Menu
Forum
What's new
New posts
Live Activity
Search forums
Members
Registered members
Classifieds Member Feedback
Car Audio Discussion
General Car Audio
Car Audio Build Logs
Car Audio Equipment
Subwoofers
Speakers
Amplifiers
Head Units
Car Audio Help
Wiring, Electrical and Installation
Enclosure Design & Construction
Car Audio Classifieds
Car Audio Classifieds
Car Audio Wanted
Classifieds Member Feedback
Gallery
New media
New comments
Search media
SHOP
Shop Head Units
Shop Amplifiers
Shop Speakers
Shop Subwoofers
Shop eBay Car Audio
Log in / Join
Test
Forum
Search
Search titles only
Search titles only
Log in / Join
Search
Search titles only
Search titles only
What's new
New posts
Live Activity
Search forums
Members
Registered members
Classifieds Member Feedback
Menu
Reply to thread
Forum
CarAudio.com Classifieds
Car Audio Classifieds
old school Soundstream amps.
JavaScript is disabled. For a better experience, please enable JavaScript in your browser before proceeding.
You are using an out of date browser. It may not display this or other websites correctly.
You should upgrade or use an
alternative browser
.
Message
<blockquote data-quote="ace956" data-source="post: 8288597" data-attributes="member: 660919"><p>Hello envisionelec, I found a post on DIYMA from someone named Troutsqueezer. In it he talked alot about ESS, Threshhold, Stewart Electronics and Soundstream. Troutsqueezers post on dIYMA led me to his web page. It's called Goldfinch Acres. On there I saw a picture of he and his wife. It looked alot like a draftsman that worked at Stewart Electronics named Dennis Berry and his wife Sally, who he met while she worked at Stewart. Then I noticed after a paragraph on that page, he signed it: -Dennis. Like I said he was a draftsman and that was what he did for Stewart, Soundstream and then Intel. If he had an EE degree I never heard about it.</p><p></p><p>So I don't need you to tell me who he is I found out on my own. Donna Haas hired An Engineering technician named Lance Matta, a Draftsman named Dennis Berry and Steve Cullison from Stewart. I had a feeling it was Dennis. I don't know why he would say what you claim he said. <strong>Troutsqueezer and your source is Dennis Berry </strong></p><p></p><p>Here is a copy of Troutsqueezers post from DIYMA.</p><p></p><p>I'm not sure how much I will access this forum but I did run across some postings from it quite by accident. As luck would have it, the thread was about some audio history that I am intimate with, specifically, the audio company SoundStream and various amplifier engineers such as Wade Stewart and Nelson Pass. The information being passed on was slightly incorrect but not surprising since you would have needed to have been there to get it all straight. Not only was I there, but I was an integral part of the emerging high end home audio field as well as the emerging car audio field.</p><p></p><p>Some History:</p><p></p><p>I built my first audio amp at the age of thirteen. It was a kit from the local electronics outlet (yes, they sold kits then!) and was a 25W per ch. tube amp. From then on, I was hooked. That was 1963.</p><p></p><p>In 1970, I hooked up with a startup company called ESS which at the time stood for Electrostatic Sound Systems. There we produced high-end hybrid elecrostatic speaker systems. Later, the name was dropped but the acronym was kept after we were approached by Dr. Oscar Heil who had a revolutionary idea about a new tweeter. One which would squeeze the air rather than push it (like a cone does). This was 5 times more efficient and had great sound at a full 360 degree angle. From then on, ESS became famous for the Heil Air Motion Transformer speaker system.</p><p></p><p>I was also attending school at that time studying for my EE and hooked up in the R&amp;D lab with a couple of young engineers there named Nelson Pass, who was in charge of speaker design and Peter Werback who was in charge of amplifier design. Other engineers floated in and out of ESS over the next few years including Bob Carver, of Carver Amps, Bob Bird from Altec Lansing and George Anderson. Also, an assistant to the president of ESS at that time was Donna Haas, later to become CEO of SoundStream after spending some time at Nakamichi. At Nakamichi, they purchased the brand name SoundStream. Previously, SoundStream became known as a developer of one of the first digital-to-vinyl recording processes and put out some of the first digitally-mastered LP's. After a few years, Pete Werback left and started his own car amplifier company called Linear Power in Auburn, CA. (he eventually married my ex-fiance Ruth, who ran the company after Pete was killed in an airplane crash). Then Nelson Pass left and started a high-end amplifier company in Sacramento called Threshold Corp along with Rene Besne and Joseph Samon (two ESS shareholders). I joined the Threshold team several weeks after they organized.