Speaker Review

Welcome back everyone! This edition will be dedicated to reviewing a pair of A/D/S Monitor L780-2. These speakers were produced in the early to mid 80's and shared their "biology" with another very popular brand at the time, Braun ... yes, Braun which makes electric razors! Essentially A/D/S was created by a NASA employee who had worked for Braun, A.G in the consumer Hi Fi division. Braun sold most of it's assets to Gillette, (go figure, more razor blades!), and at that point he started A/D/S in Alabama, eventually moving to New England. He purchased components from existing Braun stock for A/D/S speakers. If you have an opportunity to look at a Braun and an A/D/S speakers side by side, you may not be able to tell the difference. By the time A/D/S made it big, Braun was out of the consumer Hi Fi business. I am sharing this story so you can see that take over and "branding" issues are not an evil of the 21st century, even with hi fidelity systems, this has been an issue for long time! But you know ... enough history, how about we move on to reviewing what I heard through my A/D/S L780-2's? By the way, for my good digital only friends, A/D/S stands for Analogue and Digital Systems ... trust me Brian, we had no clue what digital was in 1982!! Linn Sondek was the best table money could buy and CD's could not hold a candle to it reproducing music ... still can't!!! This rant leads us to the review of the A/D/S L780-2's.

Very typical of the day, these speakers measured only 21 inches high, by 12 inches wide, by 11.5 inches deep, and weighing approximately 30 pounds each. Power handling was about 125 watts maximum, minimum power is about 60 watts per channel. I hooked them up to a Sansui 881 Receiver rated at 63 watts per channel. I felt, even in 1981, that these speakers needed to be sitting on stands, so I made sure they sat on stands at 12 inches tall. The "source" for music was a Luxman PX 100 direct drive turntable in pristine condition, with a Signet TK1EA cartridge. Essentially, a kick ass table with an audiophile caliber cartdrige for 1982. I listened to "A Star is Born" by Dave Gruisin, (album title is "Discovered Again"), which was a Mobile Fidelity release. It provided, (and still does), superior sound reproduction, surpassing CD quality of that time. My results, according to my listening preferences, were mixed because of the speakers in question.

The A/D/S' produced a warm sound, which I expected since a Sansui was the driving amplifier. More on another blog about Sansui and "warm" sound. Anyway, the 780's were true to the denomination of "monitors". The sound was clear, tight, concised and just plain on the money, as it was recorded. These speakers were outstanding at producing a two dimensional presentation of the source being played. The "stage" presented was ok. I say the stage was ok because I am sure this was the first encounter with "digital sound" I experienced. The speakesr, as stated earlier, were tight, great presentation, superior sound reproduction ... essentially a wall of information being presented. It was the difference between color photography and black and white. Let's face it, black and white can create absolutely beautiful photograph's, but nothing beats color!! If you have never experienced time coherent, three dimensional speakers, by all means, any speaker in the A/D/S line is highly reccomended as they reproduce vinyl and analogue tapes beautifully. Shoot, they even do a nice job with the "Digital" thing!! That will do it for this edition of Outside Edges, Adventures in Analogue. Next review will be my vintage reference system, which is the reason for "The Outside Edges, Adventures in Analogue"