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ESL57 vs ESL63

The 57’s are going for twice the price of 63’s.

i like the managable size of this speaker, this is really a part of my soon to be retirement built two channel system.

besides the price, how do these two fair amongst each other. Realistically how much power do the require, tubes ? Solidstate ?

my hope would be to also get into lower powered triode type amps with this projects.....

kgveteran
cd318
2,636 posts
 
I can't help but feel that most of the mythology around the Quads originated from the high regard held by his contemporaries for the great man himself, Peter J Walker.

Box/cone loudspeaker manufacturers must have been alarmed upon the arrival of this new technology, but as we have seen, electrostatics were not the future road forwards but merely a sideline.

It's also interesting that although Walker himself believed the 63s to be superior it was the ESL that passed into Hi-Fi legend.
clio09
3,343 posts
 
I have the 57s but have spent some significant time with the 63s as well. Overall I prefer the 57s, but I use a set of stands to raise them up a bit to improve the image height. While I use a woofer array and active crossover to biamp in my system, the 57s on their own do bass much better than I expected. They aren't going to go much below 40 Hz but what is there is pleasing. I play a wide variety of music with them including rock.

Mine have the clamp boards installed which means I can use just about any amp with greater than 20 watts power and not have to worry about arcing the speakers. It's a worthwhile upgrade if you purchase a pair without them. I either use Atma-Sphere M60s or a Music Reference RM-10 on the 57s. Both amps work quite well with the speakers.
kgveteran OP
377 posts
 
My plan for a HT room and a separate listening room will not be happening, so they will share duty in my HT, i listen mostly to music. My HT is 13’x19’ the vaulted ceiling runs front to back centered on the 19’ lenth, i think they could sit on my current subs when in use, the subs are 19” tall......

 

bdp24's avatar
bdp24
9,412 posts
 

"the 57’s need a fair bit of SS power"?! The 57 was designed to be run with the QUAD amp, which produced 15 watts/ch. One solid state amp which became very popular with the 57 was the Bedini 25/25 (guess how much power it produced ;-), which was capable of overpowering the speaker. As clio said, the Music Reference RM-10 is an ideal amp for the 57, especially the Class-A 25w/ch version.

Add subs for below 40-60Hz and be happy forever. Unless you’re cd318 ;-) . The speaker is not for everyone---you have to be able to appreciate it’s abilities, nor for all music---I wouldn’t try to play AC/DC at 100dB (which I like to do) on them. But for singers and small-scale acoustic music? Perhaps still unsurpassed, and yes, better than the 63, regardless of what Peter Walker thought. But take off those idiotic metal grills!

audiokinesis
2,713 posts
 

I have owned both and would choose a GOOD, MATCHED pair of 57's.  To my ears the 63's have a bit of over-emphasis in the lower treble region that I never could get used to. 

I used various tube and solid state amps and my preference was for the Atma-Sphere M-60's. 

Duke

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