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On to how I think the speakers sound. Here I must review at least two speakers. I have actually auditioned three samples of the CS2. The first arrived soon after AHC's review in 1985, but was almost immediately replaced because, as I remember, the midrange drivers had something wrong with them. Then came serial numbers 2975 & 2976, the lovely rosewood speakers I've had for over two years (the ones with the readily removable grilles). They are the pair that have most formed my impression of the CS2. Then, just last Friday, arrived serial numbers 8083 & 8084, sent when Thiel heard that…
Sidebar 1: LA's Associated Components
I listen in an unusual room, 20' by 35' with an 11' ceiling—almost 8000 cubic feet. Although heavily carpeted and furnitured, the room is not at all dead—not nearly dead enough for J. Gordon Holt, who is, for my tastes, too accustomed to his Tube Traps. Amplification for this review was provided by Mark Levinson, in the form of the Nos.26 and 20. Source material was analog LP (no digital-to-analogs, thank you) played on a Well-Tempered Turntable (the best value ever in a $1000–$2000 'table-plus-tonearm, in my opinion) with a variety of cartridges,…
Sidebar 2: Measurements
Fig.1 shows the plot of impedance with frequency for the Thiel loudspeakers. It agrees with the appropriate specified impedance in the "Specifications" sidebar, but it is noteworthy how little change there is. Obvious features can be distinguished, such as the port tuning for the CS2, but I would conjecture that Jim Thiel has used some form of conjugate load system in his crossover design to give such flat curves with frequency. (This is where elements are added to the crossover to compensate for phase and impedance changes to result in a simple resistive load.) I…
Sidebar 3: Specifications
Description: Three-way, reflex-loaded loudspeaker. Drive-units: 1" soft-dome tweeter, 3" paper-cone midrange unit, 8" plastic-cone woofer. Crossover frequencies: 800Hz, 3kHz. Frequency response: 38Hz–20kHz ±2dB. Phase response: ±10°. Sensitivity: 87dB/2.83V/m. Nominal impedance: 6 ohms. Minimum amplifier power: 40–250W.
Dimensions: 39" H by 12" W by 12" D. Weight: 62 lbs each.
Serial numbers of review samples: 2975 & 2976, 8083 & 8084.
Price: $1350/pair (1985); $1650/pair (1989); no longer available (2007). Approximate number of dealers:…
As far as I can tell, Santa Fe–based speaker engineer John Bau had designed but four commercial loudspeakers before the TC-60 was launched at the 1994 Winter CES: in order of appearance, they were the Spica SC50i (1980), the TC-50 (1983), the Angelus (1987), and the SC-30 (1989). None were expensive, and all garnered much praise, both in Stereophile's pages and elsewhere.
Why, then, wasn't Spica one of the most successful speaker manufacturers in the land? Partly the blame must be laid at the feet of the speakers: the one thing none of them did was rock out at party levels. But…
Sidebar 1: Specifications
Description: Two-way, stand-mounted, reflex-loaded (QB3 alignment) loudspeaker. Drive-units: 1" (25mm) impregnated cloth-dome tweeter; 6.5" (165mm) polypropylene-cone woofer. Measured crossover frequency: 3.4kHz. Electrical crossover slopes: first-order, 6dB/octave, high-pass to tweeter; fourth-order Bessel, 24dB/octave, low-pass to woofer. Frequency response: 48Hz–20kHz, –3dB. Sensitivity: 87dB/W/m (2.83V). Nominal impedance: 8 ohms (5.6 ohms minimum at 10kHz). Power handling: 60W continuous, 120W peak.
Dimensions: 21.25" (540mm) H by 11.5" (292mm) W by 10.5…
Sidebar 2: Review context
Power amplifiers used to drive these speakers were either a pair of Mark Levinson No.20.6 monoblocks, a Krell KSA-100S, or a Krell KSA-50S; the preamplifier was the remote-controlled Mark Levinson No.38S, or the value-for-money McCormack TLC-1 buffered passive control unit. A Mod Squad Phono Drive EPS amplified LP signals from a Linn Sondek/Cirkus/Trampolin/Lingo/Ekos/Arkiv setup sitting on an ArchiDee table. Digital source was a Mark Levinson No.30 or a Counterpoint DA-10, each driven by a Mark Levinson No.31 transport via Madrigal AES/EBU cable. An Audio…
Sidebar 3: Measurements
The TC-60 is significantly less sensitive than the Dunlavy SC-I, its B-weighted figure being around 85dB/2.83V/1m. It's easier to drive, however, its impedance (fig.1) remaining above 7 ohms other than in the high treble, where it drops to a still-kind minimum of 6.2 ohms. Note the slight wrinkle in the traces just under 300Hz—this implies the existence of a cabinet resonance at this frequency. The port tuning is indicated by the saddle in the magnitude trace at 29Hz. This is very low for the size of the speaker; it's difficult to predict what the actual bass…
Manufacturer's Comments
Editor: Thanks for the excellent review of our TC-60 speaker, my latest attempt to coax a quart of juice out of a pint jar. John Atkinson did an amazingly good job of delineating the many tradeoffs involved in this (and any other) design. It is such a relief to have been reviewed by someone who actually has a real understanding and appreciation of what goes on under the veneers.
It is also a joy to be working with Richard Schram, Ric Mancuso, and everyone else at Parasound Products. Working with people who are as capable and enthusiastic as they are makes…
If reviewers can be believed, the diminutive, $995/pair Epos ES11 loudspeaker has been a phenomenal success worldwide since its 1990 introduction. Stereophile added its voice to this hallelujah chorus in Vol.14 No.7, when the '11 kicked butt in a blind-listening-panel evaluation of inexpensive small speakers. While the ES11 did plenty of things extremely well, it was inevitable that it was limited in terms of ultimate sound-pressure levels (spls), deep-bass extension, and dynamic persuasiveness. While the ES11 was an unqualified success given its modest size and price, one couldn't help but…