![]() ![]() It is one of those speakers you remember when and where you first heard them. ![]() While they did house the drivers, they spread and allowed the sound to look and flow like no other speaker made quite since.Īll in all, Altec Model 19s are in a niche all their own. These were big furniture pieces and very much looked the part with a lovely finish and fine construction. They did not rattle or ring but delivered a sturdy platform for the lower-end bass extension port to cabin the drivers in wonderful style. The cabinets arrived in a rugged Oak style or stylish Walnut wood. The crossover was a charm to me and gave these amazing speakers their soul of sound reproduction.Īnother awesome thing is that you do not require a huge muscle amp – a simple, modest, well-made tube amp is easily played through these. They have “slam” in abundance but also finesse.Īs great as the driver match-up was, the crossover made it all possible, an extremely smooth transition assisted by a pair of L-Pads, where one could tweak the upper-frequency ranges or even the lower vocal ranges. The speakers will pressurize the room, shaking it with deep bass where the source requires it, yet the bass is free of boom or exaggerations. The 15″ bass driver produces some of the cleanest, clearest basses I have ever heard. They matched and blended so well that their sound is renowned in the audiophile community – at last, a truly BIG sound in a stylish and accurate package.Īnother bonus is that this mid-woofer was rugged and had a true low-end capability of 30 Hz – even better than all that is that it could do it loudly with a 99db efficiency, which again helped match it up to the horn combinations’ ability to play loud and clear. Matching this particular mid-woofer to that horn set made pure sonic sense. The Altec 16″ woofer offered an excellent higher-end range best to meet the lower-end capability of the great horn combination. Combining the 811 lenses with this driver was pure audio art! The horn is efficient and has a well-established design by Altec. The horn lens has outstanding dispersion characteristics for excellent room coverage and smooth frequency response. Back in the day, it was revolutionary for a horn driver this size to hold the more distant high-end frequency capability this driver delivered. ![]() The “Tangerine” horn driver had extended upper range capacity not many, if any, had when these were initially built. ![]() This is somewhat of a scaled-down version of the venerable VOTT – but with better frequency extensions. The heritage behind the Model 19 is the Altec Voice Of The Theatre legacy. However, this is not just any simple two-way type speaker. It is fantastic in design, being a simple two-way type. This is a speaker for the audiophile as well as an occasional listener. In this article, I’ll do my best to pick the best vintage Altec Lansing speakers and review those I tested. My colleague owns a 15″ Lansing element from the 1930s and several Altec Lansing 311b, 604, 811b, Model 19, as well as some other models. Horn-loaded – speakers (e.g., all at Altec) gained a reputation for harshness in HF and midrange coloration, and consumer demand for them almost dried up by the mid-1970s. The popularity of Altec Lansing theatrical loudspeakers among audiophiles waned in the mid-1950s with the promotion of the Acoustic Research/Janszen dynamic/electrostatic hybrid loudspeaker. Then it went down in connection with purchases from various technology/investment companies, and engineers fled to other companies like JBL, EV, and others.Īny day of the week, older Altec Lansing beats those other companies with better active filters and PEQ regarding audible distortion and frequency response.Īltec Lansing stands in a class of its own of older high-sensitivity speakers. Altec Lansing was dominant in the USA in cinemas and studios, and homes with “higher requirements” from the 40s until the late 70s. ![]()
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