clean and clear sound. So supurrb If you close your eyes you would think you are there.

size. 8 ft tall makes for some tight fits.

I bought these new in 83 and have moved them once. They are incredable and the pure joy of anyone who listens to them is always apparent on there face. You need power to make them preform. Built my house so that I could maximaize the speakers in my listening areas. Sweet spot is about 7 ft in front and they need a seperation of about 14 feet.
I only wish I could still find them, I would probably by another set.

Clarity, imaging, especially good at low levels, low listener fatigue.

Big & ugly, can't really crank them

I first heard Acoustat Spectra 3300 at a friends house in back in the late 80's and I was amazed. About the time I purchased my Model 3's I was prepared to purchase his 3300's for $1,800 (a bit much) but I found the #'s for $700. I love these speakers but I am frustrated by lack of power. I am driving them with a Dynaco Stereo 400 II which I believe has enough power. I had tried using a sub but was not happy with the loss of clarity. Room placement is a huge factor with these speakers. They are much better out in the middle of the room. Much better bass and the bass is very tight.

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None

Imaging, clarity, midrange, highs, lows, soundstage

Size, directional

I purchased these speakers last weekend. They came with the Acoustat power amplifier. I had to verify they would fit inside my house because they are almost 8' tall. I also had to ask my wife if she could live with them. When she helped me unload them, she was not impressed because the grille on one was gone and the grille on the other was in horrible shape. I had to plead with her to allow me to place them in the living room (temporarily) just to see what they sounded like. I hooked them up and played some music. Immediately, I began to hear things I have never, ever heard anywhere. I was stunned.I kept playing music into the night. My wife and kids came in the room and their mouths dropped open. This is the honest truth. My kids, ages 9,11, and 13 brought their favorite CD's down to play and a donnybrook almost opened up over which song to play next. These speakers make oldy goldy songs sound magnificent. Well recorded music such as Jackson Browne, James Taylor, and Steely Dan are unbelievable. I also played some Jim Croce songs and the sound of the guitars strings was hard to believe. The soundstage is huge and virtually flawless. The overall sound is the best I have ever heard. And I have owned and built numerous speakers such as Quad, Klipschorn,Dynaudio, JBL, other smaller Acoustat and have heard speakers in audio shops costing 10k and more. None of these come close to these Acoustats. They sound much better than the Quads and the bass is very good. Since I have had them, not one person in my family has said one word about removing them from our living room. I am going to re-grille them and maybe re-laminate the bases. I have loved audio for the past 29 years and this is the crowning achievement in that time span. I will never let these go away.

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Quad ESL-63

ONLY AVAILABLE USED. VERY RELIABLE SPEAKER .ACOUSTAT NO LONGER IN BUSINESS.DID NOT KNOW HOW GOOD THEY CAN SOUND UNTILL I UPGRADED MY CD SYSTEM ,CAREFULL PLACEMENT AND VERY GOOD EQUIPMENT WILL GET THE BEST SOUND. VERY GOOD BASS ,DOWN TO 28 HRTZ OR LOWER, SWEET HIGH END ONE OF THE BEST MIDRANGE AROUND. EXTREMELY LARGE SPEAKER SINCE IT IS 94 INCHES TALL BY 21 INCHES WIDE. DYNAMICS IS AVERAGE WITH A HUGE SOUND STAGE . ONE OF THE SPEAKERS THAT I CAN REALLY BE HAPPY WITH,SINCE I HAVE BEEN AN AUDIOPHILE FOR OVER 18 YEARS AND HAVE A PREFERENCE FOR PLANAR SPEAKERS. BETTER THAN APOGEES FULL RANGE RIBBONS ANDMUCH BETTER THAN THE MATIN-LOGANS SINCE THESE HAVE NO CROSSOVERS OR BOXY COLORATIONS OF THESE HYBRIDS.. CLOSE TO STATE OF THE ART WITH THE BEST ELECTRONICS. ONLY RIVAL IS SOUND LABS A-1.

