metal grill around the tweeter (and
- 19-

you'd better check to make sure the Advent
you buy has one of these). The other part
was something less than candor from the
company itself, No matter wh at it says on
the spec sheet, the Advent cannot take 100
watts rms per channel. Peaks, yes. But not
anything like steady·state power. We have
since discovered that the Advents can han-
dle prodig iOLlS amou nts of power on peaks
(measured in microseconds), but that it
simply isn't safe to connect them, without
fuses, to an, amplifier capable of producing
60 watts per channel or more.
tn fusing the Double Advent System, we
ignored f.dvent's recommendation and used
AGe 3s. These fuses, used in conju nction
with thl' Phase Linear 700, do not blow
until the speaker is being fed 60 watts rms
steady loads Ithat represents zero on the
Phase l.inear's averaging meters!' Any
sunden transient through the system (a
dropp~d tone arm, a faulty switch) will
hiow the fuses and protect the Advents.
With the Phase Linear 700 and the Double
Advent System, you seldoll) have to worry
about hitting the "zero" meter reading
mark; few records will even push the Phase
Linp.al' meters past the "minus 20 kb" point.
(0""5 that will: th." Mehta/London record·
i"9 nf "lhe Planets," the Horenstein/None·
such recording of Mahler's Third, the
Stokowski/London recording of Ives'
Second Orchestra Set.) This does not mean
there won't be peaks of many hundreds of
watts going Sllccessfully through the fusing.
1herp will he, only the Phase Linear won't
show them. (For the record, we have blown
the fuses 'Jnly when using the Advents and
tl'e Phase Linear with a master tape of an
organ recording and with some of Ampex's
new Dnlbyi?ed open-reel tapes. I
We must say that we really had no idea
of ju<t how good the Advents were until we
t'ie::l them with the Crown DC-300, and
lat'" with th" combination of the Citation
11" and I he Phase Linear 700. Each im-
prove",e"t in the amplification chain of the
ref"re,'''e sv<tem made considerable differ-
ences ill t"e way we perceived the perfor·
mance nf the Double Advent System_ At
pre<er1t, ""jth the ADC XLM, the Citation,
the PI13se Linear a"d a ReVox A77 Mk III,
the Double Advents sou"d more like good
electro<tatics than any other cone-type
speaker we have ever heard. The Double
Advents, however, sacrifice nothing in the
way of bass response and they are capable
of handling volumes of sound that will make
your ears feel as if they are watering.
So what does one say, pending further
developments in cartridges and amplifying
equipment?
Well, one says this: The Double Advent
System is relatively colorless. And it takes
considerable listening, and to a variety of
program material, to realize just how little
of their own sound the Advents contribute
to the rep rod u ct ion process. Double
Advents do not, for some reason unknown
to us, exhibit any of the difficulties that
other speakers do when they are used two
per cha"nel.
(We heard Triple Advents, in an audio
showroom, put everything else in the store
to shanle. We even tried it ourselves and
decided that our music room was too small
to support that much sound, but we are
assured, by Advent, incidentally, that such a
thing as Triple Advents works very, very
well in mansion·type living rooms.)
Double Advents do not, even with their
32 Hz response, exhibit that sense of bigness
on the bottom end (as in, say, Ormandy/
COlumbia's recording of Tchaikovsky's
"Capriccio lIalien"}, nOr the extreme sense
of brass weight that a Klipschorn wi II in its
lower reaches {as in, say, Reiner/Victrola's
potpourri of nussian goodies, inclUding
"Marche Slav" and "N ight on Bald Moun-
tain"!. At low levels, they do not exhibit
the mid-range detail of a pair of Dayton-
Wright electrostatics, although at loud
listening levels the differences in deta it and
transparency are not quite so marked.
At the very high end, from about 10kHz
up to afJproximately 15 kHz or so (you actu·
ally extend the sense of upper-end response
with the Advents in tandem), the Advents
are ver, smooth. They are somewhat super-
ior in imaging to most speakers and they
reproduce the sense of overtones and tbe
upper harmonics better than any cone
speaker that we can think of, (Assuming, of
course, the Citation 11a and Phase Linear
700 are used with teh ADC XLM at the be·
ginning of the audio chain.}
We did not, for example. find the Jans-
Zen Z-600s much more detailed than the
Advents (although the JansZens did sound
"sweeter"l, while we did find the Advents
stereo imaging superior to any electrostatic
we have ever heard. The Double Advents are
also superior to the Bozaks, the Klipsch and
the KLH Nine in smoothness through.out
the frequency range (in a word, there isnot
only less coloration but, concomitantly,
fewer deviations in response between BO Hz
and 14 kHz, far fewer.)
