TheBigYin
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Ok - heres where I am. Basically, in the early 2000's I "mothballed" my HiFi separates setup because I basically moved back into the family home to take care of my aging parents. The kit was as follows
AR "The Turntable" - Circa 1986 - for those who don't know it, its sort of a "Sondek Lite" - same principles, sprung undamped subchassis and floating armboard - at the time I did an A-B comparison at home between it and the Rega 3 and it basically wiped the floor with the Rega.
Mission 737r Speakers - Another Mid/Late 1980's treasure - not quite up to the 770's but they were smaller, more compact, and more suitable to rooms smaller than 6m x 8m...
Aiwa AD-F 990 3-head Cassette deck - probably overkill for what I used it for, but I think i'd had a good christmas bonus back in 1985...
There's also a Teac 4 channel Reel-to-Reel that I can't remember the serial no. of, because it's still in storage at the moment, and a cd-recorder / player that again hasn't found its way out of the packaging yet...
and of course the thing I need advice upon - the amplifier.
Now, this one's completely "off the wall" - from the above list, I guess most people who were into HiFi in the 1980's would be thinking NAD, AR Cambridge, maybe even Naim - but I went very leftfield...
I've currently got a Technics SU-V55A - wtf is that and why did I buy it. You know, looking back, I'm asking the same thing. At the time I remember doing an AB comparison with the NAD 3020's "big brother" - can't remember the serials as it's best part of 40 years ago, bought in 1990, when my Marantz amp gave up the ghost - and the Technics was marginally cleaner and "faster" - read more controlled on the bass-end which helped with the Mission's.
Anyhow - I was happy with it right up until it went into storage. When I dragged it out a month or so ago, it was humming like crazy, and every single potentiometer was crackling. 3 input channels weren't working, and after 10 minutes it switched itself off. Opened the lid, had a look around - it needed a complete re-capping (only to be expected I guess) but I counted over 25 separate dry solder joints - at which point i thought "stuff that for a lark - i'll get a replacement amp"
I'm not looking for some all-singing all-dancing amp to be honest - it'd be nice if i had 2 tape input/outputs - to be able to play from the cassette and record to CD for example - I can always jack the reel-to-reel into an aux channel - as I don't envisage actually recording anything from the hi-fi sources to it - but may want to make more "portable" versions of the big box of old master tapes from various bands I was involved in BITD...
But I do ideally want a "proper" phono input, rather than a phono-preamp that goes into a line-in - just to reduce the clutter of boxes and wires a little.
and - i'm trying to do this on a budget (£150 or under ideally) - hopefully something from a "name brand" that I might possibly recognise - and if s/h then new enough that I'm not back to the soldering iron and wasting a day re-cap'ing and swearing at things. It'd also be nice if it looked at least somewhat similar to the old school standard width components - which would also help it fit in the housing unit.
I'll leave this one with you lot to hopefully come up with something - while I go back to re-commissioning the AR turntable - it seems to have developed a "knock" from the motor - which is pretty much unobtanium for the UK 50hz spec at least - so I've had the old one in bits, cleaned everything, and I'm currently running it back in whilst drip feeding it on extremely light machine oil - 36 hours of continuous running so far, and its knock is now barely audible - though i don't know if it'll be worse through the amplification chain, as, yep, I haven't got a working amp...
AR "The Turntable" - Circa 1986 - for those who don't know it, its sort of a "Sondek Lite" - same principles, sprung undamped subchassis and floating armboard - at the time I did an A-B comparison at home between it and the Rega 3 and it basically wiped the floor with the Rega.
Mission 737r Speakers - Another Mid/Late 1980's treasure - not quite up to the 770's but they were smaller, more compact, and more suitable to rooms smaller than 6m x 8m...
Aiwa AD-F 990 3-head Cassette deck - probably overkill for what I used it for, but I think i'd had a good christmas bonus back in 1985...
There's also a Teac 4 channel Reel-to-Reel that I can't remember the serial no. of, because it's still in storage at the moment, and a cd-recorder / player that again hasn't found its way out of the packaging yet...
and of course the thing I need advice upon - the amplifier.
Now, this one's completely "off the wall" - from the above list, I guess most people who were into HiFi in the 1980's would be thinking NAD, AR Cambridge, maybe even Naim - but I went very leftfield...
I've currently got a Technics SU-V55A - wtf is that and why did I buy it. You know, looking back, I'm asking the same thing. At the time I remember doing an AB comparison with the NAD 3020's "big brother" - can't remember the serials as it's best part of 40 years ago, bought in 1990, when my Marantz amp gave up the ghost - and the Technics was marginally cleaner and "faster" - read more controlled on the bass-end which helped with the Mission's.
Anyhow - I was happy with it right up until it went into storage. When I dragged it out a month or so ago, it was humming like crazy, and every single potentiometer was crackling. 3 input channels weren't working, and after 10 minutes it switched itself off. Opened the lid, had a look around - it needed a complete re-capping (only to be expected I guess) but I counted over 25 separate dry solder joints - at which point i thought "stuff that for a lark - i'll get a replacement amp"
I'm not looking for some all-singing all-dancing amp to be honest - it'd be nice if i had 2 tape input/outputs - to be able to play from the cassette and record to CD for example - I can always jack the reel-to-reel into an aux channel - as I don't envisage actually recording anything from the hi-fi sources to it - but may want to make more "portable" versions of the big box of old master tapes from various bands I was involved in BITD...
But I do ideally want a "proper" phono input, rather than a phono-preamp that goes into a line-in - just to reduce the clutter of boxes and wires a little.
and - i'm trying to do this on a budget (£150 or under ideally) - hopefully something from a "name brand" that I might possibly recognise - and if s/h then new enough that I'm not back to the soldering iron and wasting a day re-cap'ing and swearing at things. It'd also be nice if it looked at least somewhat similar to the old school standard width components - which would also help it fit in the housing unit.
I'll leave this one with you lot to hopefully come up with something - while I go back to re-commissioning the AR turntable - it seems to have developed a "knock" from the motor - which is pretty much unobtanium for the UK 50hz spec at least - so I've had the old one in bits, cleaned everything, and I'm currently running it back in whilst drip feeding it on extremely light machine oil - 36 hours of continuous running so far, and its knock is now barely audible - though i don't know if it'll be worse through the amplification chain, as, yep, I haven't got a working amp...