Beautiful soundstage, excellent definition and clarity. Bring music to life. Full sound.

These speakers need room and have to be set up properly. There is only a very narrow sweet spot. I personally like to have them cross about one foot in front of me. They should be 18 inches off the back wall and 18 inches off the side walls. 18 inches is minimum, 3 feet if you have the room. Speaker seperation sould be about 8 to 10 feet. The speakers are also almost 8 feet tall and will not generally fit in a developed basement with their lower ceiling heights. To get what these speakers can deliver, you have to plan your room around them, you just can't stick them in the corner. Not all amplifiers like electrostatics either. You'll need a good stable amp to drive them.

Have had these speakers since 1983. Did not upgrade the transformers, still got the factory ones. Never had a problem. These speakers really shine and come to life when you drive them with good equipment. I'm presently running a Sumo Nine Class A amp (70 watts a side) with the Sumo preamp. I don't own a CD player and my fornt end is an Oracle Delphi table with an Eminent Technologies ET1 linear tracking (fictionless air bearing) tone arm and a Dynavector Diamond cartridge. Running good patch cords and cables (very important to let that signal through). At this point, I've had the same system for 15 years and am not about to change anything. It seems to provide good balance. Back to the speakers. If you can find a pair for sale, consider yourself lucky. I'm not saying the 2+2's are the best there is, what I'm saying is that you'll have to really search to hear better. One of the signs of a good speaker is that you can listem to them for long periods without getting fatigued. The sound you get is crisp and clean. You'll hear your music again and for the first time you'll realize what it can really sound like. I've listened to my 2+2's for almost 20 years and all I can say is you have to hear it. You cannot put into words the openess, warmth, clarity, crispness, detail and the sound stage you will experience. Your ears are different form mine and your musical tastes may be different but once you hear a pair of 2+2's you'll quickly discouver what I'm talking about. Don't overdrive them. These speakers are not designed to play at high earth moving decibel levels. They are designed to try and replicate live music and that they do well.

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Heard many speakers over the years. Traded in a set of Tannoys when I bought these. Heard the hybrids and in my opinion they're not in the same league even though hybrids tend to be good. Ribbon speakers seem to have a slightly harder sound.

Awesome and realistic soundstage.Fantastic and true to the musical venue in live performance recordings.

Very large,need excellent system to match their transparency

I own acoustat2+2 with the older transformers and not the newer medallion transformer.They sound best with the cloth removed and that is how I listen to them.My speakers were manufactured in 1982(saw the year on the loudspeaker base when I removed the cloth.They sound best with valve amplifiers.I am using them with a pair of custom 60 watt single ended classA pure triode amps.The amps run out of power only at very loud volumes in my 6X7sq metre room.
Highly recommended if you can find a pair.

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None.Used box speakers and when hearing the acoustats after one minute,purchased them

Soundstage is HUGE. Detail amazing. Midrange to die for. Super reliable.

Big. Takes some effort to find people to repair them but SO worth it. They probably will never need repair anyway. They are also very directional and the sweetspot is very small. if you move your head one foot in the wrong direction the sound changes...but still sounds amazing.

First let me say that this review is for the model III acoustat. It's only 5 foot tall (not 8 foot!) and has three panels inside, not two. i have heard they sound very similar and some prefer the IIs and some the IIIs but any acoustat owner will break into a BIG smile when you tell them you own either.
Ive listened to speakers costing 5k, 10k, 20k that were nothing but tweeters and woofers stuffed inside of a souped up wooden box with special wood and finish, bla bla. crap, all of them. the sound on these things is so far far far superior.
The speakers need to be set from the rear wall at least 3 feet because sound comes from both front and back. if they are too close to the back wall you'll get some distortion. i ran these things with sonic frontiers sfs80 (80wpc) tube amp and thought i was in heaven. but the bass was a little weak. i thought that was the speakers and was FINE living with it. but then i bought an audio research vt100mkII and WOW! lots of great, tight, tight bass. i'm still going to look for a sub just for the hell of it and see what that does but i will say it again: ive never heard a speaker better than these. the LOW prices they go for on the used market are due to the fact that these things are big and heavy and dont ship well so sellers look for local buyers. the best deal around by far. i feel sorry for audiophiles who buy expensive b&ks and the like. oh well...good for me cause i'd like another pair. GOD i love these things!