</p><p></p><p>At Threshold Corp. many famous faces and names in the high-end audio industry floated by. Dan Diagastino (sales rep for awhile) and Joe Samon went on to start Krell. Some of the junior engineers went on to start Coda. Most of the journalists of the day became aquaintances, Audio magazine, Stereophile, Audio Amatuer. People like Ike Isensen of Tube or not Tube in San Diego, Mike Wright of Dayton-Wright fame, etc. With my help, Nelson published several how-to articles in these magazines, some of which caught the ire of Mark Levenson because our article detailed how to build pure class A amps that out-performed his very expensive jobs at just a fraction of the cost.</p><p></p><p>In fact, what caught my eye while surfing was someone in this forum stating that Nelson Pass designed the first SoundStream amp, the D50 I believe. In fact, Nelson assigned that task to one of his newly-hired junior engineer/technicians, Digger, from South Carolina. I don't think SoundStream ever did pay Nelson because he complained about it years later but then, that amp was a complete piece of junk. One of the worst I've ever seen.</p><p></p><p>Later, I went to work for SoundStream as an engineer and had a hand in designing nearly all the car audio amps, soundstage equipment and home audio products, working for Wade Stewart at first and then for Donna Hass. Another misnomer is that Wade designed amplifiers. In fact, his engineers did that. Those engineers were Peter Bath, Steve Cullison, Kjell Steffensen, and myself.</p><p></p><p>To summarize, I know the history of all the SoundStream amps which were actually made by Stewart Electronics, and might be pertinent to this forum, and a lot of the history of high end audio in general.</p><p></p><p>The best time I ever had was spending a few weeks with Oscar Heil (truly a mad scientist, his brother invented epitaxy) in his laboratory in Belmont, CA. helping him to develop the air motion woofer. I might elaborate on that later.</p><p></p><p>Also, I have designed sound systems back in the old days for Peter Frampton, The Almond Brothers, members of the Jefferson Airplane and for Steve Katz, then in charge of stadium sound for Bill Graham Presents.</p><p></p><p>Anyway, enough typing.</p><p></p><p>-Troutsqueezer.</p><p></p><p>Troutsqueezer</p><p></p><p>View Public Profile</p><p></p><p>Send a private message to Troutsqueezer</p><p></p><p>Visit Troutsqueezer's homepage!</p><p></p><p>Find More Posts by Troutsqueezer</p><p></p><p>Add Troutsqueezer to Your Contacts</p><p></p><p>Bookmarks</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="ace956, post: 8288597, member: 660919"] Hello envisionelec, I found a post on DIYMA from someone named Troutsqueezer. In it he talked alot about ESS, Threshhold, Stewart Electronics and Soundstream. Troutsqueezers post on dIYMA led me to his web page. It's called Goldfinch Acres. On there I saw a picture of he and his wife. It looked alot like a draftsman that worked at Stewart Electronics named Dennis Berry and his wife Sally, who he met while she worked at Stewart. Then I noticed after a paragraph on that page, he signed it: -Dennis. Like I said he was a draftsman and that was what he did for Stewart, Soundstream and then Intel. If he had an EE degree I never heard about it. So I don't need you to tell me who he is I found out on my own. Donna Haas hired An Engineering technician named Lance Matta, a Draftsman named Dennis Berry and Steve Cullison from Stewart. I had a feeling it was Dennis. I don't know why he would say what you claim he said. [B]Troutsqueezer and your source is Dennis Berry [/B] Here is a copy of Troutsqueezers post from DIYMA. I'm not sure how much I will access this forum but I did run across some postings from it quite by accident. As luck would have it, the thread was about some audio history that I am intimate with, specifically, the audio company SoundStream and various amplifier engineers such as Wade Stewart and Nelson Pass. The information being passed on was slightly incorrect but not surprising since you would have needed to have been there to get it all straight. Not only was I there, but I was an integral part of the emerging