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Old Classic Receivers: A Mistake to Buy?

I was contemplating purchasing a 70's receiver, as I used to love the construction and appearance of the Sansui, Kenwood, Pioneer, Marantz. However, when I ran this by an audio friend, he said, "Forget it."

He says: They sound terrible. The caps & resistors used before the early 90s' were dreadful. The electrolytics are drying up and will start crackling and substantially degrade the sonics. The switches and controls used were almost never sealed, so they deteriorate and make noise and can't be fixed even by taking them apart and cleaning them.

Tuners: He says that nearly all non-digital tuners used varactors, which go out of alignment and cause problems, so no old tuners, with the exception of the Mac MR-78 and possibly a few others, are worth dealing with.

I am tempted to believe all that he is saying is true, but I see a market for these items, and also know that people claim they are still using these pieces for 25 years.

What's the truth here? Can some of the techies enlighten me?
kevziek
kevziek OP
323 posts
 
Something nobody's mentioned is the cheap phenolic circuit boards used back then. They were really junk.
rar1's avatar
rar1
1,755 posts
 
Kevziek:

So, it has now been over a year since you started this thread and there have been numerous responses generally attesting to the more than acceptable sound and/or build quality of the old classic receivers. What did you wind up doing? Did you actually purchase some vintage equipment and what were your experiences? In all candor, to date, your comments could be typified as more of the "put down" variety as opposed to any "forays into the vintage world" variety. Just curious.

Regards, Rich
gbrowni1b709
1 posts
 
I have a Pioneer SX 1250(Mid 70's era). It is used daily. It has been in the shop only once about 5 years ago. My old Pioneer sounds 400% better to me than the newer Black Plague stuff that costs three times as much. Perhaps your "expert" is totally ignorant of technology he knows nothing about.
rwbadley's avatar
rwbadley
143 posts
 
What a great topic. I posted a question just now about the newer Marantz and Denon integrated. What I have been using as a main for the last dozen years is a lowly Denon dra-535. It just yesterday kicked the ass of another in a line of amp auditions. This one the guy had built himself, and it sounded quite good, but without the detail and power I have been used to. It seemed a bit flat also. My other main for the fifteen years before that was a Marantz 1040. That little diehard is still kickin' in the shop system. What a great overall sound it has too.

The look and feel of the older stuff is really hard to top imho. Where can I find a newer unit built like the classics, with even better sound character? And Remote! (I'm a little lazy anymore)
I do think the e-bay market has really inflated prices on some of the vintage eqpt (if you're a buyer) if you're selling it works out perfect.
mader315
13 posts
 
This may be a little off topic but I think the comparison is worth while especially in regards to the tuner sections in recivevers or for that matter separate tuners. As a ham radio operator many years ago I ran into much of the same issues with the then new PLL /digital filtering HF equipment. Compared to the older tube/analog equipment the new stuff just couldn't process a signal as well. Yeah, you got lots of cool lights and digital readouts but that was about it. In essence what happened is that the use of digital tuning/signal processing allowed manufaturers a cheap way out. Rather than use $$$$ crystal latice filters to reject unwanted signals they could get by with cheaper but less effective IC's and software. I suspect that the much the same thing occured in stereo tuners.
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