The Advents do seem to "smear" the
sound of the instruments of the orchestra
(the effect is like a very small blurring, a loss
of resolution) more than a well·designed
- 20·

electrost~tic, or the Audio Research Magne-
planar, which is the most precisely focused
speaker we have heard. And the Double
Advent System occasionally exhibits a cer-
tain "roughness," very much like small
bristles, in the cross·over range.
Quite obviously, a speaker system in the
authoritative class - makes a series of com·
promises with the sound of music itself. To
our way of thinking, the Double Advent
System suffers when compared in first one
area, then another, to individual speaker
systems costing many times more, but over-
all, none puts it to shame.
----HP
Manufacturer's Comment:
We're pleased that a publ ication ded i·
cated to serving the cultist audiophile popu·
lation has selected to review ~ product as
modestly priced as our speaker systen1. We
are frequently asked why we do not build a
mOre ambitious speaker, and our answer is
that we do make such a product: two Ad-
vents per channel. Yours is the first review
of that "product."
Some specific comments that we think
will be of interest to your readers:
The Advent "utility" version is identical
in performance to the standard, walnut·
veneered model, and the cost saving is worth
mentioning, particularly for anyone contem-
plating the purchase of four Advents.
The protective metal grille you refer to is
on all Advent speakers manufactured since
Spring, 1971. It can be fitted on any of our
speakers made before that time and is free
for the asking.
Since the speaker was designed, super
power amplifiers have become mare com-
monplace. In recognition of this trend, we
have swi tched over to the use of high tem-
perature voice coils to increase the power
handling capacity of tile speaker.
Re our lack of candor, we are falsely
accused. At one time we stated in our litera-
ture that the Advent Loudspeaker "can
safely be used with amplifiers of up to 120
watts rms per channel for the reproduction
of musicill maWriill. n However, since this
statement was misconstrued to mean that
the speaker could handle 120 watts steady
state, which, as you correctly point Ollt, it
cannot, the statement was deleted over two
years ago to prevent furt her confusion_
We agree that fusing is desirable with
amplifiers of 60 watts or more per channel.
Your experience with AGC·3 fuses would
lead uS to believe that they would be a satis-
factory substitute for the ones we
recommend.
·21
Finally, if we may be a bie ir"fI1ouest,
we'd like to introduce anothEor slant on your
comment that the performance of the
Advents improved wi th "each improvEo,,,ent
in the amplification chain." We think the
Advent Loudspeaker is rare in the "Ameri-
can experience," because it i~ a r~l~tiv~ly
inexpensive device capable of rEosolvillg per-
formance diHerences among expe'lsive
devices.
Andrew Petile
Product Man~yer
Advent Corp.
HF L Comments:
I can add little to HP's review except tel
say that you have to st~ rt at $250 per
speaker to have allY thing to compare the
Advents to, which rn(:ans 5240 for a pair uf
Advents is quite a bargain. I can also con-
finn the adjectives used: firm, detailEod alld
transparent.
A pair of these speakers (yes, Hany,
only a pair) arc used as my reference mOlli·
tors for location and rnixdown when I
attend to my professional recording chores.
You know how flat they are when you
listen to them compared with Koss Pro 4
AA Headphones. They both sound tlie
same: the finest dynamic headphones all the
market and the first speaker that I have
heard that sounds as flat and detailEod as
these headphones.
My main listening rooon is currently
enhanced by BOSEs. I suspect that whEon I
go 4-channel for good, Advents or Infinity
2000 As will be my choice. These speakers
keep remarkable company.
JWC Commen tS:
Full-range electrostatic freak that I ~m, i
still find myself mightily impressed by tl.e
Larger Advent sound. What the Advent CillI'
nor do {at any volume level, as far as I am
concerned I is to reproduce the kind of rtlid·
range detail that seems to come naturally to
full·range electrostatics. On the other hand,
I know of no convelltional speake,' that
surpasses the Advent in this area, and very
few that equal it (on the basis fo brief listen-
ing, I suspect that the AR-LST Illay do so -
for a helluva lot more money.1
The other thing that impresses llIe about
the Advent is how homogeneous and bal
anced throughout its range it sounds - and
On this point it docs closely approach my
beloved full-range electrostatics. It is this. I
suspect, that contributes most to its highly
"musical" sound.
