Anyone want to try them out ?
no probs
I am not a particularly discerning listener compared to friends who are hifi buffs, but I have always had a descent set up. My current set up is markedly better than anything I have had before.
Marantz PM6006 amp sounds crisp and powerful.
Q Accoustics floorstanders sound much better all round than my B&W DM602s. B&Ws are quite flash for kitchen speakers.
Projekt turntable
Tibo DAB reciever
Bluetooth thingamajig
Retro gigi can be beautiful if maintained, but like retro mountain bikes they aren't as good as modern kit. And yes I do still want Leek Stereo 20 monoblocks, but I'd prefer a new Croft valve set up.
Those yamahas are nice, couple of euro websites have prices for the lowest spec at around 1700 quid
The speakers that came with a Sony hifi stereo system in 1989, our family's first CD player, with twin tape decks, FM receiver and a turntable, those speakers, old, faithful friends of thirty years or more.... those old, anonymous, anodyne friends have just started to sound a bit blown and fuzzy, and I am so sad. 🙁
Thread revival here.
I got a DJ Controller for Xmas. I wanted some speakers for it. Easiest (least spendy) way was to dig out my old Technics speakers and amp from the loft. Did that at the weekend brought the whole stack down tuner / turntable / CD / tape player as well.
Ordered a new stylus for the turntable that turned up last night got the vinyl out of the loft. My 9 yr old son has been obsessed after finding some tapes at his grandparents (pre-lockdown obvs). His grandfather found a really old bedside clock radio cassette player - he plays all these tapes on this thing. The tape speeding up down all the time.
Well we got some old vinyl out and popped it on to the turntable. My son loved it!!!
Maybe I'm a bit sentimental but it was fun. Nothing like the little pop and crackle as the needle finds the groove on an LP...
It was a bottom of the range Technics stack bought in 1990...
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Still got my Tannoy dc2000 speakers from the 90s, three way sealed box dual concentric floor standers. Really linear bass response, watching movies sounds almost like you’re at the cinema. Paired with an 80s Nad series 20 amp that probably needs a recap but still sounds good.
Also had a pink triangle turntable which I stupidly sold for peanuts 10 years back. They go for quite a bit now.
What do do with an ancient Band & Olufsen turntable?
It's a Beogram 3400 which started to make crackly sounds, so I plugged in another turntable and stuck it in the cellar until I could get around to sorting it. That was 1993. Dug it out and surprisingly after checking it wasn't going to go bang with the voltmeter, it ran! The needle in the MMC20s cartridge is all floppy, like whatever ssuspension it had has left altogether, but the drive and auto place/return works as it used to. THe veneer needs re-doing and one of the three hinge points has snapped, but if I was keeping it, gorilla glue is better than anything I had in the 80s.
So , is there someone who restores these and might want to revive it or part it out for bits?
@Freester- are you my wife? She bought the same as you in 1990!
@crab- fool. I’ve still got my Little Pink Thing (even though it’s poorly- one day I will get it sorted even though it will cost as much as a decent new turntable to do so).
@midlife The B&O sounds worth saving. I was after a B&O system but the Pink Triangle got my cash on the day
Back in the mists of time at Uni circa 89-90 used to pop into JonnyRoadhouse near the Poly in Manchester to gaze at secondhand Naim stuff. Now Cyrus but rarely crack out the cds anymore
Sony Ts-22 turntable, Nad 3020B amp, Majority Fitzwilliam Dab/Internet radio, Goodmans RB20 speakers.
The turntable and speakers must be nearly as old as me.
@FB I know I know....
But I bet yours has gone in the same place mine did, the resistors on the psu board. The components are cheap so it shouldn’t cost too much to put right.
Bit of a mix.
Audio Technica LP5X TT
Marantz CD63 Mk 2 KI Signature
Sony ST-SE500 FM/AM tuner
Marantz PM5005 Amp
All moving my DALI Spektor bookshelf speakers
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The CD player has been further modified from the KI spec and is stunningly good.
It's just come back from a retro audio repair specialist who described it as having a practically zero noise floor and revealing sounds she's never heard on her test disc. It needed a new laser block. Definitely a keeper.
@kayak23 - how's the Majority DAB performing? I was considering one.
@crab- had it looked at by a good local indie a few years ago. It can’t remember if it was just psu or psu/ motor. They recommended a swap to dc motor that PT originally wanted but was to pricey at the time to sell. Funk Firm do an upgrade for £500 or there’s another company doing the same for c £300 but a few forums don’t rate the latter. So I dither and another year passes!
My Rega 3 is 33 years old this year and still sounds amazing.
The Royd A7's and NAD amp I bought to go with it are long gone, as are the Quad II's and LS3/5a's that replaced them.
Still have my first CD player though, Technics SL-PG 520A. Again, about 30 years old but I can't find anything at sensible money to better it.
@kayak23 – how’s the Majority DAB performing? I was considering one.
It's brilliant!
Connected up to the wifi no bother, paired with my phone no bother.
Seem to have good Dab reception inside a plywood box in a poky attic.
The remote is really handy and saves me having to drag myself 2 feet across the room.
I'm liking the internet radio thing.
Great bit of kit for £100 👌
Anyone running a graphic equalizer with an integrated amp?
I have loss of hearing in one ear and when I'm playing from my MacBook I use an App called Boom to tweak the sound to how I like it.
I was thinking of picking up an old Technics equalizer but don't know how to hook it up to my Marantz amp.
Ta!
Don't they usually have a line in and line out? So you put it between the source and amp eg between the cd played and amp?
