The story of the smallest Advent speaker

If you’re a retro speaker enthusiast, you’ve probably heard of the large Advent speaker, but have you ever heard of the small Advent speaker? For audiophiles looking for that colorless classic Advent sound without the massive footprint of the large Advent speaker, the smaller Advent speaker was the perfect solution. It really is a testament to smaller speakers that even today, a couple of these purchased in 1972 stand up to current day speaker technology. This really can’t be said for the great advent speakers or similar brands like Bose and JBL of that era.

You could call the approach of the advent speakers of the early 1970s groundbreaking. They were the consummate innovators led by Kloss and his team of wacko audio geniuses. Since Kloss’s goal when he founded Advent in 1967 was to develop a commercially viable large-screen television, the Advent Loudspeaker was something he arrived at somewhat deviously. Lucky for us, he did! The great Advent loudspeaker, as we all know, was the most modern method of acoustic suspension “bookshelf” loudspeaker of the day. With a smaller hard dome tweeter and 1-foot air-suspended woofer, this speaker packs a reasonable punch in a small package. The advent large speaker cabinet was made of wood or MDF (customer’s choice). It included 1 tweeter control.

Regardless, when 1972 rolled around, Kloss, fresh off the success of the big advent speaker, decided he needed to design a smaller model. The smaller advent loudspeaker was very similar to the original advent loudspeaker, albeit with an 8 1/2-inch woofer and a 9 1/2-inch diaphragm in its smaller cabinet. The crossover and tweeter frequencies were actually the same as the large advent speaker, but lacked the control that was standard with the original advent speaker. It also lacked the option of a real wood cabinet. That said, the price was 30% cheaper at about $140 a pair at the time of product launch.

To found the smaller team of advent speakers, Kloss brought in respected colleague Andy Kostatos (who later founded Boston Acoustics), and offered his expert talents to the speaker, specifically in crossover tuning. Kostatos eventually left Advent in 1974 after a recapitalization effort rocked the company.

The stock small Advent speaker was a real beauty and due to its more compact components, by buying these speakers now on the used market there is a good chance you will find a speaker like new or at best with just some minor details. reforms such as rubber gaskets or cones.

There are some interesting things to keep in mind when it comes to the Small Advent monitor. The first thing is that they really are not that “small”. Truth be told, the smallest advent cabinet is actually larger than 90% of what would be considered bookshelf speakers today. Second, the build quality was quite rough and not as slick or shiny as today’s speaker/cabinet builds are. That said, the smaller advent speaker fixtures in particular were quite sophisticated for the time and still are today. Finally, if you’re shopping for smaller advent speakers, do your best to find a pair with the original papers – the manual that came with these bad boys was awesome! Even then it was clear that the Small Advent loudspeaker was targeted and built for serious audiophiles, the same people who covet these loudspeakers even today. The smallest advent speaker is a great introduction to the advent monitor and a proven speaker in the audio world!