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AudioTitor
 
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Default What is so great about Altec 604 speaker?

I'm new to this old audio thing and I hear comments like, "You need a pair
of Altec 604's to go with that amp". What is so great about this Altec 604
speaker? It looks like it belongs in a Mesa Boogie guitar amp.

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Some people don't like Altec 604s. Dick Pierce (who was presumably
named that before it became a popular body modification in some
quarters) is one.

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xrongor
 
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personally, i think you can do better for the money.

for what its worth, if i wanted a sports car i would never consider a
ferrari either...

randy

wrote in message
oups.com...
Some people don't like Altec 604s. Dick Pierce (who was presumably
named that before it became a popular body modification in some
quarters) is one.



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Michael Squires
 
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The Altec 604/5 series, Tannoy dual concentrics, and similar 1940/1950
speaker designs like the Jensen G610B, EV 15TRX, and University 315
are 2 or 3-way designs based on a 15" woofer with a horn-loaded
tweeter.

I've owned Altec 605A's, a Jensen G610B, and currently listen to
University 315-C's. The advantages of these speakers are that they will play
very loudly with little input (I'm using an NAD 2140, 40wpc), are very
reliable, and can sound very "live" playing certain kinds of music (music
that doesn't depend on very low bass and is performed primarily on reeds and
brass, such as my preferred music, the big bands of
Ellington/Basie/Henderson/Shaw and their various reincarnations).

I ran some measurements on the 315-C's about 25 years ago, using a WE 640
1" condensor microphone, GR 1554 analyzer, and GR pink noise generator. The
315-C's had a LF break point of 35Hz and had a table up 6db from 500Hz to
6KHz (where the weird decoupled midrange section of the woofer cone operates)
and then flat out to the HF limit of the WE microphone, 10Khz. This was
extraordinary for 1960, pretty good in 1975, and still not too bad today.
I hope to test these with more modern instrumentation, but not immediately.

Up until fairly recently these speakers weren't very expensive on the used
market; I paid $200 for the pair of 315-C's, including cabinets; since they
are quite happy driven by small amps the total cost of the system can be
pretty cheap compared to other alternatives.

Finally, the build quality on these speakers is very high; cast aluminum
frames, huge magnets, cones/suspensions/voice coils that seem to last
forever.

I'm currently refurbishing a JBL S8R system (LE15A/PR15/375/075) but with
a true 500Hz horn/lens replacing the one in the original; I know it will
be both louder and extend a bit deeper in the bass than the 315-C's but
don't know if I'll like it any better.

Mike Squires
--

Mike Squires (mikes at cs.indiana.edu) 317 233 9456 (w) 812 333 6564 (h)
mikes at siralan.org 546 N Park Ridge Rd., Bloomington, IN 47408
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AudioTitor wrote:
I'm new to this old audio thing and I hear comments like, "You need a

pair
of Altec 604's to go with that amp". What is so great about this

Altec 604
speaker? It looks like it belongs in a Mesa Boogie guitar amp.


LOL!

I got my pair for $50 two years ago, impulse garage sale stop after a
fruitless morning at my normal Saturday swap meet; homemade cabinets by
deceased 'audiophile Grandpa' ("You just missed his 'Big' speakers,
they sold for $100." -Jeez- I wonder what they could have been???); the
horns were out, and they were wired out of phase being demo'd with a
small Sansui receiver (BTW with no antenna; the folk threw it in for
free as they were sure it was broke too, wouldn't pick up a local FM
station 10 miles distant.)

All I had to go on was the Altec Xover plate on the side of the big
black 'ugly' boxes, I couldn't see through the dense grill cloths, and
they sounded like crap (did I have $50 to take a chance with? Sometimes
I get *Lucky*!). Brought them home, did my flexure repair on the
original diaphrams (known issue for Altec diaphrams, the flat ribbon
wire breaks), cleaned the boxes up (and remounted the Xovers in front,
now with no grill cloth, so you can see them in all their glory.) They
had sat so long, the cones had 'drooped' and the surround doping had
crawled south. The first real evidence (for me) that Mr. Lansing had it
right; turn your woofers (! every ~ten years? LOL!) They're now my
bench 3 playback monitors. Quite worth $50! (Whenever I'm depressed, I
just check eBay's selling point for stuff like this ;-)

Why are 604E's so 'important'? According the 'free' Altec Lansing demo
LP I got back in the 70's (A&M Altec promo record named "Odyssey"),
which 'hooked' me and caused my purchase of my first A-7's, 604E's were
a sort of defacto recording studio reference at the time ("used by more
recording studios for playback monitors than all others combined.");
point source, *very* efficient, and if loaded into appropriate cabinets
relatively flat (lucky for me, 'Grandpa' evidently payed attention when
he built the cabinets.) In my experience (with my pair), the first
version 604E horns/diaphrams (my pair are also true 16 ohm), there just
isn't any top end above ~14K (I'm aware that I would need to change up
to the 'tangerine' (sp?) diaphram setup to get past 14K.)