I say amen to two points made In the
review_ First, double Advel1ts do indeed

produce more than just quantitative im-
provements over single Advents - and still
at a cost that is relat ively tiny for a system
of such accomplishment, Second, the
Advents really are good enough to benefit
from use with associated equipment costing
far more than would ordinarily be used with
speakers in their price range. They are, in
short, so analytical that they deserve the
best possible amp, pre'amp, etc,
Phase Linear 700
Manufacturer: Phase Linear, Inc" 405
Howell Way, Edmonds, Wash. Price: $770,
So popular has the Phase Linear 700
amplifier become since its introduction in
1971, it seems unlikely at this stage that
most of The Absolute Sound's readers will
not have developed at least a nodding
acquaintance with it. Many, in fact, will
already have formed an opinion of it, based
either on listening to it, or on some Idnd of
gut reaction ("Who in hell would need a 700
watt amplifier?"). Well, we have our
opinions, too; if they differ from yours, per-
haps this will form the basis of our first
lively "Letters to the Editor" barrage.
For any of you whose heads have been
buried in the sand for the last couple of
years, a brief description, This is a basic
stereo ampl ifier rated at 350 watts per
channel, (at 8 ohms), both channels driven,
It is equipped with output meters and two
switch·selectable pairs of inputs. One pair of
inputs is capacitance coupled and level-
controlled by a pair of knobs on the front
panel. The impedance of these inputs is
100K ohms, independent of the level-con-
trol setting. The other pair of inputs is
direct coupled, 10K ohms, and bypasses the
level controls, The whole thing is theoretic-
ally rack mountable (the mounting holes on
our sample didn't agree with the hole
spacing on our rack, for some reason) and
weighs 45 pounds. Other vital statistics
include a (statedl damping ratio of 1000 : 1
at 20 Hz. The sensitivity on our specif ica·
tion sheet is given as 1,14 volts for 350
watts into 8 ohms, but we understand that
this has varied somewhat with subsequent
factory modifications (in any case, sensi-
tivity on our unit through the direct inputs
seems exactly equal to that through the
indirect inputs, with the input controls at
maximum settings), Readers interested in
knowing more about some of the technical
innovations embodied here, such as the use
of TV horizontal drive transistors in the
output stages, or the use of a 200 volt
unregulated power supply, should consult
the Audio (February, 1972) article by the
amplifier's designer, Robert Carver,
It would be awfully nice, and quite in
keeping with our simplistic view of the uni-
verse, if we could reassure one and all that
this brute of an amplifier would be of value
only to those whose speaker systems
obviously could benefit from immense
power - such as full-range electrostatics.
Alas, no; as you shall hear.
Our first significant encounter with a
700 occurred when we brought one home,
to try with a double pair of KLH-9s. Sure
enough, it handily outdid a Crown DC·300
we had been using for several months, !,living
the 9s significantly more mid-range clarity
and tightening up the bass a bit, {The differ·
ence was not quite as marked, however, as
the qualitatively similar improvement noted
several mo nths before, when the DC-300
absolutely Wiped-out two Mcintosh 2105s
that were being used simultaneously on the
four KLH-9 panels},
At this point, we began listening to the
700 on more conventional speakers - ones
that certainly would not be capable of hand-
ling more than a small part of the amplifier's
full output - expecting that differences
between this and less powerful high-quality
amplifiers would be obliterated. And there
we were confounded. On just about every
decent speaker system we tried, there were
major differences in sound between ampli-
fiers. Almost always, moreover, the differ-
ence was in favor of the Phase Linear.
Our major comparisons involved three
amplifiers: the Phase Linear 700, the
DC·300, and the SAE Mk III. Among those
of us doing the listening, there was unani-
mous feeling that the Phase Linear, on any
speaker auditioned, produced the tightest,
truest bass, The SAE was least clean in this
respect (sounding downright boomy on a
single pair of the larger Advents}, and the
DC-300 intermediate, Clarity and definition
in the mid-range was ranked in the same
order,
In evaluating the upper registers, how·
ever, opinion began to diverge significantly,
It was generally agreed that the Phase Linear
was again the best of the three vis-a-vis high
frequency definition, but that the SAE Mk
III produced a "sweeter" sound, which
some found more listenable and appealing,
particularly on hybrid electrostatics like the
Infinity 2000 and SAE Mk Xl I. Though the
difference was less marked on conventional
cone tweeters (such as the Advent), it was
still discernible.
