Welcome, Heretic!

L-to-R: Heretic Speakers A4, AD612, AD614

As both Herb Reichert (Stereophile 4/23) and Jeff Dorgay (Tone Audio) observed in their reviews of the Heretic AD614, these speakers thumb their noses at modern Hi-Fi doctrine and dogma. They are not tall and thin. They do not have a slew of small drivers. They use serial crossovers. Slaps in the face of what Herb termed ‘Hi-Fi hegemony’, all!

And yet, and yet . . . These modern takes on the Altec coax studio monitors seen in EMI studios with the Beatles bring a coherency and a physicality of sound that a music lover’s brain responds to instantly when paired with complementary amplification.

Faital Pro 303 Heretic 12” coax driver

Let’s get the nuts and bolts out of the way first. The AD614, which you can experience for yourself at Old Forge, is as follows:

  • A 2 way, ductless monitor
  • 12” high sensitivity, high power handling
  • 1” coaxial compression driver in a short exponential horn
  • 97 dab/w/m (3-300 unclipped watts reco)
  • Impedance: 8 ohms
  • Freq Resp: 45-22,000 hz (in typical room: 35-20k)
  • Second order serial Linkwitz-Riley xo
  • FSC 12 ply birch plywood construction, finished with water-based acrylic or food grade 100% vegan linseed oil & pure beeswax.
  • Dimensions: 25.5”h x 18.75”w x 14.5”d, 43 lbs.

Stay tuned for detailed listening impressions and amplifier pairing notes in a few weeks!

Published by David Cope

After 15 years doing audio shows and marketing for Audio Note, UK, I took a year off, intending to establish a recording studio dedicated to making natural, minimally processed recordings of acoustic instruments playing jazz, folk, blues, bluegrass and classical music. Somewhere along the way I borrowed a pair of Auditorium 755 speakers and a Shindo pre-amp and power amp from Jonathan Halpern of Tone Imports. Quick as you can say, "Bob's your uncle!", I had become an audio retailer, using Old Forge Studio as a dual purpose space. It's all very exciting and more than a bit crazy . . .

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