Your thoughts about ATC loudspeakers

@david_ten

I have used extensively since ’95 ATC speakers. SCM 20, SCM 20SL, SCM100A and their C6 subwoofer and even their largest active centre channel.

They all sound very similar even active vs passive.

As you go larger and go active the clarity and distortion drops while the SPL capability increases to truly incredible dynamic levels.

Recently I simplified to their active 150 elliptical design which has a 15" woofer. If you are a stickler for precise timbre of sound for percussion, vocals, piano and pretty much anything at live music levels then you can’t go wrong with ATC - especially the larger models - no speaker I know of has better driver integration or such extremely low distortion at high SPL than a large ATC. The sound is neutral and precise and totally natural/realistic.

My speakers and class A to 2/3 power active discrete component amps are entirely made in the UK by ATC. All three drivers are entirely made in house by ATC. The tweeter is a new in house design and has no Ferrofluid - it has a double spider - perhaps the only tweeter using this design. As others have mentioned, the magic is in the bass and mid range with ATC - the bass and mid range are so clean and tangible that this is immediately easily noticeable versus other speakers. The new tweeter is designed and built in house by ATC (like all their drivers) and is only available on very recent models and it is outstanding but the tweeter improvement vs other speakers is not of the same order of magnitude noticeable significant improvement as the bass and mid range.

Active is such a no brainer - it allows amps to work within a limited bandwidth and without the heavy load of a passive lossy crossover - the design is just an order of magnitude better than the traditional approach in terms of low distortion and driver integration (provided active is done well as it is possible to mess up any design approach).

@david_ten      

My bad. I indeed meant to say clarity increases and distortion drops as you go to larger models but the overall sound remains totally consistent. The super version (stronger drive motor) of their 3 inch dome mid range combined with the active amplification and phase aligned active crossover is really worth aiming for if you have the means - all the 50 and larger active models have this. Alternatively, passive 20 or 19 and a JL subwoofer might be a sensible way to go on a tighter budget. 

@1graber2   

Large ATC are one of the few select speakers of choice for "shock and awe" in multi-million $ facilities. (Basically impress the hell out of the clients)

Prism launched a new HiFi version of their DAC at British Grove last year...again large ATC are the choice for Mark Knopfler's studio.

http://www.the-ear.net/features/prism-sound-british-grove

@dragon_vibe 

+1 on Quested - great speakers and Trevor Horn is amazing so you can trust his ears!

Quested uses ATC mid range on Hans Zimmers large soffit mounted monitors. PMC also used the ATC mid range (I think they have been using a cheaper clone from Volt since about 2000).  So you are indeed looking at quite similar designs but likely voiced or crossed over a little differently so that you much prefer Quested over the others.

@audiotroy 

The Quested and PMC don't quite have the level of detail of the ATC mid but for listening they both sound great. They also have more bass than ATC but again not quite as precise and tight as ATC. I think dragon_vibe finds the less clinical presentation to be more pleasant and less fatiguing. All three speakers are very good. All three have their fan base.

@dragon_vibe

@itzhak1969

Agreed. Good points.

ATC tend to go well with big Bryston amps or amps around the 200+ watt range. Definitely not suitable for anything under about 150 watt tube amps like big Audio Research or Macintosh amps.

ATC active amps are solid state with MOSFET output stages and biased such that they are Class A to 2/3 power. So active ATC is really the best way to go with this particular brand. And this brand is best avoided by those folks who prefer to drive their speakers with tubes or those who want more personal control over the sound.

And there is No Best Speaker suited to everyone! Only the best speaker for each individual within the context of their preferences, requirements and experience. One can only say that ATC are a world class speaker chosen by many (but not all) golden eared professionals with rather specific musical requirements for a truthful presentation that allows for ease of important mix/mastering decisions of the source master tapes/files.

@drubin

ATC are voiced for realistic live music levels. So turned down to levels of a TV or a radio and they will sound anemic in bass (see equal loudness curves). You can of course simply boost the bass at low levels and it will sound great.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Equal-loudness_contour

ATC bass is not resonant like some ported designs and this means bass will not be boosted or bloated even when cranked.

ATC help sound engineers design the mixing to sound good at a loudness level that suits the music. Obviously the normal loudness listening level is different for various genres. Anything intended to be listened to at moderate to low levels needs a bass boost and anything intended to be listened to at Rock highest levels needs to have less bass.

If you always listen moderately or softly then much of the benefit of ATC massive drivers (that are low distortion even at high SPL) is going to be wasted or remain unused. Our ears can handle a huge dynamic range and much of the detail can only be entirely heard at realistic levels. If you play at a maximum of 80 dB SPL at the listener then you have around a max of 40 to 50 dB dynamic range audibly available above the noise floor. If you play such that the highest sounds are 110 dB SPL then you have an additional 30 dB of audible detail that was not available at low listening levels. It is key to understand that by cranking it you are able to hear a further 30 dB below the noise floor at a soft level and only a very robust over-engineered design of speaker can deliver this. Large ATC are like 70 dB down in 2nd and third harmonic distortion throughout the mid range - this is very clean and this is why the SCM 40 will sound clearer than the 19 which has the 3 inch mid grafted onto a 6 inch woofer.

@keoliphant

At lower volumes Harbeth is a great choice even with SS. ATC are bone crunching dynamic at louder SPL with SS but at lower volumes (if that is mostly what you are after for an office) then I would advise a warm traditional style tube preamp to warm them up but definitely SS power amp to drive them. KEF is similar to ATC - fairly neutral. Harbeth sound really good at low volume - they have almost a tube warmth to them in the bass (so not the last word in bass but great for casual listening at lower volume - think BBC classical radio all day )

I am not familiar with how warm the BHK preamp sounds. I see both BHK pre and monos are MOSFET output which will have no problem with ATC but probably won’t be as warm as a conventional tube amp with autotransformer.

@jon_5912

What at are you using as a source and preamp with the Active 110?

A tube preamp will warm up ATC as they simply reproduce what is fed to them...very faithful to the source.

@ssnkssnk   

Welcome to the forums. You can display photos of your system setup on this site. Harshness will be source dependent. The speakers are very revealing of the source. CD loudness wars have resulted in quite a lot of harsh sounding pop/rock.