I have a pair of Mission 704a floorstanding loudspeakers. I bought them in 2001 for £400 which was half the price they were selling at in other places. After all this time I have began looking at new speakers.

Thinking that an almost ten year old pair of speakers would easily be out matched by what was available in todays market I began shopping with a budget of £1000 in mind. My first choice was Monitor Audio Gs20 which were no good, sounded like they were choking and someone was playing an MP3 through them. I then tried Spendor, Acoustic Energy and QUAD all of which lacked in one way or another.

Oh dear I thought......better up the budget to about £1500 pounds or so. I was talked into listening to Monitor Audio Gs60 Gold series at a price tag of £2000. After listening for a while and not beig impressed I decided it was the test room acoustics and took the speakers home for a shot in my own pad.

What I heard actually surprised me a lot. The differance between them and my Missions was very, very slight. The Mon Auds had them on the top end with a little more accuracy and brightness. But the Missions had them at the mid and bottom end with fuller base and a better sound stage presence with an altogether wider mid range and a more solid sound. The Mon Aud base was punchier and more accurate but the whole sound felt processed and sounded like.....well.....speakers!! I can close my eyes with the Missions and feel as if the band are on stage in front of me.

What gives?? One of the so called greats being outperformed by Ten year old speakers that were under half the price when they were sold back then??? Not only that but all of the other ones I tried were even worse. The £1600 Spendors I wouldn't have taken for free!!!!!

Is there any other avenue to try or are we just all being ripped off by companies who rather than say that they are at the pinnacle of speaker technology would rather keep changing design and making the speakers pricier hoping that along the way no one will notice?

By the way....

Mission 704a Bi Amped and wired
Roksan Caspian Int Amp
Cyrus Power Amp
Nordost Solar Wind Inter connects
Arcam Cd72

Yamaha RXV1600
HKardon DVD25

Havn't heard anything that beats it.....yet!
That includes overpriced £5000 amp and speakers!

What gives?? One of the so called greats being outperformed by Ten year old speakers that were under half the price when they were sold back then??? Not only that but all of the other ones I tried were even worse. The £1600 Spendors I wouldn't have taken for free!!!!!

Did you factor in inflation over those 10 years? Speaker technology has not changed over the last 10 years so there should be no big difference.

Ask yourself what REALLY NEW technology in drivers, crossovers and cabinets has been released in the last decade? Now you know why your speakers are still great.

I wish I had kept my 770 Freedom's from 1987!

Yeah. There is really not much difference between speakers now and then. You would have to go back much further. Also remember that you become very accustomed to a certain speakers sound over the years. Sometimes a new different speaker will not sound better to you, until you really get use to it. To this day, a pair of Spica TC-50s or Dalhquist DQ20s blow me away. There just great speakers from the 80's and will beat most ones today. When you think of it, it still is basically the same components.

Sounds like you oughta keep your current speakers.

No matter how much technology advances, a good speaker is still a good speaker.

I've been through this several times. I have some old M&K 2B's, and they still compete today. I realized I was going to have to shell out more $ than I was wanted, to get a better speaker. But it does seem like there are more quality speakers out there now.

Thanks.....you guys have helped me make up my mind and have saved me £2000!

I was wondering though if it is possible to have speakers serviced? I think the terminals may need a little attention internally and when the speakers are over half volume the tweeter rasps a little, maybe this could be fixed with a little tune up???

Thanks again!

In case you're interested, there is a forum that tends to focus on older equipment, audiokarma.org.

There are many people who use speakers from the 1970s and earlier. My primary speakers are currentlly ADS L500s, made in the 70s. Improvements in speakers have focused on making them smaller and less expensive to build. There have certainly been things learned about psychoacoustics, improvements in materials and designs, and other things that should lead to better designs. But the improvement isn't as much as you might expect. And a mere 10 years isn't significant.

Stereophile recently reviewed the Smaller Advents, from 1972, as if they were new speakers. There are areas in which a newer design would do better, but they also had their strengths. Current speakers in the same price range (after inflation) measured better, but not by as much as you might expect. There are plenty of people who still like and use them, and other models from the same period.

If you don't get an answer here about repairing your speakers, post on the speaker section of Audiokarma. Because the site deals with older speakers, many of which have to be restored, there are people who can help you diagnose the problem and do your own repair or point you to those who can do it for you.