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In Reply to: RE: AR 2ax Speakers posted by ESDI-80 on March 23, 2016 at 10:32:33
Pick your poison. There will be those that like each one. You have to decide which is better for you....
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Right now, my Dynaco A25s are my favorites. The mids and highs are excellent and I am hearing details I don't hear on other speakers systems I've listened too. Due to my low frequency hearing loss, I am running them with loudness switched in so +8DB at 50Hz and an additional +4DB at 32Hz and 16Hz on the EQ. Bass is very nice and extended, and to my ears, doesn't seem to mud up the upper bass or mids.
I will be hooking up the 2ax's in the living room so we will have to see how they perform. :-)
Unlike the other low single digit AR speakers (3,4,5) AR kept redoing the 2's in major ways over time, 2, 2a, 2ax. Of these AR speakers, I think the one to own is the 5, but they are tough to find. The 5 is basically the 3a with a 10-inch woofer, which High Fidelity liked better than the 3a in smaller rooms and was less power hungry. HF claimed the overall balace from top to bottom was better with the 5 than the 3a. The 2ax came close to the 5 but it was cheaper and not quite the equal.
Any version of the 2ax(the tweeter could be the AR3 or AR3a tweeter) should really be considered a 2 way with super tweeter since the mid crossover is at 2 kHz. It's just an AR2x with an extra tweeter so the 'mid range' is the AR2x tweeter.
Edits: 03/23/16
...but I owned a pair of 2ax's for several years. Always thought the bass was very good, but the mids and highs were muted and lacking in clarity. Now granted my source components at the time may have had something to do with it, but based on my experience, I wouldn't recommend the 2ax's. I can't believe some of the prices on eBay and even Craig's List for them.
There is no beer in food, but there is food in beer.
I owned the 2ax's, too - bought them new. I was never happy with the mids - that mid-range driver always struck me as a little rough, and that made them much less listenable than I had hoped. (I remember listening to them in a dealer's showroom compared to comparably sized/priced "Aztec" speakers. The AR's sounded like someone threw a blanket over them, similar to what you call "lacking in clarity". If I'd listened to my ears and not AR's marketing, I'd have bought the Aztecs.)
I soon sold the AR's and replaced them with large Advents, which remained my primary speakers for over 20 years.
The 5's used the same Dome mid and Tweeter used in the 3a, but had the 10 inch woofer used in the 2ax. They were also nominally 8 not 4 ohm and less power hungry than the 3a. High Fidelity loved them when they tested them, comparing them with the 3a and claiming that they sounded better in anything but a giant room.
I remember visiting AR's showroom at Grand Central Station in New York. I only had the budget for the AR-6 at the time (their next-to-the-least-expensive speaker, one step up from the AR-4x), and it was a chance to listen to it driven by AR electronics and an AR turntable playing good quality recordings. I thought it was fine, until they switched to the AR-3a, which was simply majestic in comparison. I never did buy the 6, instead stretching my budget to get the 2ax - the tweeter and woofer from the 5 plus a less expensive midrange. Alas, that was a disappointment.
All that said, I have a pair of AR-10pi's today (a derivative of the 3a design with crossover features from the LST). I absolutely love them. As I've said elsewhere, they are high on my list of speakers that are good enough that if you own a pair, you can stop looking for something better.
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