Can someone please help me identify what kind of speakers these are? They don't have any brand name on them and the guy who gave them to me a while back told me he bought them in the 70's for $1,000 a piece. They have an M and A sort of intermixed as a logo on the back, but still that doesn't tell me much. It says model 12XP and the serial begins: J 0xxxx(x's represent actual numbers). I want to sell them so i need to figure out what kind they are. Thanks for any help anyone can give me!!!
We have a member here who worked in the industry for quite sometime and may be able to help. I would also try AudioKarma as there are quite a number of folks over there whose primary interest is older gear.
I don't remember any major company which would have produced those speakers. Most speaker lines were moving well beyond the type of construction shown in your photos. The claim these speakers cost $1k each in the 1970's is rather preposterous as inflation adjusted pricing would then put these speakers in the neighborhood of a current pricing of $3900 - apiece! There just were not that many speakers in the 1970's which sold for $1k each. For example, a JBL L100 cost about $350 each, a pair of Bose 901's with equalizer would have set you back $475, an Altec Voice of the Theater would run $525 each and a Quad ESL would have cost $425 each. Any of those speakers would have been higher technology and come with a pedigree not apparent in your examples. I'm certainly not the last word on such things but a $1k speaker from the 1970's would have been something I remembered.
My guess would be the speakers are what is called a "black box" or "house brand" speaker which was sold by a specific store with a highly inflated retail pricing which could be heavily discounted to close a sale. It really doesn't matter what they are or how much they supposedly cost 35 years ago. Pre owned speakers are worth what someone is willing to pay and nothing more. Judging the speakers simply by their appearance, I'd say shoot for $100 for the pair and go down with any reasonable offer. If they were given to you, you don't need to squeeze out profit, do you?