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All kinds of in the box speakers

Absolute clarity and depth of classical and jazz music

Not strong on Rock and Roll but still very good.

I had these for close to 8 years and was never disapointed. For the uninitiated, these speakers are 2" shy of 8ft tall, 22" wide but only about 4" thick. The panel is actually 4 panels , hence 2+2 each panel being about 46"x10". Think of the monolith from 2001 and you have a good idea what these look like. That was their downfall with me - actually the wife. They look 1980's and you can't hide almost 32 sq ft of speaker panels!!

Since I live in an ordinary 2500 sq ft house, they were always in a corner against a wall. They need to be at least 36" from any wall either to the side or behind. Reason is that the sound comes out the back as well as the front and having them real close to the wall confuses the listener as reflections come into play. One of the biggest 'wow factors' for these speakers other than the fact that they are only 4" thick is that the sound does not come from a single point source like a traditional speaker. The sound eminates from the whole panel, highs and lows. It's amazing. people would go up to them, shaking their heads in amazement.

Sound: Over the years I used a bunch of source hardware. Usually a Nakamichi CD Player and a Linn LP12/Ittok turntable and I drove each one with a NAD 2100 running in mono, only 100W but quite adequate although the volume went quite a way around the dial. You will need some HP, don't expect that 40W Pioneer receiver from Best Buys to run these things. I now have a pair of Adcom 555s (375 Wpc into 4ohms) and I only wish i had those 2+2s back!!! These present a wierd load to an amp - some say down to 2 ohms at certain frequencies so again, pick something good to run them. If the store you bought your amp/receiver from also sells washing machines, forget it :)

A lot of electrostatics these days are hybrids in that they have a regular cone woofer to handle the bass. The reason that these are so large is that Accoustat tried to do the bass thing without the woofer. They did it pretty well, these will go down to 30Hz but remember the whole panel has to do highs and lows so on rock and roll, they don't have the perceived punch that say my Vandersteen 2Ces have. Jazz and Classical, these are winners - or...get a good high quality subwoofer to take the workload off the 2+2s. The sweet spot is minute. You have to 'focus' them about 2' behind your head. Moving accross the sofa will give you different soundstage depth.

Overall though, if you have never heard an electrostatic i'e you 'grew up' on countless sets of traditional speakers, you owe it to yourself to audition a set of these or maybe something newer. The sound is pure, transparent with unbelievable depth (when in sweet spot), no crossover so frequencies are not divided between drivers.

If you can get a set of these - do it and buy a truck to move them!! I love my Vandys but long for the Accoustats. I bought mine for $1000 in 1990 and sold them for $1100 in 1998!!! One day I'll get another set.

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Many, Linn Kans, different Kefs, no electrostatics.

Low distortion. Very musical. Not flashy.

Extreme low end not well defined.

I have had my Acoustat 2+2s since 1984. They were the store demo pair and thus I got them at a really good price. Also, at the time they were Stereophile rated "class B". They have the original transformers. Even though I had the chance to do the Medallion upgrade, I just was not willing to part with the interface boxes to obtain the upgrade (thus no speakers for ??? weeks).

Anyway, even though the beige cloth cover needs to be replaced, I am as happy with them now as when I purchased them. Perhaps when I win the big lotto I will buy a killer subwoofer to go with them. Of all the things I have purchased in my life, these speakers remain one of the best purchases I have made (my 14 year old car is another). In spite of my less than current state-of-the art audio equipment, I can sit down and just enjoy the music and forget that it is coming out of a bunch of boxes.

absolutely awesome soundstage only rival the best soundlab period buy used and talk to dave and enjoy chris

none if you wantincredible sound that badc forget aBOUT this stupid spousal factor if she dont want to know

done

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FORGET HER