high end home audio field as well as the emerging car audio field. Some History: I built my first audio amp at the age of thirteen. It was a kit from the local electronics outlet (yes, they sold kits then!) and was a 25W per ch. tube amp. From then on, I was hooked. That was 1963. In 1970, I hooked up with a startup company called ESS which at the time stood for Electrostatic Sound Systems. There we produced high-end hybrid elecrostatic speaker systems. Later, the name was dropped but the acronym was kept after we were approached by Dr. Oscar Heil who had a revolutionary idea about a new tweeter. One which would squeeze the air rather than push it (like a cone does). This was 5 times more efficient and had great sound at a full 360 degree angle. From then on, ESS became famous for the Heil Air Motion Transformer speaker system. I was also attending school at that time studying for my EE and hooked up in the R&D lab with a couple of young engineers there named Nelson Pass, who was in charge of speaker design and Peter Werback who was in charge of amplifier design. Other engineers floated in and out of ESS over the next few years including Bob Carver, of Carver Amps, Bob Bird from Altec Lansing and George Anderson. Also, an assistant to the president of ESS at that time was Donna Haas, later to become CEO of SoundStream after spending some time at Nakamichi. At Nakamichi, they purchased the brand name SoundStream. Previously, SoundStream became known as a developer of one of the first digital-to-vinyl recording processes and put out some of the first digitally-mastered LP's. After a few years, Pete Werback left and started his own car amplifier company called Linear Power in Auburn, CA. (he eventually married my ex-fiance Ruth, who ran the company after Pete was killed in an airplane crash). Then Nelson Pass left and started a high-end amplifier company in Sacramento called Threshold Corp along with Rene Besne and Joseph Samon (two ESS shareholders). I joined the Threshold team several weeks after they organized. At Threshold Corp. many famous faces and names in the high-end audio industry floated by. Dan Diagastino (sales rep for awhile) and Joe Samon went on to start Krell. Some of the junior engineers went on to start Coda. Most of the journalists of the day became aquaintances, Audio magazine, Stereophile, Audio Amatuer. People like Ike Isensen of Tube or not Tube in San Diego, Mike Wright of Dayton-Wright fame, etc. With my help, Nelson published several how-to articles in these magazines, some of which caught the ire of Mark Levenson because our article detailed how to build pure class A amps that out-performed his very expensive jobs at just a fraction of the cost. In fact, what caught my eye while surfing was someone in this forum stating that Nelson Pass designed the first SoundStream amp, the D50 I believe. In fact, Nelson assigned that task to one of his newly-hired junior engineer/technicians, Digger, from South Carolina. I don't think SoundStream ever did pay Nelson because he complained about it years later but then, that amp was a complete piece of junk. One of the worst I've ever seen. Later, I went to work for SoundStream as an engineer and had a hand in designing nearly all the car audio amps, soundstage equipment and home audio products, working for Wade Stewart at first and then for Donna Hass. Another misnomer is that Wade designed amplifiers. In fact, his engineers did that. Those engineers were Peter Bath, Steve Cullison, Kjell Steffensen, and myself. To summarize, I know the history of all the SoundStream amps which were actually made by Stewart Electronics, and might be pertinent to this forum, and a lot of the history of high end audio in general. The best time I ever had was spending a few weeks with Oscar Heil (truly a mad scientist, his brother invented epitaxy) in his laboratory in Belmont, CA. helping him to develop the air motion woofer. I might elaborate on that later. Also, I have designed sound systems back in the old days for Peter Frampton, The Almond Brothers, members of the Jefferson Airplane and for Steve Katz, then in charge of stadium sound for Bill Graham Presents. Anyway, enough typing. -Troutsqueezer. Troutsqueezer View Public Profile Send a private message to Troutsqueezer Visit Troutsqueezer's homepage! Find More Posts by Troutsqueezer Add Troutsqueezer to Your Contacts Bookmarks [/QUOTE]
Insert quotes…
Verification
Post reply
Forum
CarAudio.com Classifieds
Car Audio Classifieds
old school Soundstream amps.
Top
Menu
Home
Refresh