If only pictures could sing...
You would probably be astonished as I am now by the voice of these humble speakers. The Sony APM-12ES are capable of a great, even glorious, sound. The way voices and some wind instruments come out into the room, not to mention the strings! Natural dynamics, relaxed sound, believable timbre. The attributes of high-end audio, but you can find them used for 100 euros. They can summon the ghosts of past sounds. And they serve music exceptionally. I'm keeping them in my collection, I'll probably use them frequently from now on, and encourage you to try a pair if you can. Can't say anything about other models in the same range, because I haven't tried any. These are in fact, I believe, the first serious pair of Sony speakers I listen to. I don't know how much of this astonishing realism can be credited to the APM technology flat square woofer.
About these speakers, Radio museum says: "Bookshelf two-way bass-reflex speaker system. Square woofer 140x140mm with sandwich honeycomb aluminum diaphragm and 19mm dome tweeter with aluminum diaphragm. Cross-over @ 3kHz,nominal impedance 8Ω, sensivity 88dB SPL at 1 metre for 1 watt. Frequency response 35Hz-20kHz, power handling 80W sine [...] This model was developed for "european ears" and manufactured in Germany (and maybe also in United Kingdom?). APM means "Accurate Pistonic Motion"." (source: https://www.radiomuseum.org/r/sony_speaker_system_apm_121es.html).
Stereonomono reports a description of APM technology in their article on the APM-33W.
I find your comments very interesting....as the APM 12ES was never touted as an expensive or high-end speaker. I have been curious about various APM for a while but have yet to hear any.
ReplyDeleteThe APM 181ES appears to have a similarly-sized APM woofer and tweeter, with the addition of a conventional cone mid (a true 3-way design) in a bigger cabinet with more bass extension. Could perhaps be worth seeking out. Hope you keep enjoying the 12ES!
Thank you for your comment. I still haven't heard any other APM speakers. The 181 could be better than my 12, who knows, should try and compare. I think if you can find any of these speakers, they will be quite cheap. In fact the very low cost was one of the reasons I bought mine and tried them, with zero guarantee that they would sound good (no reviews, nothing). If you can find and try them, please let me know what you think about them, you may not agree with my assessment, but I bet they will be interesting to listen to.
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