I think you loose the ability to have the equaliser for different inputs on your amp though.
If you have a tape monitor function on the amp then you could connect the equaliser to the tape connections on the amplifier and use record / monitor function to send sound to equaliser and listen to it maintaining the ability to use many sources for the graphics equaliser.
Even the 2215b despite only being 15wpc have quite some kick to them.
A chunky power transformer putting out plenty of current, it’s why valve amps always sound so good.
Did someone ention amps with VU meters? They never went away...
Been discontinued, though, which might be a good thing for anyone taking a shine to it;
McIntosh MA8000 Integrated Amplifier $18,995.00
Never went away and also discontinued... Schroedinger's amps? 😂
Aren't valve amps always class A? And with no consistent PS to them?
still clinging onto my 1980's Michell Engineering turntable
I've got a lovely old Lenco Goldring GL85 turntable.
That replaced a 70's Technics SL-1300, which was nice and solid, but had issues with speeding up and down very slightly. I tried servicing it from various youtube videos, but couldn't fix it.
Still got £150 for it on ebay 🙂 I imagine they fixed it and sold it for double 😆
Amp is a Technics SU-A600 mk3 - bought this in London in about 1997. Not the top tier of amps, but sounds pretty good to my untutored ears.
Currently they're running into some Roth Audio OLI RA3 speakers. These aren't retro at all!
I’ve got a Tag McLaren 5x100R 5 channel power amp from circa 2001 that still sounds absolutely awesome. Is that classed as vintage yet or just old?
Weighs more than an Orange 5 and I expect it would survive a nuclear bomb going off.
Currently being fed Tidal from a Cambridge 851N network streamer and bi-amped to a pair of Neat Momentum SX5i’s that were an absolute steal from eBay.
One of the few things that come out of lockdown have been some excellent late night listening sessions accompanied by a good stout!
How old is retro?
I've got some Audiolab kit from the 90's 8000CDM, 8000DAX, 8000S and 8000P. I actually don't use it anymore the display went in the 8000CDM - a really common fault with Audiolab stuff, there was a bit of a buzz from the 8000DAX. Then one of the channels went on the power amp.
I've still got it all boxed up under the stairs, I might get round to repairing the amps at some point I don't think I'll bother with the CD and DAC.
I do still use my B&W CDM7 speakers that I bought in 1998, but they are wired up to a Yamaha network receiver now. It doesn't sound as good as the Audiolab stuff but its still sounds pretty good and takes up about 20% of the space of the old set up.
I’m a music fan more than a hifi buff but alot of my stuff falls into the retro camp.
I’ve got some B&W DN5 speakers I think, from 1976 that cost £4 from an old lady at a boot sale. Running of a Technics SUA700 amp I got in about 91 and a cheap Technics DD deck off gumtree.
I’ll skip past the 6x 1200/1210s I have in my possession currently.
Best Buy was a complete 1984 system that appeared in my local record store in 2013. Turntable stand/speaker stands. Castle speakers. Naim Nait1 amp. LP12 with Ittok arm. All for the princely sum of £400.
This is my baby from probably '82 - bought with my first proper wages - burning a hole in my pocket. They didn't make a matching DVD player, that was a later addition.
Been used mostly all my adult life, through Uni halls and houses, except for a short banishment to the loft. Looking a bit out place at the moment, needs a nice shelf somewhere where it can spread out in its retirement.
I've got a cupboard full of old laptops and other electronics not even a quarter the age of this. It's got a fault on the tape mechanism, which is apparently common, but otherwise has never failed.
That’s got a look to it. Not seen anything quite like it. 70s chrome vs ubiquitous dark grey that things had after.
We had a huge silver amp in a house share 20 years ago that looked the biz and hurled out some big noise
Its's all separates:
AP-M7 Linear tracking turntable
DT-M7 Timer / Power control
AT-M5L Equaliser
AT-M5L Tuner
AM-M5 Amplifier
HX-M5 Tape
CD-M015 Rogue CD player
I think it was marketed under Clarity M5 or M7 :
https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=Akai+Clarity
Still sounds and looks great, can run 4 speakers, single button turn on through the power unit, has a timer etc - function overload, equaliser still looks cool.
That's ace Haloric! 1st rule of 80s HiFi stacks was they had to have more flashing lights than Blackpool illuminations. 🙂
+1 that Akai stack is mega
I'm not sure if you'd class it as retro, but I have an Arcam Alpha 7 CD player, Musical fidelity XA1 amp and some Monitor Audio floorstanders (monitor 3), all from about 1998ish. The Arcam has recently bitten the dust so I'm contemplating treating myself to a new CD player, probably a Marantz cd6007. I'm just wondering about whether the rest of my setup will do it justice?
I have this Bang and Olufsen from mids 80s (86/87):
Beomaster 5000 (amp)
Beogram 5000 (turntable)
Beogram CD 9000 (with 5500 front to match)
Vety nice B&O set-up.
@kayak23 - got a Fitzwilliam. What a bargain piece of aceness!
FM DAB
Internet radio
Spotify Connect
Aux in
EDIT: and Bluetooth
And so easy to use.
I remember my mate's dad got the full B&O 5000 system in the house. Amp, deck, tape, tuner (it was before CDs IIRC). He had speakers and controllers wired in all around the house IIRC.
Ta Derek, to us it still looks stunning.
@Freester,I'd love to have seen that. We have the remote, comical in size by today's models, but very programmable as you might expect.
So just got a record player and currently have some pretty awful speakers. Anyone got any recommendations for some monitors? Not after anything massive its just a living room set up.
cheers!
