Design Acoustics D-6

I picked these up on Saturday. The legs in the pictures aren't original and will be removed.

These are very odd, with 5 Peerless tweeters ( 4 are similar to the ones used by Rectilinear Research in the Mini IIIs the fifth like the ones in the IVs) and one midrange driver on the front, and a 10 inch woofer (needing refoaming) and it's port on the back.

I remember the brand from my obsessive stereo magazine reading in the seventies, when the company made a big splash with it's dodecahedron shaped D-12.

I will let an anonomous writer fill in more:

"Most of you are probably familiar with the dodecahedral D-12 (D for Design) that was Design Acoustics first product and that made the name for the company. That speaker was reviewed by Stereo Review and came out as one of the highest rated speakers ever reviewed by Julian Hirsch. The problem was that the design was just too unconventional even for the Eames era, so a 'conventionalized polyhedron" was marketed that was listed as the D-6. The price was quite a bit lower than the big brother and it became a relative market success for the quite small company. High-Fidelity Magazine immediately reviewed this model in June 1973 and found it to be one of the flatter measuring designs they had encountered. Following his glowing review of the D-12, Hirsch picked up the model for review in September and essentially said that it was his favorite. It was the only speaker to rank a perfect 100% score overall up to that time and for sometime afterwards and in other reviews years later, it was still mentioned favorably. Interestingly, Hirsch liked the D-6 better than the AR LST, though today the D-6 is forgotten and the ARs go for the price of a decent used car.

Hirsch aside, I will say that these are very good speakers for their size and what was available at the time. Thanks to the Peerless drivers, which are unusually smooth for cone tweets, the highs are pretty good and the odd arrangement counters the tendency of cone tweeters to beam terribly. The rear firing woofer, crossing over at 800 Hz, doesn't do what it should do, imo, without very careful positioning near a wall. So, the sound can end up being lean with good mids and highs, but with a major lack of lower midrange and midbass. Overall, they're an interesting design that sound better than one would expect, but will tend to perform less than optimally in most rooms. At the prices they can be found for (eBay pairs have sold for ~$300 in the past, but sometimes others can sneak by for ~$50-100), they are a steal for vintage speakers despite the unconventional (omnidirectional) sound."

I will get them working and look forward to hearing them! I fear that placement close to walls will be difficult in my space, so full of stuff, but am sure they will reward my efforts.