To this writer's ears, the greater defini-
tion of the Phase linear high end is prefer·
- 22-

able to the slightly sweeter, slightly more
liquid, slightly warmer sound of the SAE
Mk III. Tastes will legitimately vary over a
matter like this, of course, but at present, I
would certainly not want to give up my
Phase Linear 700 for any other amplifier I
Ilave heard.
Furthermore, I wou Id feel impelled to
stick to this position even if I had to give up
my present I>ower·hungry electrostatic
speakers for some of much higher
efficiency, such as Advents, which would
probably go up in smoke if exposed to a
Phase Linear at full throttle.
Fortunately, you can select ancillary
equipment useful in taming the 700's high
end, if you think it a bit too wild. For
example, you could avoid the modified·rise·
time version of the Citation 11. which is
quite hot indeed, or the rather bright·sound·
ing Dyna PAT·4, in favor of, say, an SAE
Mk I. If most of your listening is to discs,
the combination of Decca·London Mk V
cartridge and an electrostatic high end might
best be avoided with this amplifier, in favor
of the less detailed but suaver ADC XLM.
This is so clearly an area of individual taste
that every user will have to be his own
judge. Hope your friendly local stereo outlet
is tolerant of a little experimenting.
One other thing, On which we probably
will get static from our readers: Given a
pre·amplifier capable of working properly
into an impedance as low as 10K ohms, I
have not been able to detect any audible
difference between the sound of the direct·
coupled and capacitance-coupled inputs of
the Phase Linear 700.
-JWC
HP Comments:
JWC and I have no fundamental disagree-
ment over the merits of the Phase Linear
700. Using the Double Advent System,
which has lower useable bass response than
the Dayton·Wrights, I cou Id detect differ·
ences between the amplifier's capacitance·
coupled inputs (labelled normal inputs on
the amplifier itself) and the direct inputs.
The difference? The bass end of the Double
Advents became noticeably cleaner and
tighter, which, in turn, prompted me to can·
c1ude that the bass went deeper. In my
listening room, this constituted improve-
ment, since the Double Advents are sitting
directly on the floor and in corners. But,
unless one is very careful, the direct inputs
(which bypass the amplifier's warmup
muting circuits) may pass some rather large
transients to the speakers when the pre·
amplifier or tape recorder is turned on. That
can cause either a blown'out speaker or
fuse, as the case may be.
The Phase Linea> does seem to draw
rather large amounts of current, enough at
times to dim most of the lights in the house
(this is especially true On playback of master
tapes or discs with very wide dynamic
rangel. And, despite the company's assur·
ances otherwi se in their instruction book, I
did not find it a good idea to plug the Phase
Linear into any of the pre· amp's power
switches. For one thing, the Phase· Linear
drew enough current to send the speed regu·
lation device of the Sony TTS·3000 awry.
Under no circumstances should I'OU even
contemplate using the 700 withou; protec·
tive fusing for yOur speakers - unless, of
course, you are using the Audio Research
Magneplanars, the Dayton·Wrights, or the
Acoustic Research LST. Of course, there
may be other speakers that can stand the
high voltages generated by the 70U.
(One of the better Paul Klip"ch stories
mak ing the rounds these days has Klipsch,
wearing earmuffs and pumping the full out·
put of a 700 into his speakers just to prove
they can take the power.)
Even at low volume levels, the Phase-
Linllar 700 does make an audible difference.
Compared with it, the Mcintosh 2105
sounds rather coarse and grainy. Compared
with it, the Crown DC·300 sounds entirely
too "hot," That is, almost glassy and some·
times rather brittle on the high end, While I
found considerable differences between the
low·end reproduction of music of the
Mel ntosh and the Crown, I did not find the
bass differences between the Crown and the
700 nearly so pronounced. The 700 seemed
tighter, and several shades more detailed. It
was the high end of the Phase Linear that
knocked me out. {As a matter of fact, after
I had plugged it in, I hadn't quite reached
my chair - a few feet away - when I
noticed a more neutral, far more musical
sound from the 700.}
One of the most astonishing things the
Phase Linear can do (and it is something I
have heard to other amplifier do) is "float"
the percussion section of a n orchestra
slightly up and over the rest of the orches·
tral sound. Now this is precisely the audi-
tory effect one gets in the concert hall. With
normal amplifiers, the percussion sections
either sou nds stra ined and/or buried some·
where in the upper registers with the strings
and brass,
For the most part, though, what I like
about the 700 is that it doesn't sound like a
transistorized amplifier - at least not in
relation to two important points: (1) hard·
- 23-

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