So a friend of mine was shopping around for vintage speakers. He found 2 pairs of Klipsch La Scala's for $1200 and figured that he could turn around one of the two pairs and come out close to even if he was patient.

While he was browsing prices on them he found another pair with better crossovers and a nicer wood finish for cheap right in the neighborhood. Why not turn around the two original pairs and buy this pair?

So he's sitting on three sets of La Scalla's and checking out prices online. So of course he finds a pair of Klipschorn's for $750 two hours away, which he really prefers to the La Scalla's. He gets in the truck and picks them up. Now he's sitting on four sets of giant vintage speakers.

He knows that all I do is hang out, sell coffee and listen to tunes all day, so he's offered to put a pair of the La Scalla's in shop on loan. I've got a set of decent Paradigm's in there right now and there is nothing wrong with them. I'm going to have to do a bit of remodeling, I think I'll take him up on the offer.

I'm an idiot as far as Hi Fi goes, tell me what you think.

Anyone ever had a pair? I know they were designed as PA speakers and people seem to either love or hate them. They are out of they world efficient. I wouldn't need to push more than a Watt to fill the shop.

Are they going to need a sub to sound good?

I've got a 90's mid range Dennon Stereo amp in there right now, the only other amp I have that isn't in use is a 70's Realistic. Would it be worth it to pick up a different amp? a pre amp? Affordable options only, any thoughts?

I listened to them for a few minutes but the basement which I heard them in was a terrible place to listen to anything. He's keeping all the cabinets hiding in the basement because he wife would lose her shit if she saw them all.

kleinbl00:

I need to get to know this friend of yours.

Honestly? You have zero risk here. You have 100% upside. If you have any sort of musically aware clientele the fact that you have a set of La Scalas in a coffee shop is like... awesome.

My suggestion? Deploy as they are and let your clients fight over what you're doing wrong. Because they will. And then all sorts of ancient crusty sound gear will crawl out of the woodwork.

They've got 15s. The sub you would want to augment 15" mids would push you into dumb territory. I mean, you still wanna be able to talk over the things, right?


posted 2531 days ago