I'm quite happy, but I wouldn't pay the +$700 a pair they bring on the
'Bay.

My 2c-
-Robert
QTS
http://www.Braught.com



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kellykevm
 
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There was an era when you couldn't present a commercial control room to
the record business without a pair of 604's hanging above the window.
What made them a "studio monitor" in addition to a hifi speaker was
their durability and efficiency.
Bass players routinely pull jacks out of their Fender P-Basses when
they don't realize they are live - generating heart stopping blasts and
hums. After everyone gets up off the floor and apologies are made, the
Altec 604E's would still be working.
A few years later Audiotechnics proferred the Masterlab crossover
which extended the lifespan of the 604 as the default large speaker
studio monitor. Then, UREI time aligned them and released the 813, 811
etc, which was actually a 604 with Altec crossed out and UREI written
in in crayon.
There were certainly speakers with more depth and detail that most of
us recording engineers didn't get to hear until we attended a mastering
session with our hands folded appropriately behind our backs.
The 604 was a studio workhorse with a laudable purpose: When a sweaty
rhythm section blasts through the control room door to hear a playback
of a take they just played at 103dB, you can't give them a playback on
some candy-assed console top monitor at 85dB and expect them to be
excited about the results. 604's had... well they had balls. Kind of a
cross between a big stereo system and a good bar-band PA.
I'm not a beleiver in loud listening for extended periods mind you, but
there's a time and place to crank it up. Overdub and mix sessions can
easily be handled by better sounding nearfields at half the volume.
That's another thing. The 604's DO NOT sound good at low volumes. I
gotta beleive the guy who invented the "Loudness" control on preamps
was listening to a horn loaded duplex at the time.
I agree with a former poster who described them as good sounding on
horns and reeds. (drums and bass too) They make strings sound like
trained bees, however.
I finally sold my last studio pair to a swooning Japanese man about ten
years ago when I tapped into that corner of the world that genuflects
in front of old school, horn loaded Duplexes. He asked me to play some
Beethoven. I said "Suit yourself". When I heard that swarm of bees
buzzing through the crossover area I thought "he'll never buy these old
things". He proceeded to pay me twice what I thought they were worth
and half what he thought they were worth. We both grinned as we loaded
his minivan.

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george craig
 
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"kellykevm" wrote in message
ups.com...
There was an era when you couldn't present a commercial control room to
the record business without a pair of 604's hanging above the window.
What made them a "studio monitor" in addition to a hifi speaker was
their durability and efficiency.
Bass players routinely pull jacks out of their Fender P-Basses when
they don't realize they are live - generating heart stopping blasts and
hums. After everyone gets up off the floor and apologies are made, the
Altec 604E's would still be working.
A few years later Audiotechnics proferred the Masterlab crossover
which extended the lifespan of the 604 as the default large speaker
studio monitor. Then, UREI time aligned them and released the 813, 811
etc, which was actually a 604 with Altec crossed out and UREI written
in in crayon.
There were certainly speakers with more depth and detail that most of
us recording engineers didn't get to hear until we attended a mastering
session with our hands folded appropriately behind our backs.
The 604 was a studio workhorse with a laudable purpose: When a sweaty
rhythm section blasts through the control room door to hear a playback
of a take they just played at 103dB, you can't give them a playback on
some candy-assed console top monitor at 85dB and expect them to be
excited about the results. 604's had... well they had balls. Kind of a
cross between a big stereo system and a good bar-band PA.
I'm not a beleiver in loud listening for extended periods mind you, but
there's a time and place to crank it up. Overdub and mix sessions can
easily be handled by better sounding nearfields at half the volume.
That's another thing. The 604's DO NOT sound good at low volumes. I
gotta beleive the guy who invented the "Loudness" control on preamps
was listening to a horn loaded duplex at the time.
I agree with a former poster who described them as good sounding on
horns and reeds. (drums and bass too) They make strings sound like
trained bees, however.
I finally sold my last studio pair to a swooning Japanese man about ten
years ago when I tapped into that corner of the world that genuflects
in front of old school, horn loaded Duplexes. He asked me to play some
Beethoven. I said "Suit yourself". When I heard that swarm of bees
buzzing through the crossover area I thought "he'll never buy these old
things". He proceeded to pay me twice what I thought they were worth
and half what he thought they were worth. We both grinned as we loaded
his minivan.


Did you ever consider re-capping the crossover with PP caps and give

another
audition????.........GC



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