To say that the Teslas imaged like gangbusters would be an understatement. These speakers disappeared—particularly when used with a great tube amplifier, like the VAC PA90. With the VAC amps, the music just hung there, suspended in space. So what if the upper midrange was a little scratchy? So what if dynamics were somewhat limited and the bass was—well, not all there? These speakers were doing some amazing things.
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Foreword by Sam Tellig: I wanted to like the Sci Fi Teslas. I originally heard these speakers at Dave Wolf's store in New Canaan, Connecticut—no longer in business, alas.
The two bass-midrange drivers are mounted to the extended front fascia with what Sci-Fi calls "RIDS," for Resonance Isolation and Damping System. Mike explains that there are two ways to reduce driver basket resonances: mass-loading and decoupling. Mass-loading involves tightly securing the drivers to a heavy, inert cabinet; a good example of this is the deader–than–Andy Gibb Wilson WATT. However, this approach tends to be very expensive, so Mike has opted for the latter method; the woofer baskets on the Tesla are decoupled with two soft-foam gaskets, one between the driver basket and the…
Some weeks later, the third and final pair of Teslas arrived, along with the Trillium amps. Mike explained that the reason for the bass hump in the original review pair was that, unbeknown to him, his padding supplier had switched from polyester to Dacron; the padding wound up with only a third the fibers of the original stuff. A switch back to the original padding, plus more of it, plus a retuning of the port, was said to have gotten rid of the hump. Additionally, the tweeter was given a series 1 ohm resistor to bring it down a bit.
Mike said to just set up these Teslas exactly where he…
Jack English adds a postscript
Audio Dealer: Nice to see you again, Mr. Audiophile. Now that you've spent a couple of weeks with the Teslas, are you ready to buy them?
Audiophile's Left Brain: Well, they are gorgeous. They're large enough to look like a piece of modern furniture but not so big as to overpower our listening room. The slim look and curved ends make them unique and equally attractive. I've grown tired of all those big, rectangular boxes. Even the legs look good.
Audiophile's Right Brain: Yeah, they're easy to look at and priced right, too. There certainly…
Sidebar 1: Measurements
There were no surprises in the Tesla's plot of electrical impedance magnitude and phase (fig.1). The shape of the curve in the bass implies that the rear port is tuned to a low 22Hz, revealed by the dip in magnitude at that frequency. (I left the foam plug in place for all the measurements, though I did remove the grille socks.) The impedance drop to 5 ohms at 90Hz should not present good amplifiers with any drive problems, though as a great deal of high-power musical information lies in this upper-bass region, this impedance dip will also lead to a more limited…
Sidebar 2: Specifications
Description: Two-way, reflex-loaded, floor-standing, dynamic loudspeaker. Drivers: two 6.5" bass/midranges, one 1" aluminum-dome tweeter. Crossover frequency: 1kHz. Frequency response: 32Hz–35kHz ±3dB. Sensitivity: 88dB/W/m. Nominal impedance: 8 ohms.
Dimensions: 49" H by 8" W by 13" D. Weight: 52 lbs each.
Serial numbers of review samples: 00377, 00378.
Price: $1990/pair (1992); no longer available (2006). Approximate number of dealers: 45.
Manufacturer: Scientific Fidelity, 6301 Riggs Place, Los Angeles, CA 90045 (1991). No longer trading (2006…
Manufacturer's Comment
Editor:
"Any magazine which publishes reviews has a primary responsibility to the truth."—John Atkinson, "As We See It," Stereophile, Vol.14 No.12
Borrowing a few lines from Stereophile seems to be the best way to make a point. All we at Scientific Fidelity want is the same thing from this review: the truth.
"Cuz Oi Di'I' Moiiiiiii Whyyyyyyyyyy!"—Corey Greenberg, Stereophile, this issue
Now, I must admit I have never heard Sid Vicious do "My Way," and I'm not sure I want to. My personal tastes lean more toward the Sinatra version, for…
Vifa & Scientific Fidelity, from June 1992 (Vol.15 No.6):
Editor: It is not Vifa's assignment to comment on tests of loudspeakers [that use Vifa drive-units], as Vifa cannot take on the responsibility of the use and the sound of its speakers in the final product. As is known, we are involved in the design of neither cabinets nor crossovers.
Meanwhile, it is Vifa's assignment to deliver faultless, high-quality products which fulfill the high acoustical demands our customers are making today.
Mike Maloney [of Scientific Fidelity] was never promised a letter from Vifa…
I've been a little remiss in writing about one of the best tools for travel I've experienced recently: Ray Samuels Audio's Emmeline The Hornet ($350), a tiny (3" L by 2" W by 1" H) rechargeable portable headphone amplifier. I tend to travel with my iPod packed with hi-rez music files and a pair of low-impedance headphones. That's not a marriage made in heaven, so I also need a headphone amplifier. Over the years, portable headphone amps have gotten better and better while getting smaller and smaller. The Hornet is the smallest I've discovered so far and is my current favorite.
It…
Sam Tellig wrote about the Hornet in September 2006 (Vol.29 No.9):
I haven't met Ray Samuels, except by phone, but I have one of his products in my hands right now. Well, actually, I have it in the palm of one hand: the incredibly tiny Emmeline The Hornet portable headphone amp, which I heard about from Wes Phillips via the Stereophile e-newsletter of June 1, 2006.
As soon as I read what Wes said, I knew I had to have a Hornet. Not because I own an iPod—I don't and probably, just to be contrarian, never will—but because I take my Sony D-EJ100 portable CD player to the library,…