well. I was all ready to go get some JBL Control 1s from RS for £50. A chance visit to Cash Convertors in Ipswich yesterday and i saw some little Sony speakers.
at first sight- looked nothing special- power rating 40w nominal, a bit small etc.
A look at the model number- SSA1 seemed to suggest they were not entry level rubbish.
Got them hooked up once i'd satisfied myself that the drive units didn't look damaged.
And yes, they were on the end of a 30wpc Marantz integrated with treble and bass controls on max and playing some trance music. They sounded crap! Once the tone controls had been 'rectified' you could tell they were just incredibly revealing of both source material and the source hardware. I took note of the model number and asked them to put them to one side.
The chap there, bless him, said that there were a larger pair of Sonys for only £20 more that were shielded (although these SSA1s are shielded). The larger ones retail for £80 and i sold them at bennetts- they're really rubbish!
Anyway, looked them up in a 1996 issue of HFC. These SSA1s retailed at £500 odd, used 'bio cellulose' tweeters and have a sensitivity of 85dB and 4 ohm impedance. Not a nice easy load for my Sonic T amp, i thought.
Anyway, went back today and bought the speakers. There was something rumbling around in them- perfect opportunity to open them up and see what made them £500s worth.
First off a special note about the baffle. If you look, the tweeter panel is recessed to time align with the voicecoil of the woofer. There are felt things attached to the tweeter ala Russ Andrews! Secondly theres some kind of carpet material around the tweeter part presumably to aid dispersion.
Then around the woofer there is also a felt layer. As a result there are no hard surfaces on the front baffle at all!
Crossover. These crossovers look as meaty as the mighty Omiga Audio modded Rogers crossovers. Nice thick cable used internally too. This is where the knocking problem was by the way- the crossover had detached from its velcro mountings at the bottom of the cabinet. Nothing major at all and fixed within 20seconds!
Tweeter. Note the sponge thing covering the voice coil. Who knows what bio cellulose is
Woofer. Note some rubber things glued onto the surround and cone. Again, presuambly to aid dispersion.
Woofer again. There are 2 magnets on it. That may explain their bass abilities. Bit surprised to see pressed steel chassis but you can't have everything!
Cabinet- you can see how thickly its constructed.
Finally the Sony badges are leather! yes...leather. Construction and attention to detail here is totally OTT but i love it!
So how do they sound on a decent system. Well on they went to my plinius/SAT system (see sig). This pumps out over 225wpc into 4 ohms, nearly double their rated maximum power input! Never mind
They sound fantastic. My dad asked me 'have you got your subwoofer on'!
They are so brutually honest and revealing of the source material. They sounded impeccable on a recording made by my band. Of course its an impeccable recording- i made it!
On a great performance of Rhapsody in Blue conducted by Bernstein (magical btw) they sounded great but there was too much atmospheric noise such as music stands moving, audience noises etc.
On a Hue and Cry CD there were times when i thought low male vocals lacked a tiny bit of depth but listenning to the same work through some Stax headphones revealed it to be the source.
I put the Vaessens back on and sure enough the lower octaves did reappear- these Sonys are great but they just can't go lower than 40hz- the rule of physics says so...so the Vaessens are staying.
So now the Sonys are on my computer monitoring system and surprise surprise, being driven by a Sonic T amp. Despite the fact i had to have the Plinius on 10 o clock volume to get a decent level the sonic T drives them fine up to around 11 o clock. Quite a surprise.
I think these were Sonys answer to the Ls3/5as. Same ruthless presentation, same cabinet dimensions and 'deadness' of the cabinet too. A utter utter bargain!
Oh...the price? £22.50
And before you all start moaning that there are never any other bargains out there i got another pair of speakers today too- some Axis LS28s. A bit of research on the net found that they were $699 a few years back. They are made in Australia (a stones throw away from the birthplace of my Plinius!) but thats a story for another thread!
at first sight- looked nothing special- power rating 40w nominal, a bit small etc.
A look at the model number- SSA1 seemed to suggest they were not entry level rubbish.
Got them hooked up once i'd satisfied myself that the drive units didn't look damaged.
And yes, they were on the end of a 30wpc Marantz integrated with treble and bass controls on max and playing some trance music. They sounded crap! Once the tone controls had been 'rectified' you could tell they were just incredibly revealing of both source material and the source hardware. I took note of the model number and asked them to put them to one side.
The chap there, bless him, said that there were a larger pair of Sonys for only £20 more that were shielded (although these SSA1s are shielded). The larger ones retail for £80 and i sold them at bennetts- they're really rubbish!
Anyway, looked them up in a 1996 issue of HFC. These SSA1s retailed at £500 odd, used 'bio cellulose' tweeters and have a sensitivity of 85dB and 4 ohm impedance. Not a nice easy load for my Sonic T amp, i thought.
Anyway, went back today and bought the speakers. There was something rumbling around in them- perfect opportunity to open them up and see what made them £500s worth.
First off a special note about the baffle. If you look, the tweeter panel is recessed to time align with the voicecoil of the woofer. There are felt things attached to the tweeter ala Russ Andrews! Secondly theres some kind of carpet material around the tweeter part presumably to aid dispersion.
Then around the woofer there is also a felt layer. As a result there are no hard surfaces on the front baffle at all!
Crossover. These crossovers look as meaty as the mighty Omiga Audio modded Rogers crossovers. Nice thick cable used internally too. This is where the knocking problem was by the way- the crossover had detached from its velcro mountings at the bottom of the cabinet. Nothing major at all and fixed within 20seconds!
Tweeter. Note the sponge thing covering the voice coil. Who knows what bio cellulose is
Woofer. Note some rubber things glued onto the surround and cone. Again, presuambly to aid dispersion.
Woofer again. There are 2 magnets on it. That may explain their bass abilities. Bit surprised to see pressed steel chassis but you can't have everything!
Cabinet- you can see how thickly its constructed.
Finally the Sony badges are leather! yes...leather. Construction and attention to detail here is totally OTT but i love it!
So how do they sound on a decent system. Well on they went to my plinius/SAT system (see sig). This pumps out over 225wpc into 4 ohms, nearly double their rated maximum power input! Never mind
They sound fantastic. My dad asked me 'have you got your subwoofer on'!
They are so brutually honest and revealing of the source material. They sounded impeccable on a recording made by my band. Of course its an impeccable recording- i made it!
On a great performance of Rhapsody in Blue conducted by Bernstein (magical btw) they sounded great but there was too much atmospheric noise such as music stands moving, audience noises etc.
On a Hue and Cry CD there were times when i thought low male vocals lacked a tiny bit of depth but listenning to the same work through some Stax headphones revealed it to be the source.
I put the Vaessens back on and sure enough the lower octaves did reappear- these Sonys are great but they just can't go lower than 40hz- the rule of physics says so...so the Vaessens are staying.
So now the Sonys are on my computer monitoring system and surprise surprise, being driven by a Sonic T amp. Despite the fact i had to have the Plinius on 10 o clock volume to get a decent level the sonic T drives them fine up to around 11 o clock. Quite a surprise.
I think these were Sonys answer to the Ls3/5as. Same ruthless presentation, same cabinet dimensions and 'deadness' of the cabinet too. A utter utter bargain!
Oh...the price? £22.50
And before you all start moaning that there are never any other bargains out there i got another pair of speakers today too- some Axis LS28s. A bit of research on the net found that they were $699 a few years back. They are made in Australia (a stones throw away from the birthplace of my Plinius!) but thats a story for another thread!
