2. speakers
  3. 1438453035

1990s speaker recommendation

Earlier this week I saw on my workplace bulletin board a good deal on some speakers that I remembered listening to for hours back in the mid 1990s when I worked at a series of HiFi shops. I tried to pick them up but was too late, but the incident got me reminiscing about speakers from that era and a quick look at my local craigslist shows a fair amount of inventory.

I'm looking for suggestions for a good pair of floor-standing or sub/sat speakers under $300 from this era. Style of music in our house runs almost the entire gamut. This would be complementing a pair of smaller a/d/s bookshelfs in our living room.

Please make recommendations of specific brands and models to look out for second hand. Thanks.
tr808
timrhu
2,778 posts
 
Snell Type E.
soix
2,133 posts
 
Agree with Zd. Why buy a 20 year old speaker when you can get an almost new pair for the same $$$. Personally, I'd wait for a pair of used Silverline Minuets to become available. Best of luck in your search.
ebm
5,165 posts
 
Spend some cash don't buy trash!!
bodhi
49 posts
 
08-02-15: Whitecap
Polk Audio SDA series. I like the SDA 1C.
Those Polk SDA speakers are classic for sure, though Infinity used lighter and stiffer cone material in their drivers & used a nicer tweeter imho (Emit-R). Carrie Christie also did a superb job on the wood cabinets, however that's only my subjective view as an Infinity lover.
johnnyb53
3,490 posts
 
I'm generally not a big fan of older speakers because there have been significant technological improvements in the last 20 years, especially the last 10.

However, I have a 19-year-old pair of speakers that are still competitive with many new offerings, and no, you can't have mine. They're the Mirage M5si floorstanding loudspeakers. They're a 2-way bipolar. They have the purity and immediacy of a 2-way mini-monitor with the room-filling sound of a bipolar radiatin pattern, and bass reach down to around 26 Hz.

There is a pair in much better condition than mine in the classified section (no affiliation here), but they're about twice your budget and the seller won't ship from Michigan, but will deliver to adjacent states at 30 cents/mile.

These are outstanding speakers that do everything right and nothing wrong that I've found in 19 years of ownership and daily listening. They like lots of power and open up further with bi-amping or at least bi-wiring. This is one 20-year-old speaker that you won't match or beat with current $600 speakers.
More to discover